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And consider that the Space Shuttle was used extensively late in its life to help build the ISS. We have nothing similar to help build another one. I'm sure the
by Tommstein 3y ago
And consider that the Space Shuttle was used extensively late in its life to help build the ISS. We have nothing similar to help build another one. I'm sure there's good reasons to do it (hopefully not just budgetary ones), but it's unfortunate that we're deorbiting it at all. The cost of maintaining/upgrading the one we already have probably pales in comparison to the cost of ever building another one.
- 8bitsrule 3y agoLot of useful mass there. Recycling makes a lot of sense, and we will wind up sorry if it's not done. Wouldn't take much to put it up into a very high parking orbit.
- s1artibartfast 3y agoWhat would it take to put it in a parking orbit?
- philipwhiuk 3y agoA lot of delta-V. The only parking orbit is graveyard, above GEO - everything decays over a fairly short time period.
- oldbbsnickname 3y agoYep. It would require a ton of money to tank that much fuel up there. For maintenance alone, ISS requires 7 metric tonnes of fuel every year just to stay where it's at.
- wkat4242 3y ago7 metric tonnes isn't a lot. It's what a 747 uses to taxi to the runway. Of course bringing 7 tonnes to orbit is another story but even that is not so bad.
- quantified 3y agoI had to look that up. A 747's max fuel capacity was 63,705 US gal according to [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_747 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_747] and jet fuel is around 3.25kg per gallon, so ballpark of 207,000 kg or 207 metric tons could go into the biggest 747s. 7 metric tonnes is about 2,150 gallons. Interesting stat. Isn't a lot, but it sorta is, too.
- kawhah 3y agoThe GP's estimate is out by almost an order of magnitude.
- Xylakant 3y ago"not so bad" is relative: It's two flights of a spacex dragon 2 launcher: 3,307 kg (7,291 lb) to ISS https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Dragon_2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceX_Dragon_2
- kawhah 3y agothe point is that discarding lumps of metal in space is not wasteful, since it would require much more material brought into orbit to make them useful than to replace them if discarded.
- wkat4242 3y agoYeah and they are no longer in a reliable state. Years of radiation embrittlement, holes drilled by careless russians, weakening due to micrometeor impact.. I also would not bother reusing any of it.