Posted on 12/14/2018 4:39:33 AM PST by BurgessKoch
SpaceX launch capability will become more a strategic asset to the U.S. military. China knows this; and, as in other cases where they lobby our governmental office holders to garner an advantage, they seek to stymie our capabilities.
Agreed. Strategically, we need the ability to launch assets into space on short notice, using American equipment which cannot be embargoed by any foreign power.
Fortune: Is SpaceX Undercutting the Competition Even More Than Anyone Thought?
http://fortune.com/2017/06/17/spacex-launch-cost-competition/
“According to analysis by Ars Technica, the figures suggest that competing launch provider United Launch Alliance continues to charge several times more than SpaceX on average, despite ULA’s efforts to lower costs. The document shows an estimated 2020 cost of $422 million per launch if the Air Force selected United Launch Alliance to conduct them. That combines costs for launches using ULA’s large Delta rocket as well as its smaller, less expensive Atlas V rocket.
By contrast, SpaceX has been awarded two Air Force contracts at far lower per-launch costs of $83 million and $96.5 million. At the time they were awarded, those contracts were estimated to undercut ULA prices by around 40%. The new budget estimates suggest the gap could be even larger.”
“The Falcon Heavy is an absurdly low-cost heavy lift rocket”
“The bottom line is that the Falcon Heavy is a more powerful rocket than the Delta IV Heavy, and by various measures the latter will probably soon cost the US government about five times as much. Put another way, the Department of Defense may have to pay half a billion dollars more for a single launch of certain military satellites on the Delta IV Heavy versus the Falcon Heavy.”
The actual reality is that the competitors of SpaceX are the ones getting subsidies, by getting awarded contracts when they are not the actual lowest-cost providers.
In the overall bigger picture with any and all of these, are we going to sell or give up the old house we already could not afford when we get done paying for the new one? the new one we also still cannot afford? Then pay those who we bought it from to live in it too?
In the overall bigger picture, if SpaceX is the low-cost provider right now (it appears to be) then cut off United Launch Alliance.
I understand the premise, But still too small of a picture. We are as of right now 21 trillion in debt, 21,843,614, to be exact. Will we be now be laying off or not refilling unneeded positions at NASA because we are paying these companies instead? Will NASA ask for a smaller budget in response to these new savings?
No... And here lies he problem. We are paying a second party to do a job that we are already paying NASA to do, so it is an added cost with no savings at all. I can add fairly well and as a business man this doesn’t add up to a saving in the least. It is all added costs.
What bothers me is the government is never honest to the taxpayers about how much all these “savings” are actually going to “cost” our Great Grandchildren in the end. A business would go broke immediately if it was operated like this. In the end it is actually double the cost.
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