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The International Space Station photographed by the departing
Expedition 56 crew members in the Soyuz MS-08 crew capsule on Oct. 4, 2018.
Credit: Roscosmos/NASA
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Ken
Kremer -- SpaceUpClose.com &
RocketSTEM – 7 June 2019
CAPE CANAVERAL, FL – From the business capital of the world at Nasdaq in New York City NASA officials today, June 7, announced a significant expansion in commercial activities aboard the International Space Station opening it up to U.S. industry with the goal of driving innovation and ingenuity that “can accelerate a thriving commercial economy in low-Earth orbit” and allowing private astronauts to visit for the first time for up to month, starting in 2020.
NASA will also permit the docking of a commercial research module onto the end of the Harmony module to carry out R&D, manufacturing and marketing activities for profit.
The goal is to stimulate a robust economy in Low Earth Orbit at the ISS starting now and at future free flying space stations in the future.
The new near-term, five-part plan was outlined in detail during a live broadcast on NASA TV direct from NASDAQ NYC on Friday, June 7 with top NASA managers including the agency’s Chief Financial Officer Jeff DeWit, Bill Gerstenmaier, associate administrator, NASA’s Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate, and Robyn Gatens, deputy director, International Space Station, all at NASA Headquarters.
“We’re reaching out to the private sector to see if you can push the economic frontier into space,” said Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA director of space operations, at the breifing. “This is a shift for NASA that will be beneficial for the American economy and for the American citizens.
“The commercialization of low-Earth orbit will enable NASA to focus resources to land the first woman and the next man on the moon by 2024 as the first phase in creating a sustainable lunar presence and preparing for missions to Mars.”
“The five-point plan will enable commercial and marketing activities aboard the International Space Station, with a long-term goal to achieve a robust economy in low-Earth orbit from which NASA can purchase services as one of many customers.”
CAPE CANAVERAL, FL – From the business capital of the world at Nasdaq in New York City NASA officials today, June 7, announced a significant expansion in commercial activities aboard the International Space Station opening it up to U.S. industry with the goal of driving innovation and ingenuity that “can accelerate a thriving commercial economy in low-Earth orbit” and allowing private astronauts to visit for the first time for up to month, starting in 2020.
NASA will also permit the docking of a commercial research module onto the end of the Harmony module to carry out R&D, manufacturing and marketing activities for profit.
The goal is to stimulate a robust economy in Low Earth Orbit at the ISS starting now and at future free flying space stations in the future.
The new near-term, five-part plan was outlined in detail during a live broadcast on NASA TV direct from NASDAQ NYC on Friday, June 7 with top NASA managers including the agency’s Chief Financial Officer Jeff DeWit, Bill Gerstenmaier, associate administrator, NASA’s Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate, and Robyn Gatens, deputy director, International Space Station, all at NASA Headquarters.
“We’re reaching out to the private sector to see if you can push the economic frontier into space,” said Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA director of space operations, at the breifing. “This is a shift for NASA that will be beneficial for the American economy and for the American citizens.
“The commercialization of low-Earth orbit will enable NASA to focus resources to land the first woman and the next man on the moon by 2024 as the first phase in creating a sustainable lunar presence and preparing for missions to Mars.”
“The five-point plan will enable commercial and marketing activities aboard the International Space Station, with a long-term goal to achieve a robust economy in low-Earth orbit from which NASA can purchase services as one of many customers.”
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The International Space Station photographed by the departing
Expedition 56 crew members in the Soyuz MS-08 crew capsule on Oct. 4, 2018.
Credit: Roscosmos/NASA
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“We need to think of a different way of doing business,” said Gerstenmaier. “We have no idea what kinds of creativity and literally out-of-this-world ideas can come from private industry.”
This new plan goes far beyond the existing ISS National Lab (CASIS) setup.
50 commercial companies are already conducting commercial research and development activities via the International Space Station U.S. National Laboratory.
Furthermore, “NASA has worked with 11 different companies to install 14 commercial facilities on the station that support research and development projects for NASA and the ISS National Lab.”
NASA’s five point plan as described by Robyn Gatens involves:
-enabling use of government resources for commercial activities. It allows profits,
-creating the opportunity for private astronaut missions to the space station, up to 2 per year starting in 2020,
-enabling commercial destinations in low-Earth orbit, including the forward port on the Harmony module,
-identifying and pursuing activities that foster new and emerging markets, and opportunities for long term growth and sustainable demand for using microgravity,
-and quantifying NASA’s long-term demand for activities in low-Earth orbit via a NASA white paper.
And you will need to have a good scientific, commercial or educational reason to be approved to journey to orbit as a private astronaut to the ISS.
You cant just go up as a ‘space tourist’ on a ‘joy ride.’
The NASA outline documents specifically mandates the commercial activities require the microgravity environment for research and development activities and requires it serves NASA’s broader goals of space exploration.
“To qualify, commercial and marketing activities must either:
· require the unique microgravity environment to enable manufacturing, production or development of a commercial application;
· have a connection to NASA’s mission; or
· support the development of a sustainable low-Earth orbit economy.”
To help enable a competitive commercial LEO economy
NASA is “initially making available
five percent of the agency’s annual allocation of crew resources and cargo
capability, including 90 hours of crew time and 175 kg of cargo launch
capability, but will limit the amount provided to any one company.”
The use of NASA astronauts will be regulated “to conduct coordinated, scheduled and reimbursable commercial and marketing activities consistent with government ethics requirements aboard the station.”
Marketing efforts involving NASA astronauts will be permitted so long as they are “behind the camera.”
Of course it wont be cheap for those private astronauts lucky enough to secure a ride to the orbiting lab complex.
Private astronauts will need to pay NASA a cool $35,000 per night for life support and to use ISS facilities – and that’s above and beyond the approximately $60 million ticket cost for a seat they’ll be required to purchase first to be able to soar to space by launching aboard either the Boeing Starliner or SpaceX Crew Dragon space taxis under development as part of NASA’s commercial crew program.
Boeing
and SpaceX are expected to charge NASA about $58 million per seat for NASA
astronauts.
This is lower than the approximately $85+ million per seat the Russians currently change NASA for seats aboard their Soyuz spacecraft which currently remains the only path for humans to travel to the ISS and back – since the forced shutdown of NASA’s Space Shuttles back in 2011.
“We’re going to re-evaluate the pricing every six months,” said Jeff DeWit, NASA’s chief financial officer. “If a private astronaut is on station, they’ll have to pay us while they’re there for the life support, the food, the water, things of that nature.”
So a one month stay aboard the ISS will cost roughly $1 million – payable to NASA.
“I would expect the cost to be in that range [around $58 million] for private astronauts,” DeWit said.
“The two companies right now that can do it are Boeing and SpaceX. And so, they would have to contract with them and whatever prices Boeing and SpaceX set is on them. But when they get to station, there will be a cost. It will be roughly about $35,000 a night per astronaut.
“But it won’t come with any Hilton or Marriott points,” he added jokingly.
NASA says they can support up to two private astronaut missions per year.
Theoretically this could involve as many as a dozen passenger astronauts using a seven seat spaceship with one pilot and six private astronaut crew members.
The use of NASA astronauts will be regulated “to conduct coordinated, scheduled and reimbursable commercial and marketing activities consistent with government ethics requirements aboard the station.”
Marketing efforts involving NASA astronauts will be permitted so long as they are “behind the camera.”
Of course it wont be cheap for those private astronauts lucky enough to secure a ride to the orbiting lab complex.
Private astronauts will need to pay NASA a cool $35,000 per night for life support and to use ISS facilities – and that’s above and beyond the approximately $60 million ticket cost for a seat they’ll be required to purchase first to be able to soar to space by launching aboard either the Boeing Starliner or SpaceX Crew Dragon space taxis under development as part of NASA’s commercial crew program.
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Up Close view of SpaceX Crew Dragon
spacecraft bolted atop Falcon 9 rocket with Crew Access Arm astronaut walkway
in position after being raised vertical at NASA’s historic Launch Complex 39A
in Florida on March 1, 2019 ahead of maiden liftoff March 2 at 2:49 a.m. EST on
critical unpiloted test flight on Demo-1 mission. This vehicle was destroyed
during static fire test anomaly failure on Apr. 20, 2019 on Landing Zone-1 at
Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FL. Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/spaceupclose.com
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This is lower than the approximately $85+ million per seat the Russians currently change NASA for seats aboard their Soyuz spacecraft which currently remains the only path for humans to travel to the ISS and back – since the forced shutdown of NASA’s Space Shuttles back in 2011.
“We’re going to re-evaluate the pricing every six months,” said Jeff DeWit, NASA’s chief financial officer. “If a private astronaut is on station, they’ll have to pay us while they’re there for the life support, the food, the water, things of that nature.”
So a one month stay aboard the ISS will cost roughly $1 million – payable to NASA.
“I would expect the cost to be in that range [around $58 million] for private astronauts,” DeWit said.
“The two companies right now that can do it are Boeing and SpaceX. And so, they would have to contract with them and whatever prices Boeing and SpaceX set is on them. But when they get to station, there will be a cost. It will be roughly about $35,000 a night per astronaut.
“But it won’t come with any Hilton or Marriott points,” he added jokingly.
NASA says they can support up to two private astronaut missions per year.
Theoretically this could involve as many as a dozen passenger astronauts using a seven seat spaceship with one pilot and six private astronaut crew members.
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The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket that will launch
the first astronaut crew aboard the Boeing Starliner commercial crew vehicle to
the ISS later this year has arrived at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station after rolling
off the Delta Mariner cargo ship on June 5, 2019. Credit: Ken Kremer/kenkremer.com/spaceupclose.com
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“We’re looking to the private sector to do the training, to do the transportation, to work out the accommodations, to be the interface between the individuals that want to fly the private astronauts and us,” Gerstenmaier said.
“So we expect the private sector companies to do all that.”
The ULA Atlas V rocket for the 1st Boeing Starliner crew capsule that will launch astronauts just arrived at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station this week. Read our prior story with eyewitness photos here.
The first crew trio will fly on the Crew Flight Test (CFT) mission hopefully late this year.
CFT will comprise Boeing astronaut and former NASA astronaut Chris Ferguson and NASA astronauts Mike Fincke and Nicole Mann who will fully demonstrate Starliner and Atlas V’s ability to safely carry crew to and from the orbiting laboratory.
Back in March the unmanned Crew Dragon launched on the flawless Demo-1 mission to the ISS and SpaceX seemed on track to be the first American company to launch astronauts to the ISS on a private spaceship funded by NASA.
However the recovered Demo-1 capsule was completely destroyed by a sudden explosion in mid-April during a static test fire of the SuperDraco abort engines at the Cape’s Landing Zone-1. Those abort engines are required to save the astronauts lives in case of a catastrophic rocket emergency.
Thus it is not known at this time when SpaceX will get back on track with their crewed Demo-2 mission.
The ISS itself is currently funded by NASA and its partners through 2024.
NASA is no longer seeking to halt funding thereafter as the agency was ordered to do last year by the Trump Administration- in an about face following heavy bipartisan criticism in Congress.
This is important because no company will invest money in a facility if a shutdown is looming in just a few years.
“There will be no gap in human spaceflight in low Earth orbit,” said Gatens.
"We’re hoping that new capabilities can develop that can one day take over for the space station, and we will begin to do that transition when those capabilities become available.”
Watch my commentary at ABC and Fox local TV News Orlando about the ULA Atlas V arrival and offloading and the future of astronauts rising to space aboard commercial vehicles like the Boeing Starliner crew capsule at these stories from June 5 here:
http://www.fox35orlando.com/news/local-news/ula-rocket-arrives-on-space-coast-from-alabama-factory
https://www.wftv.com/news/local/first-booster-for-boeings-human-rated-starliner-spacecraft-arrives-at-space-coast/955667616
Listen to my commentary at BBC 5 Live radio on June 7 here:
Watch for Ken’s continuing
onsite coverage of NASA, SpaceX, ULA, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman
and more space and mission reports direct from the Kennedy Space Center, Cape
Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida and Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia.
Stay tuned here for Ken's continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news: www.kenkremer.com –www.spaceupclose.com – twitter @ken_kremer – email: ken at kenkremer.com
Dr. Kremer is a research scientist and journalist based in the KSC area, active in outreach and interviewed regularly on TV and radio about space topics.
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Stay tuned here for Ken's continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news: www.kenkremer.com –www.spaceupclose.com – twitter @ken_kremer – email: ken at kenkremer.com
Dr. Kremer is a research scientist and journalist based in the KSC area, active in outreach and interviewed regularly on TV and radio about space topics.
………….
Ken’s photos are for sale and he is available for lectures and outreach events
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