February 3, 2010
Vision Impaired
The administration proposes; Congress disposes
The release of the new proposed budget for NASA has unleashed a blizzard of news articles and commentary. The administration proposes to terminate Constellation, the agency effort to design and build a new space transportation system to carry people to low Earth orbit and beyond. In its place, they plan to let contracts with several companies to provide orbital launch and spaceflight services, both as transport to ISS and to “destinations beyond LEO.” This major change in the agency’s business model follows in the wake of last summer’s Augustine committee report, which concluded that NASA’s “program of record” to return to the Moon and beyond was inadequately funded and possibly, misdirected as well.
The Augustine “Flexible Path” was an architecture designed to take people beyond LEO, but to low gravity targets: L-points, near-Earth asteroids, and Phobos and Deimos, the asteroid-like moons of Mars. The idea behind that concept was two-fold. First, it was a way to send people into deep space without the very high programmatic expense of developing a lunar landing spacecraft. Given that Constellation is significantly over budget, cost control is certainly an issue. The second motivation for FP was the feeling (not explicitly stated in the report, but clearly implied) that the agency plan for lunar return was largely a repeat of the Apollo experience of 40 years ago. The strength of this impression varied among the committee members, with some thinking that the chosen architecture was simply the wrong approach while others questioned the value of going to the Moon at all. The new proposed budgetary direction seems to follow the Augustine Flexible Path (FP).
I have previously discussed what I perceive as the most significant problem with FP, namely, that it is activity without direction. The administration’s budgetary version of this path confirms this perception. Much verbiage is thrown around about multiple missions to all sorts of destinations, blazing new trails with new technology, trips to Mars that last weeks instead of months, and “people fanning out across the inner solar system, exploring the Moon, asteroids and Mars nearly simultaneously in a steady stream of firsts.” But nowhere in the budget documents or agency statements is there anything about the mission that we are undertaking. So we’re going to an asteroid. What will we do there? Why are we going there? What benefit accrues from it?
The Vision for Space Exploration (VSE) of 2004 not only laid out a clear path, but also described exactly why such a path was being taken. It is not a repeat of the Apollo experience. We go to the Moon to learn how to create a sustainable human presence in space. We do this by experimenting with and learning to use the material and energy resources of the Moon to create new space faring capability. These skills enable us to build a space transportation infrastructure that allows routine access not only to the Moon, but all of cislunar space (where our space assets reside) and the planets beyond. All of this activity is to be accomplished under the existing budgetary envelope; as there is no deadline, we trade time for money.
Many conflate the VSE with Constellation, the agency’s program to build the Ares launcher and Orion spacecraft, but they are different and distinct. The former is a strategic direction; the latter is an implementation of that direction. This is not some academic distinction; it goes to the essence of the current debate about NASA and the space program. Virtually all of the argument and debate about our future in space has been about means rather than ends. Launch vehicles, spacecraft, and architectures have been grist for the mills of the space blogosphere. Beyond a vague notion that people should “move into the Solar System,” the purpose and meaning of that movement has been articulated much less often. Partly that’s because different people have differing notions of what those motivations should be – science, settlement, curiosity, and technical innovation all have their adherents. But if you do not clearly understand what your mission is, you are not likely to successfully implement it.
The VSE was a clear strategic direction. It not only identified the path forward, but also the specific activities that would enable that path to be followed. The new budget outlines the means (new commercial launch and transport) but not the object of our space program. But more critically, it discards the clear and practical direction of the original VSE. Before the new budget, we knew exactly where we were headed and why: a return to the Moon to learn how to live and work productively on another world. Now, all we know is that at some point in the future, we will somehow go somewhere to do something. Or other.
I wrote recently about a variant of the Flexible Path architecture outlined at the blog Vision Restoration. I think that this approach has a lot of merit, but suggest one critical modification: it does not have a statement of the mission. The VSE in its original guise should be stated up front and made a clear and unalterable part of the architecture. If during the course of the program the implementation somehow falls short, change the implementation, not the mission. The failure to do this in the Constellation Program led us into a blind alley of cost and schedule overruns, the Augustine committee, and now, cancellation.
This new policy will increase NASA’s natural tendency to engage in organizational “Brownian motion.” We are already seeing agency leaders call for new studies to determine what will be done at the (so far unspecified) new destinations. The current program looks upon itself as a transportation architecture; the activities undertaken at any given destination are irrelevant. The new “direction” outlined in the budget request is similarly focused on means (e.g., commercial launch and transport) rather than ends (e.g., What will humans do at Earth-Sun L-1?). And it will likely come down the same path, as indeed it appears to be starting to. NASA as an organization will adjust to this; after all, viewgraphs are easily changed and mission studies easily re-written. But what about the aerospace industry? They find it very difficult to pivot on a dime when the direction changes.
I’ve often written about how I think the VSE ought to be implemented and have found the existing program of record wanting in several respects. But at least it aimed in one direction. We need a program plan that gets us beyond LEO using small, incremental, cumulative steps and the new model promises to do just that. But small, incremental steps taken in random directions yield uncertain progress.
What is your mission? It’s not just the most important thing; it’s the only thing. NASA forgot that during the last 6 years. Now, the White House has joined them.
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Excellent article. I know you and I do not agree on the path NASA took with Constellation in the past, but now there is simply no path at all. The administration has taken to comparing this new shift to emphasizing commercial spaceflight to the rise of commercial aviation.
My question for them is what existing market is available to support human spaceflight beyond LEO? Commercial aviation was able to advance due to the available of the existing mail distribution contracts offered by the US Post Office. Furthermore, the market in LEO is limited to ISS and the FY2011 has provided no program or insight on how to expand that market.
Without clear program and mission objectives, NASA will become very vulnerable to budget cuts in the future. This means that robotic missions will also likely be cut as well. I cannot imagine that the new proposal is a win-win for anybody. Not even commercial spaceflight.
Comment by Gary Miles — February 3, 2010 @ 1:45 pm
Since President Obama’s budget doesn’t include any funding for the development of an HLV, only research in the possible development of an HLV, there really is no Flexible Path program.
Bolden clearly didn’t want NASA to return to the Moon because he wanted us to go to Mars. But I believe that when he finally realized that we simply don’t have the technological know how to protect astronauts from the dangers of galactic radiation and solar events, he decided to turn NASA into an R&D program to get to Mars. This decision is going to set us back a decade, IMO.
Once some other nation, or nations, start setting up permanent settlements on the Moon, then our politicians will finally realize the full political and economic consequences of our decision to abandon the Moon!
Comment by Marcel F. Williams — February 3, 2010 @ 8:39 pm
You nailed it Paul and very eloquently. However concerns with the New FLEX based NASA go well beyond the lack of vision and inspiration. The New Commercial NASA is laden with old NASA baggage and wasteful investments. A six billion dollar bribe to gain commercial and private space buy-in. Multi-billion dollar shuttle derived HLV (bridge to nowhere) bribe for southern politicians ensures jobs for votes continues. And the multi-billion dollar ISS boondoggle orbits endlessly. Let’s not forget additional missions and spending to support “Climate Gate”. Lots of smoking mirrors and amidst all the cheers and hoopla. CCDev could provide some of the focus and direction for incremental VSE related technology development. However CCDev receives mere funding crumbs and is overshadowed by the LEO based funding support Space-X appears destined to receive for ISS supply.
Comment by Doug Gard — February 4, 2010 @ 12:01 am
Loved the article, as usual.
If there’s no declared mission other than to do research, then it’s very hard to fail. A politician who announces a singular goal might then have his or her progress measured with respect to the achievement of that goal. If things don’t go well, then that could be bad for the politician.
Solution: Get rid of the goal!
Your comments on Brownian motion are spot-on.
Comment by Itokawa — February 4, 2010 @ 8:56 am
In your previous post, you stated:
“What is needed is the incremental, cumulative build-up of space faring infrastructure that is both extensible and maintainable, a growing system whose aim is to transport us anywhere we want to go, for whatever reasons we can imagine, with whatever capabilities we may need.”
The new Obama/Bolden direction appears to be moving in exactly this direction; it does so much more than Constellation did and with one additional feature, by opening the development to ‘commercial’ firms, it gets the nation out of the ‘solely NASA’ inability to provide development experience, which BTW NASA has very little of any longer at least in its existing managerial ranks.
A few years ago, Jeff Hanley Constellation Program Manager, stated that “we no longer need a Vision; we now have a program”. In many respects that was where NASA went wrong.
At least for movement and transport of people in space, including cis-lunar space, developing the technologies and infrastructure that establishes the capability to “transport us anywhere we want to go, for whatever reasons we can imagine” does not require significant changes in hardware from one destination to another.
It sounds like in your latest post, you are now reversing your previous statement and saying, what we really want is a definitized program of destinations.
There are additional elements that need to be considered. One is the budget.
When the Bush Vision was established, the discussion was that the NASA budget had been stable at approximately .5% of the annual US budget for 40 years and that NASA needed to build a program that fit within this constraint. There would be no significant increase in funding.
The previous NASA Administrator figured he could raid all of the other NASA programs, including aero, science, shut down ISS, etc, in order to redirect the funds to Constellation. The Constellation management and charter also sought to ‘take over’ almost all of NASA’s efforts beyond low earth orbit.
Yet, as you have pointed out, they selected only one mission implementation, which was an Apollo redux.
As many others have pointed out, Constellation forgot about technology development. Constellation management also chose to neglect that their vehicle designs and architecture really did not accommodate some of the missions they were pursuing. The Administrator said that Orion was going to be a Mars transit vehicle. But the spacecraft was not large enough to accommodate that size crew for a Mars length mission. Itr did not have the living space, facilities, or logistical/storage space for deep space missions. Constellation management conveniently changed their safety standards or neglected human ratings when it served their interests. This was something we’d learned to expect of certain of their managers on ISS, where they did exactly the same thing.
Orion wound up without the systems redundancy that should be expected of a deep space vehicle. Next thing we knew, Constellation was showing Orion capsules traveling in tandem. Two would provide more living space and rendudant systems.
Another aspect that deserves consideration and that is how poorly Constellation was being implemented. It is interesting to read how prime contractor Lockheed Martin by Thursday this week was announcing that Orion would be ready to fly in 2013. L-M has been working the Orion vehicle design since 2005, 5 years, yet has not gotten through preliminary design. Preliminary design is generally 1/5 to 1/4 of the development program. If preliminary design has taken this long, the anticipation is that getting to initial operational capability is another 10 years. Augustine said maybe the people involved will figure out what they are doing and the situation will improve so Orion might fly as early as 2017, though 2019 is a better bet. This is important because it means we have little confidence that the existing Constellation/Orion management will do better than they have done until now. I have no doubt that this is the reason that the new Obama/Bolden plan opens the program to industry. We need to seek support and leadership from a broader community, some of whom have the appropriate abilities in systems development.
I don’t think that the new plan precludes what you are now saying we need, which would be a schedule of destinations and capabilities. I think the first step in the process is to recognize that Constellation had not done this, which is what you have been saying for several years. The second step, about to take place is to establish the schedule and plan as best can be done, and figure out how to go about implementing it. NASA Headquarters folks are saying that many of the Exploration people will simply redirect their function towards establishing the technology development program. I think if NASA is going to do this, they need to get out of the ‘Mission’ mode, which is exactly what you have been saying.
Maybe the NASA Administrator and POTUS are paying attention to what you have been saying?
Comment by Guest — February 5, 2010 @ 5:56 am
Guest,
Thank you for your thoughtful comments.
It sounds like in your latest post, you are now reversing your previous statement and saying, what we really want is a definitized program of destinations.
Hardly. My previous statement was about means; in order to go beyond LEO, we needed an incremental, cumulative program that could be paid for as we established these incremental capabilities. But increments with no direction get you nowhere. The Moon is a destination, but more importantly, it is an enabling asset. By using lunar resources, would would learn how to “cut the cord” with Earth of space logistics.
Your point about the problems with Constellation are well taken and I myself have pointed out that we were focusing on the wrong things. Hanley’s comment that you quote, if accurate, reflects the basic problem with it. But Constellation was an implementation of the VSE and if your implementation falls short, you should change it, not your objectives.
My criticism of the “new path” is that it has abandoned ends; it has no destination, no activities at any destination, and no obvious benefits from it, except for a “nearly simultaneous steady stream of firsts” as Bolden put it. In other words, the object of human spaceflight is to be a series of flag-and-footprint stunts, then abandonment of that destination for a new, further destination and a new “first” for flags-and-photo-ops.
My previous comments about the “go anywhere, at any time” is a statement of the ultimate objective of human spaceflight; I also said that we are many years away from such a capability. The VSE made lunar return a means to that end, by using the Moon’s resources to create a cislunar space faring system.
The final problem with the new path is organizational. NASA as an entity doesn’t do well without specific direction. They barely function WITH it. The “new path” is primarily a money distribution program for new widgets. As there is no over-arching goal, there is nothing to tie together the technology development. It is a prescription for another 20 years of busy work, pointless studies and viewgraph engineering.
And lots of “management.”
NASA Headquarters folks are saying that many of the Exploration people will simply redirect their function towards establishing the technology development program. I think if NASA is going to do this, they need to get out of the ‘Mission’ mode, which is exactly what you have been saying.
That is the antithesis of what I’ve been saying. “Understand your mission” is not the same statement as “you shouldn’t have a mission.”
I tried to clarify my position at these two links:
First Nail Down the Mission
Objectives Before Architectures – Strategies Before Tactics
Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 5, 2010 @ 9:34 am
Paul,
You have it exactly right. Without the anchor of the VSE there is no yardstick to measure progress in space. Plans have to be anchored in a specific objective. Otherwise they just drift.
Advances in Technology are always the result of demand pulling the technology forward. That is why the English and not the Greeks invented the steam engine. The Greeks had no demand for the curiosity of steam while the English had coal mines to pump out. The technology of sailing vessels didn’t develop in the 1400′s until Prince Henry set a goal of reaching India. Then ship building technology saw rapid development.
The new policy is very much a repeat of the 1990′s when the Space Exploration Initiative was replaced by CATS and Administrator’s Goldin’s plan to fill the sky with X-vehicles for SSTO.
It also recalls the space policy decision in the 1970′s to build the Space Shuttle itself in the belief that “good things” will happen when the cost to space is lowered. The result was a great spacecraft that was always looking for a mission.
I hope this will turn out different but the track record shows the probably is small.
Comment by Thomas Matula — February 5, 2010 @ 1:57 pm
I work at KSC where we feel like we were just sucker punched in the gut. It’s funny how NASA liked to brag that they were keeping the workforce informed, yet when Cabana talked right after the announcement of the cancellation of Constellation, he stated that they have been working on this for a year and a half!
Comment by sucker punched — February 6, 2010 @ 7:07 am
sucker punched,
Thanks for your post. I am hearing many similar stories from all around NASA about exactly this situation. Interestingly, I have heard that many senior managers at NASA were also kept in the dark, including some at HQ. It looks like the “new path” was formulated by a relatively small group inside the administration.
If the budget roll out presentation is any guide, this new paradigm has been given very little serious and considered thought — Amateur hour lives again.
Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 6, 2010 @ 8:13 am
Sucker Punched,
Sad to say but it sounds like NASA has once again given me a good example to use in my Strategic Management courses of how NOT to develop and implement a strategic plan….
Comment by Thomas Matula — February 6, 2010 @ 12:45 pm
“But nowhere in the budget documents or agency statements is there anything about the mission that we are undertaking. So we’re going to an asteroid. What will we do there? Why are we going there? What benefit accrues from it?”
That’s an excellent question, and it’s one that the Augustine committee didn’t address very well about human space flight. But you know, you can ask the same question about the Moon. The Moon may well have value in resources, but it is hardly obvious that it is necessary to send humans there to get them, especially since the cost to get even the first ones there is $100 billion.
Comment by Doug Lassiter — February 6, 2010 @ 4:07 pm
Doug,
The Moon may well have value in resources, but it is hardly obvious that it is necessary to send humans there to get them
It may not be “obvious,” but on reflection, anyone having significant robotic systems experience will attest that things break, get stuck, jam and quit working. You need someone there to prod it back into action. A system for lunar resource harvesting will likely have many distinct steps, processes and types of equipment. A purely robotic system may be feasible eventually, but as we are just learning how to do this, I suspect that human intervention will be necessary from time to time.
None of this should be construed to mean that I am against robotic resource prospecting, harvesting and extraction missions. As precursors, they can be invaluable in sorting out how we want to design the actual production systems.
And I do not except the agency and Augustine wisdom that human lunar return costs in excess of $100 billion. They both view spaceflight through the prism of the Apollo mindset.
Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 6, 2010 @ 6:41 pm
[...] that. He blogs at “The Once and Future Moon” blog, and has, to my surprise, expressed a certain amount of disdain regarding the new policy. I can understand his point. The strategic objective of “Provide the tools and the processes [...]
Pingback by The Dawn of a New American Enterprise - Out of the Cradle — February 6, 2010 @ 8:38 pm
Great article. I agree that most viewed the VSE and Constellation program as one in the same. To me, Constellation was the chosen means to achieve the VSE with the Moon selected as the first incremental step. Canceling Constellation shouldn’t mean canceling the VSE.
What I find most also miss is that one of the VSE’s goals was to expand the global economic sphere to the moon. It wasn’t the primary goal but was always considered in any Lunar Exploration meetings I’ve attended. Maybe this should have been emphasized more. Obama’s new budget claims to consider the promotion of jobs as priority #1 but as I see it, the VSE was doing the same by laying the groundwork for an expanded global economic sphere encompassing cis-lunar space.
I believe Dr Spudis wrote the following in his ‘Objectives Before Architectures” article….
“NASA has always seen public indifference as a problem. I believe it is a great opportunity. If we are freed from the self-imposed requirement to “excite” people, we are free to carry out the more mundane task of laying the groundwork for a lasting, sustainable infrastructure in space. In other words, space ceases to be a modern gladiatorial contest and becomes instead a piece of our economic infrastructure, available for use by many different parties and not restricted to only scientists and cold warriors. An analogy might be with railroads. Most people couldn’t care less about railroads. Yes, they are aware that they exist and many people will read and know about the latest derailment disaster. But they don’t think about them unless circumstance compels them to. Yet for all this, most recognize the importance of railroads to our lives, our well being, and our economy.”
I think our goal should be to make our program immune from the sorts of political games that go on whenever a new administration comes in. We had a plan, now let us do our jobs.
Comment by gsfc guest — February 6, 2010 @ 9:44 pm
Guest,
Your comments are quite articulate and interesting. If i may, i’d like to offer the following perspective. Without an overall Vision driving us at NASA, we will be limited in the following ways. First, without a driving end goal (ie, Vision), our selection of Robotic missions and flight Tech Demos will be based upon only the decisionmaker’s biased idea of what is important, rather than a more thought out Vision or strategy THAT HAS BEEN VETTED AT THE HIGHEST LEVELS ABOVE NASA. Most likely, those decisions will be made for political reasons, or to balance workforce in the absense of strong goals set forth in a Vision. In fact, even when we had the VSE, NASA had a very difficult time sticking to the intent of that vision. I am not saying that the senior leadership will do bad things, only that the pressures and influences on them based upon real world issues will influence their decisions away from more “noble” goals, expecially if there are none formally.
Secondly, you should realize that leaving the Earth’s gravity well is pretty hard. If you haven’t seen a major game-changing breakthrough in launch technology, it is not likely to improve any time soon; after all, demand has been there for tens of years. A big LOX-RP engine is good, but it isnot going to cut launch cost significantly. We can spend money looking for incremental improvements, but it won’t lower the cost all that much in my opinion. If the country is willing for NASA to take a little more collective risk, we can address the culture of launch preparations to reduce costs today; we don’t need to wait for new technology to support a HLLV project. My point is that we can develop a heavy lift capability now. If we wait, we can get incremental improvement, but when will we know how good is good enough? To answer that, one would ask, “what’s my need? What do you want to do with it?
Thirdly, potential game changers like propellant depots have the same quesiton of Ends. OK, i don’t think it is really that hard to develop automated fluid transfer, but how big should the deopt be? What is the Ops Concept? When do we say that we can do it? What does it look like? We can demo the capability at ISS in fairly short order, but the question is, what do you wnat the depot to do specifically? What is its mission?
Paul has consistently articulated his vision, and from my perspective, it makes total sense. I hope that we can influence NASA leaders and through them, the Administration, that a VISION, coupled with this new shift, might be the best thing for NASA and the country. I’m OK with the new approach, although i think that the Administration is expecting a bit much from Commercial ability to deliver, but i’m good to try hard to see it work. What disheartens me is the abdication of any vision that we can believe in regarding where we go from here except, “take nice pictures and plant a flag and do human “exploring” (see Paul’s earlier blog).
Comment by TonyL — February 8, 2010 @ 7:02 pm
Salutations. Project Constellation was, and could still be our one golden opportunity for leaving earth orbit, finally, after 40+ years. The Mars zealots killed this thing. Pure and simple. They have been completely inflexible with their demands for NASA’s space future: “Mars first, Mars now, plus anywhere-but-the-Moon is okay by us.” I loath their contempt for the efforts of putting astronauts elsewhere. What in heaven’s name were they thinking, when they set out to finish off with lunar flights?!?! Without a clear out-of-earth-orbit mission, what possible motive would there be for a heavy-lift launcher? Do they really believe that some private commercial firm is going to single-handedly deliver to NASA a huge multi-stage rocket like Aries 5? This kind of La La Land dreaming will get you nowhere! Only a government agency can deliver such a Saturn 5-capability launch system. Commercial business will at best deliver us some teeny tiny space plane, plus a minor-league rocket to get it to the ISS. But that’ll be it, folks! Without an earth-escape stage to get a spacecraft out of parking orbit, you basically CAN’T go anywhere! Constellation was all slated to bring us that: a heavy-lift, heavy payload launch system; which would’ve had plenty of applications—sending landing vehicles to Mars included. The Zubrinites just could not see beyond their hard-headed, dead-set goals to realize that the Orion-Aries architecture was just what the doctor ordered, or would’ve ordered, to later advance their agenda. Don’t they remember Project Gemeni, from the mid-60s, which tested out the bugs in the flight systems before commiting to the bigger enterprise? Intermediate goals have always aided well, the subsequent objective. I say for all of us in the space advocacy community to make a strong effort, from this moment on, of lobbying & petitioning Congress into restoring funding for Constellation. We must try to re-start this program, even if it awaits being begun again in the next year’s federal budget. Let’s put on a vibrant campaign. LET’S SAVE PROJECT CONSTELLATION!!!
Comment by Chris Castro — February 9, 2010 @ 10:40 am
Excellent article and commentary. However, I disagree with you a bit on one fundamental point that I think merits discussion: the basic direction and purpose of the path laid out for space exploration.
The VSE had it partly right: create a sustainable human presence in space. However, I prefer to take a longer view (like on the order of millions of years
). The proper long-term purpose of space exploration is to move the human race OFF of the planet Earth and to other planets and star systems, insuring (or at least increasing the odds a LOT) our survival as a species. Stellar evolutionary theory clearly indicates that our solar system will not be habitable forever…we have a time frame of about 500 million to 1 billion years to find new homes within or (more likely) outside our solar system. In order to accomplish this task (particularly the element of long-duration travel outside of the solar system), we should be learning how to maintain a permanent presence in space NOW at a moderate level of consistent funding.
The issue is not “news-worthy” and “pop-culture” “firsts”; the issue is constant incremental improvements and expansion in our space travel, transport, and exploration capabilities.
The OTHER fundamental problem is that this view plays very poorly with the political folks: the people who control the purse strings, and have just about as short-term a view as you cant get: 2 to 4 years to the next election cycle.
Comment by Lewis Van Atta — February 9, 2010 @ 8:22 pm
Lewis,
Thanks for your comments.
I see the original Vision for Space Exploration in perfect alignment with your point. If the long-term goal of space exploration is settlement, we must use the materials and energy that we find in space to survive. Because learning how to use lunar and space resources is the central goal of the VSE, it IS the perfect near-term goal that helps create long-term capabilities.
Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 10, 2010 @ 5:06 am
[...] they discarded the entire Vision for Space Exploration and came up with the so-called “Flexible Path” (FP). Although cloaked in platitudes about how technology development will give us options to [...]
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[...] this experience offers food for thought to those who think the “new path” for NASA (as laid out in the proposed budget) will somehow magically transform the agency into a fount of [...]
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