Image courtesy of SpaceX
Space entrepreneurs who want to fly you
into orbit will get their chance to take cargo and crews to the space
station when the space shuttles retire. NASA's award of contracts
totaling $500 million to private rocketeers is a boost for a new
approach to spaceflight.
"Today it costs over a billion dollars for a space shuttle flight," says Space X founder, Elon Musk. "Unless we can dramatically reduce that cost we will never become a space faring civilization."
Musk
now has his chance. NASA is funding his private launch company to
develop low-cost transportation systems to replace the retiring space
shuttles. NASA officials say this makes good on the agency's promise to
partner with entrepreneurs to expand the next frontier.
"You
are getting the first traders along the Mississippi now. That's
happening in space," says, Edward J. Stanton, Jr., director of NASA's Constellation Systems Division, which is overseeing development of the transportation and exploration systems to return to the moon.
Space
X's ultimate goal is to colonize mars. But first the company is working
to develop an industry first, a fully reusable rocket.
"Almost
every rocket on earth except for the space shuttle is thrown away after
one flight. And the space shuttle, the big orange tank that it sits on
is thrown away every flight," Musk says.
The reusable rocket
has other cost saving features. Space X's Falcon comes ready to fly,
instead of being assembled on the launch pad.
"This is
analogous to building part of an airplane in the factory and part of
the airplane on the runway," he says. "And you can imagine that's a
pretty expensive way to split the construction."
The first
launch attempt by Space X in March 2006 was a failure, but that's no
concern for taxpayers. Under the new NASA contracts, if these companies
don't succeed, they won't get paid.
The other small company chosen for a NASA contract is Rocketplane Kistler, which is also developing reusable launch vehicles.
