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The best part of this idea is that it's incremental. Past manned missions seem to have a long period when stuff gets studied, then when it comes time to spend t
by wanorris 15y ago
The best part of this idea is that it's incremental. Past manned missions seem to have a long period when stuff gets studied, then when it comes time to spend the real money, it gets killed in favor of the study phase for some other mission.
By costing a comparatively modest amount at a time over a long series of missions, it's more likely that it will be easier for Washington to complete a mission that's already well underway and take credit for it than to kill it to save a little bit more money at that point.
And to be really pessimistic, even if it does get killed halfway through, if we've put a fuel station in space and started filling it, we can at least try to reuse those resources for whatever the next mission is.
- electromagnetic 15y agoWhat I think is the greatest potential here is that this is essentially paving the way for the government to begin selling this fuel to companies that can't afford to put their own fuel depot into space. Why is this good? Because once Congress sees the potential to make profit from NASA, then we'll see hundreds of billions dropped into it. I believe the next step to this would be to set up a depot in orbit around Mars to reduce the weight necessary for a mission to Mars.