• Yes if for policy reasons the western governments will allow non market economies launch payloads at a substantially lower cost forcing the west to develop new cheaper rockets What are the Current Thoughts for Near Term Decrease the Cost ? Within NASA and ESA and in industry the current thought are probably best summarized by the US plans for the NLS. The NLS concept is to reduce cost a factor of ten by cutting a third of today's cost could in design, production and operations, 1/ a factor of three reduction in cost through design by. - decrease in performance - increase in design robustness (engine out) - concurrent engineering to better satisfy manufacturing and operation aspects. 2/ a factor of three reduction in cost through manufacturing by. - longer series. - allowing for more structural mass - decreasing operating temperature and pressure - using known material - simplified subsystems i.e. fewer parts, less welding and more casting 3/ a factor of three reduction in cost through operations by - increased launch rates enables more efficient use of staff and facilities. - inherently robust systems - factory checkout simplifies operation - fewer or more reliable electronic parts All in all this should enable the launch cost to reduce by at least a factor of 10 What are the Thoughts for Future Improved Space Transportation Systems? What are the Future Customers Requirements ? It is important to bear in mind that not only the cost but also the availability, reliability, resiliency and launch environment are important factors for a future launch system. A future customer putting up 1 GW of power stations per year would typically need transportation 10 000 000 kg /year. To serve this big mass to LEO a diversified fleet should be used. The payload can divided into Personnel Transport, Priority Cargo and Bulk. Each having different demands on 1/ cost, 2/ reliability, 3/ accessibility, 4/ launch environment and 5/ resiliency. A human cargo would focus on reliability and accessibility. The priority cargo would focus on cost and launch environment. The bulk would focus on cost. In such an scenario the fleet of possible vehicles could be as below Personnel transport SSTO: NASP or Delta clipper Priority Cargo HLLV: big dumb boosters, SATURN 5 derivatives Bulk HLLV or mass driver, RAM accelerator, laser propulsion 8.5.2 Personnel Transport To enhance reliability a SSTO would enable the use of the fewest possible parts. If it is winged then more failure modes are recoverable. If it is ballistic the flying time is shorter. By making it reusable with a smooth land recovery the operability and hence cost would be enhanced over expendable. Two projects of this type are described. Ballistic and winged SSTO. Ballistic SSTO Space Transportation systems The trend in the word is definitely towards fewer stages. The four stage vehicles of the fifties have been reduced to two stage today. By reducing the stages the development cost can be reduced, the cost per launch decreases, the reliability increases and operations are simplified. All of this due to that
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