Image by Getty Images Europe via @daylife  Now that the Space Shuttle has been scuttled and the proposed Ares I Constellation program rocket has been cancelled, NASA has little near-term choice but to rely on the private sector for home-grown astronaut launch and return. And although several companies are intent upon providing those services, American crews may continue to depend upon Russian taxi rides for some time to come.  There are two principal issues. First, uncertain budgets and launch market commitments make NASA an unreliable customer, causing large R&D investments to be very risky. Second, working with NASA imposes contract complexities, schedule delays and added costs that jeopardize business viability. This is particularly true in regard to design control over manned mission flight safety provisions.  The original premise was that private industry can build and operate space transportation vehicles more rapidly, cheaply and flexibly than can government, opening a new era of spaceflight. But the big rub is that while this may be very true, they cannot do so the “government way”. Accordingly, companies are reportedly pushing back against NASA rules establishing how their vehicles must be designed rather than how they must perform. This is analogous to authorizing the Federal Aeronautics Administration to certify the design of airplanes- not just certifying their airworthiness.  Blaming budget uncertainties, NASA has announced that it will postpone their use of private launchers for transporting astronauts until at least 2017. This delay has prompted one prospective customer, Bigelow Aerospace, to lay off 40 of its 90-person staff. The company which plans to operate an orbital habitat or “hotel”, was depending on commercial launch services to ferry users to and from the facility. Bigelow has already placed two reduced-scale inflatable structured prototypes in orbit using Russian rockets, and had hoped to be operational with the real McCoy by 2015.  Although the White House had originally requested more than $800 million annually to support private space taxis, Congressional lawmakers reduced that amount by half. This can be attributed in part to a somewhat tense relationship that has existed between the Obama administration and Congress over space policy for some time. This contention became worse when the White House added more money to the fiscal 2012 budget request for commercial-crew efforts than was authorized in 2011… and less for NASA’s development of its own rocket and capsule for missions beyond Earth’s orbit.  NASA has now shifted to what they regard to be more flexible cost-sharing arrangements with private service suppliers. Termed the “Commercial Crew Integrated Design Contract” (CCIDC), this strategy will modify so-called “Space Act Agreement” funding terms applied in the past to partner with proposed ventures involving Boeing, Orbital Sciences Corp and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. The change will focus upon overall design of the system, rather than on single technological activities and milestones.  Bill Gerstenmaier, who heads NASA’s manned program operations, noted that Congress has attached some strings that could further reduce the budget for commercial rocket development by linking such dollars to the agency’s progress in developing a separate, larger NASA rocket, a development that will also limit NASA’s engineering and design control over the commercial program. The downside, he said is that it “doesn’t ensure that we will get exactly what we need.”  Gerstenmaier estimates that “Based on our previous work, there is a pretty good possibility” that the new acquisition strategy will support at least two contractor teams to finalize and verify their designs. However Congressman Ralph Hall (Rep. TX.), who heads the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, expressed skepticism. He said “Given current federal budget constraints, I continue to be concerned about NASA’s ability to afford contracting with two or more companies to ferry our astronauts to and from the International Space Station.” Instead, Hall favors having two companies team together to jointly develop a more cost-effective plan. Yet he agrees with Bill Gerstenmaier that “NASA cannot impose its safety requirements as would be possible under a normal acquisition.”
As Congress and the Obama administration continue to kick NASA's can down the road, our astronauts may just have to hitchhike in hopes of scoring lifts from passing Russian or Chinese vehicles.