Flagship Technology Demonstrations RFI Is Out

a) FTD 1 - Advanced In-Space Propulsion Demonstration
b) FTD 2 - In-Space Propellant Transfer & Storage Demonstration
c) FTD 3 - Inflatable ISS Mission Module Demonstration
d) FTD 4 - Aero-Assist Demonstration
e) AR&D Demonstration Vehicle
f) Closed Loop Environmental Control System
g) Innovative Architectures
h) Public Outreach and Participatory Exploration

Sounds exciting to me. By 2016 we can have a Bigelow module on ISS with brand new life support, a VASIMR test on ISS that just happens to maintain station orbit indefinitely, a ULA fuel depot demo with automated docking, and a Mars aeroshell tested from LEO.

By 2016 the first iteration of the Mars exploration system will have been tested. We will learn enough to choose the best next-step to Mars. (Likely that human asteroid mission and more, projected for 2024.)

This is a fair trade for Orion and Ares. When we're really ready for BEO, I mean ready for more than barnstorming, the rockets of that day will do the job, and the capsules of today will not. Constellation was too big for its britches.

Fantastic. To me, this is much more inspiring.

Pity the food growth objective is not more ambitious - just a few fresh toms to perk up the packed lunches, rather than staples. But I suppose you have to start somewhere.

Relatively small projects, plenty of subgoals, resilient to budget variations, leaving the US in say 10 years time in a position to go wherever it wants

I will cry if this gets ditched for a bloody moon shot.

Fantastic. To me, this is much more inspiring.

Pity the food growth objective is not more ambitious - just a few fresh toms to perk up the packed lunches, rather than staples. But I suppose you have to start somewhere.

Relatively small projects, plenty of subgoals, resilient to budget variations, leaving the US in say 10 years time in a position to go wherever it wants

I will cry if this gets ditched for a bloody moon shot.

This is some really inspiring stuff. I'm quite perplexed at those in Congress and elsewhere who don't think these sorts of technology development & demonstration missions are a good investment for NASA.

Great news, and yes, it IS inspiring stuff. Let's see more of this type of work.

Looking forward to the "Golden Age of Commercial Human Spaceflight"

(that's MY quote Jeff!)

Cress was the food plant we grew at school. Ready to harvest after a few days.

If cress needs gravity this can be easily provided since it only grows to about one inch high. Just put the plant pots on the inside of a rotating wheel.

Notice how the anti-Obama people have suddenly gone missing?

FTD 2 is a waste of time and money. Russians already do this on ISS so what technology development is required? FTD 3 is as well. Bigelow has alredy launched modules on orbit, so again, what techncology development is required?

Seems to me these are already mature technologies ready for use in a real vehicle development program.

FTD 2 is a mini propellant depot, if done properly.

FTD 3 tests that we can dock with a Bigelow module, use one in a transfer vehicle and that the air conditioning works. The current Bigelow modules are unmanned.

Not exactly sure what they're really up to behind the scenes, but the following old stuff from the Clinton-Gore/Goldin-Garver era seems to be a sort of deja-vu to the current space policy nonsense:

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If I was going to test a really, really, really...wait for it....really big nuclear device, I'd do it next to an asteroid tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of miles from earth. Something says they are looking for either the perfect excuse to blow something up and show the world how powerful they think they are or they are...umm...nuts.

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-01/russia-wants-launch-armageddon-style-mission-deflect-asteroid

and this:

Al Gore Jr, As recently as 1996 the Vice President, according to reports, played an important role in the privatising of Elk Hills naval petroleum reserve in California, later bought by Occidental for $3.5bn. Unnoticed in the furore over the Vice President's association with Occidental in the US was the degree to which he had also benefited from Hammer's and Occidental's connections, before 1990, in Moscow

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/al-gores-family-linked-to-corrupt-oilman-716413.html

And this:

the International Space Station, can be traced to a failed approach -- an approach that presidential candidate Al Gore was instrumental in charting during his years as VP

Gore's campaign brags about downsizing government, yet dodges any blame for such consequences. And Gore recently tried to shift blame onto Republicans. "When the Republican leadership sought to slash NASA funding by more than $1 billion, I fought to restore [it]," a Gore letter recently stated. Yet according to Internet space journalist Keith Cowing (an admitted democrat), the cut in question was proposed in the House Appropriations committee and reversed by House Republican leaders who "have consistently recommended more money for NASA than the White House has". That claim that Gore saved the space program from Republicans, wrote Cowing, "sounds nice, until you check the facts."

Although the public record shows that "the Clinton/Gore Administration cut NASA's budget 7 out of the past 8 years," Gore claimed otherwise: "I have played a key role keeping NASA's budget stable," his statement said. That, writes Cowing, "is simply false -- you actively helped guide its decline."

Behind the declining budgets at NASA lay a declining experience base, as NASA leadership sought to satisfy White House policies. After a visit to one NASA site, an official told a gathered audience that he could easily see what was wrong with the workforce: "too many pale stale males", that is, too many old white men. And NASA set about remedying that flaw.

http://www.jamesoberg.com/postcg.html

This is why Obama should not be employing old Clintonian/Gore policy wonks!