NASA'S Griffin Wants To Close Shuttle Replacement Gap
Aviation Week & Space Technology
04/25/2005, page 50
Frank Morring, Jr.
Washington
NASA's Griffin says shuttle replacement goal may need changing to fill U.S. access gap
Game Plan
Industry proposals for the Crew Exploration Vehicle that NASA plans as a replacement for the space shuttle are due next week, but the agency's new chief says it might be necessary to slow the CEV procurement at first to speed it up later.
After a quick trip to Kennedy Space Center for briefings on getting the space shuttle back in operation (see p. 49), Michael D. Griffin sat down with his growing staff last week to begin work on modifying the CEV procurement.
"We are going to rethink our entire program in that area," he said during an inaugural press conference Apr. 18.
The proposals due May 2 are being prepared in response to NASA's call for a "risk-reduction flight effort" in 2008 that would lead to delivery of a human-rated CEV in 2014. But Griffin was co-leader on an independent study in 2004 that recommended a way to get the CEV flying astronauts in 2010, the year President Bush has set as a deadline for retiring the space shuttle fleet.
In that study, produced for The Planetary Society, Griffin and his team called for development of a 13-15-ton "Block 1" CEV limited to low Earth orbit (LEO) that would be
launched atop a single space shuttle solid rocket motor (SRM), with a new cryogenic upper stage based on existing rocket engine technology. Under this approach, NASA would develop a "Block 2" CEV later for human exploration beyond LEO.
The shuttle-derived CEV launcher has also been touted by SRM-manufacturer ATK Thiokol and others as a faster and cheaper approach that would avoid the need to human-rate expendable launch vehicles (ELVs) like the Atlas V and Delta IV (AW&ST June 28, 2004, p. 26). The SRM is already rated safe for human flight, and the Planetary Society report suggested a version of the space shuttle main engine or the Apollo-era J-2S Saturn engine--also human-rated--for the upper stage.
NASA has met resistance on Capitol Hill to the original CEV development schedule because of the gap it would leave in U.S. human space access capability after the shuttle is retired and before the CEV starts flying. Now the White House seems to be backing off its original schedule.
"People in the executive branch have indicated that they think [the gap is] not advisable, and it doesn't work for me either," Griffin told reporters. "So we're going to be reviewing those plans. If that requires that we delay receiving responses to the request for proposals that's out on the street, then so be it. Better to take a little bit of time up front and get what we really want."
After Griffin's remarks, contractors preparing CEV bids bombarded the agency's Exploration Systems Mission Directorate with calls for clarification. Top NASA managers were considering several options last week for restructuring the CEV procurement, and could only promise answers "soon."
"When we've got answers, I'll give them to you, but I don't have them now," Griffin said during his press conference.
Nonetheless, the Planetary Society report holds clues to potential changes in NASA policy under Griffin. The new administrator has publicly criticized the space shuttle as outmoded and the International Space Station (ISS) as an inefficient use of resources (AW&ST Mar. 21, p. 28). The outside report he helped prepare calls for a drastic cutback in space shuttle flights to assemble the ISS, followed by early shuttle retirement.
"Orbiter retirement would be made as soon as the ISS U.S. core is completed (perhaps only six or seven flights) and the smallest number of additional flights necessary to satisfy our international partners' ISS requirements," the report states. "Money saved by early orbiter retirement would be used to accelerate the CEV development schedule to minimize or eliminate any hiatus in U.S. capability to reach and return from LEO."
Presently, there are 28 shuttle flights manifested to complete the ISS in accordance with the latest station partnership agreement, but NASA was already studying a reconfiguration to reduce shuttle flights before Griffin was named administrator (AW&ST Apr. 11, p. 24). William F. Readdy, associate administrator for spaceflight operations, told the Senate Commerce space subcommittee last week that NASA has been running a "Space Shuttle Program/International Space Station (SSP/ISS) Scenario Study" aimed at refocusing ISS research on the needs of the agency's new exploration program.
"The study has been providing assessments that will support decision making for research, engineering, international and fiscal considerations," Readdy said in his prepared testimony. "Two cycles have already been completed. The third cycle involves assessment of specific scenarios for U.S. exploration research mission requirements. It is currently in the final stages of being documented for review and decision by agency leadership."
At his press conference, Griffin said NASA's strategic "roadmapping" activity aimed at meeting President Bush's exploration directives was moving too slowly to support his pace of decision-making. "I will probably be establishing focused, small teams representing the breadth of experience throughout NASA, throughout the centers and targeted other institutions as necessary, in order to be helping with some of these larger-scale architectural issues," he said.
Griffin is also establishing a program evaluation and analysis "shop" in his office headed by Scott Pace, a veteran space policy analyst who moved to NASA from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy under then-Administrator Sean O'Keefe. Griffin said Pace's group will advise him on "forward-looking planning as well as the analysis of how we're doing, what we're doing within NASA."
One area Pace's group is likely to study is the best approach for a heavy-lift launch vehicle to support human exploration beyond LEO. The Planetary Society study found that while it would be possible to use existing ELVs to mount a return to the Moon, human missions to Mars would require either a new heavy-lift capability or the development of advanced in-space systems such as nuclear-thermal propulsion.
The Griffin-led study examined most expendable launch vehicles available today, as well as several different shuttle-derived heavy lifters. It agreed with the Columbia Accident Investigation Board that cargo and crew should be launched separately for safety, and found that unless a "truly revolutionary" launch technology is identified, it would probably be best to evolve an exploration heavy lifter from existing hardware.
The Planetary Society team also suggested that it would be advantageous for several reasons if the CEV could be compatible with "as many launch vehicles as possible." The resulting redundancy would prevent a repeat of the current situation with ISS operations, which are hobbled by reliance on Russian Soyuz and Progress vehicles for support while the shuttle is grounded. A standard CEV would also help hold together any future exploration partnerships among nations with launchers that could be used for human spaceflight, the panel said. "Selling CEVs to the rest of the world could become a notable export opportunity" for U.S. industry, the panel noted, while giving the U.S. "the lead with respect to defining standards and guiding human launch vehicle operations around the world."
The study also included a top-level analysis of the expense of going to Mars. Based on the NASA/Air Force Cost Model and "conservative" assumptions about potential industrial capability for the effort, the study team estimated that a nine-mission human Mars exploration program in 2014-44 would cost "no more than $129 billion over that period, or about $4.3 billion per year."
Griffin stressed at his press conference that the Planetary Society estimate was based on vehicle and propellant weight rather than a particular architecture, which remains to be defined. But he argued that it demonstrates a mission to Mars is affordable.
"Frankly, that is the best knowledge I have of what it ought to take if we do it right," he said. "The answer came out to be that in present-day dollars you could probably go to Mars for about what we spent on Apollo."
Interesting. This seems to jive with what some experts have said all along about the magnitude of a Mars mission. However, Mars being a little farther away than the Moon, really requires some additional things (spare parts, extra consumables, etc.) to go along for the ride, however, this is far and away much smaller than some of the first baseline studies conducted in the 1980's which estimated that a Mars mission could cost $400 billion!
Interesting idea about exporting the CEV vehicles--however, I kind of doubt that this would be a serious revenue stream for the US considering the 'bargain' rates the Russians charge for their Soyuz vehicle which has a pretty good operational record. However, exported CEV's might just allow some other countries to get into the 'Man in Space' business for the first time, which may or may not be a good thing....
I think changes are in the air, and I think that NASA will likley benefit from them. A fresh direction, a new viewpoint, and someone charismatic enough to hold them to the course will do more for NASA than an army of penny-pinchers!
