Space Travel & Exploration

[cubby]

I assumed he meant will SpaceX be able to independent trips before SLS can do crewed missions. As of now SLS and Starship need each other to get their with the plan for Starship being able to do it on its own. NASA also plans to incorporate landers from other agencies, just not initially. There will a commercial program for the Moon.

I didn't know the entire relationship between the two launch systems. Can Starship not get to the moon because of fuel issues? Is SLS that much bigger than Starship? Or is it something else?

Have you heard/seen/read anything about commercial mining on the Moon? Helium-3 is a big deal, iirc.

[PACOX]

I didn't know the entire relationship between the two launch systems. Can Starship not get to the moon because of fuel issues? Is SLS that much bigger than Starship? Or is it something else?

Have you heard/seen/read anything about commercial mining on the Moon? Helium-3 is a big deal, iirc.

The fuel thing really isnt an issue as far as NASA. SpaceX has to solve that problem but it's not what keeping them from being allowed to launch people. It has no interior, no escape system, landing system is still iffy, and a relatively new concept altogether. So NASA and the FTA want to see more tests on a more complete prototype before they even start to talk about human rating it.

Using Starship to land on the Moon does require as nearly as much effort to get it certified to launch people from Earth. You just need to give the astronauts somewhere to stand for the ride up and down. Touching down on the Moon is a lot easier than trying do it on Earth

About Helium-3 mining. SpaceX is will have a head start compared to others, at least on paper. Space agencies signed this thing called the Artemis Accords that limits what a can do with resources on the Moon. There's a loophole that allows private companies to basically keep what they find. Starship is like a big space cargo truck, you can load them up full of good stuff. They could build one Starship that 'lives' (never goes further than lunar orbit once there) on the Moon, all they do is load it up with helium 3, launch into to lunar orbit to unpack/refuel, then land back on the Moon. They could then use a station, or even more Starships to store helium 3 in lunar orbit. Cargo/barge variants of Starship that 'live' in space will move the H3 wherever it needs to be, back on Earth, some space station, wherever. NASA is building the Lunar Gateway space station is going to be a proof on concept for using an orbital structure to make it easier to come and go from a moon/planet - you get that down and mining the moin/asteroids becomes a lot more feasible.


Concept of two Starships working in conjunction with a space station (I think that's supposed to be the Lunar Gateway). The white one is the lander. It stays on the Moon or at the station. The silver one is supposed to the transport vehicle that got astronauts from Earth to the station. You could use the white one to just load stuff back and forth to the Moon with a small relatively small amount of fuel. Looking at the picture I think the Orion capsule (what SLS uses to hold astronauts) is supposed to be the little capsule in the front near the silver Starship.

[Tuor]

First picture of James Webb telescope... sorter...

[Ripster42]

Helium-3 is a big deal, iirc.

There's still virtually no current use for helium-3. There's not likely to be a use for large quantities of it in your lifetime. Helium-3 is not a big deal. We're still probably decades away from deuterium fusion being useful, let alone helium fusion, which, aside from some extremely specialist applications, is the only thing its good for (and there's no guarantee that it'll ever be useful).

[Tuor]

We're still probably decades away from deuterium fusion being useful...

The plant that will use Deuterium for fusion is under construction in France, might take some more time to be completed but most likely not a decade.

For those that don't know, Deuterium is a lighter type of Hydrogen that requires less temperature to fuse, even Brown Dwarfs are able to fuse it.

[Vakna]

The plant that will use Deuterium for fusion is under construction in France, might take some more time to be completed but most likely not a decade.

For those that don't know, Deuterium is a lighter type of Hydrogen that requires less temperature to fuse, even Brown Dwarfs are able to fuse it.

Deuterium is an isotope of hydrogen, not helium. It also has double the atomic mass of regular hydrogen with one proton and one neutron (as oppose to one proton). It has nothing to do with helium at all.

[Tuor]

Yeahh i edited the post...

EDIT: He was speaking in helium it missleaded me sorry.

[Vakna]

Yeahh i edited the post...

EDIT: He was speaking in helium it missleaded me sorry.

You missed the part where you described deuterium as a lighter isotope, it's heavier.

[Osmeric]

The plant that will use Deuterium for fusion is under construction in France, might take some more time to be completed but most likely not a decade.

It will also (1) not be able to breed its own tritium, (2) not operate for more than a few weeks at full power over its entire lifetime, due to materials degradation, (3) not generate power from the heat energy produced, (4) be far too expensive to be competitive (by orders of magnitude) even if (1)-(3) weren't there.

Fusion is a meme technology. It's a lot less attractive than you've been told.

[Ripster42]

Yeahh i edited the post...

EDIT: He was speaking in helium it missleaded me sorry.

I was speaking of both. Helium requires much higher pressure to get the nuclei close enough to fuse; it's going to take much longer to realize. We still haven't even come close to making the much simpler hydrogen fusion work at a commercially viable level after more than 1/2 a century of dreaming. People talking about mining helium on the moon aren't being realistic. It's not remotely a serious concern now, nor is it likely to be in our lifetimes.

Asking if or saying that a company has a head start in mining the moon is, similarly, not being realistic. The timeline of mining the moon being feasible (not can we get there and mine it, but why anyone would bother going down a gravity well that big to mine) makes any current advantage in space capabilities largely meaningless this early in the game.

[Corvus]

Turns out the rocket going to hit the moon isn't from SpaceX after all, but an old Chinese booster.

[Forogil]

The plant that will use Deuterium for fusion is under construction in France, might take some more time to be completed but most likely not a decade.

For those that don't know, Deuterium is a lighter type of Hydrogen that requires less temperature to fuse, even Brown Dwarfs are able to fuse it.

What stars use for fusion isn't immediately relevant for fusion on earth, and the importance of Deuterium for fusion is actually instead something that happens at high temperatures.

The reason it isn't that relevant is that most stars last for million or billion of years (including Brown Dwarfs that can fuse Deuterium for a couple of million years before running out). But a fusion reactor on earth cannot wait that long.

However, fusing deuterium generates energy proportional to the temperature to the power of 11.8, so if the fusion reactor is ten times hotter than a brown dwarf (and otherwise similar) it generates energy a million million times faster. By comparison colliding protons (as in the sun) is only proportional to temperature to the power of 4 I think (and the CNO-cycle is messier). It is still relevant that deuterium fusion works at "low temperatures", since that combined with high temperature dependency mean that it generates a lot of energy at high temperature.

[Cosmic Janitor]

There's still virtually no current use for helium-3. There's not likely to be a use for large quantities of it in your lifetime. Helium-3 is not a big deal. We're still probably decades away from deuterium fusion being useful, let alone helium fusion, which, aside from some extremely specialist applications, is the only thing its good for (and there's no guarantee that it'll ever be useful).

Even if we had a use, mining it on the moon is such pie in the sky idea. People vastlys overestimate the scale of what we are currently capable and underestimate the challenges of extraterrestrial endevors. Same with the clowns that think they will in their life-time see anyone mining asteroids (in the kuiper belt no less).

[cubby]

Even if we had a use, mining it on the moon is such pie in the sky idea. People vastlys overestimate the scale of what we are currently capable and underestimate the challenges of extraterrestrial endevors. Same with the clowns that think they will in their life-time see anyone mining asteroids (in the kuiper belt no less).

I would think getting anything back from the moon to use on Earth would be, at least currently, and even with SpaceX's orders of magnitude reduction in lift cost, still cost prohibitive.

[Nerraw]

Soooooo. Things have changed a little bit recently, and it's not looking great for most space actors at this point:

Western launch operators
ULA: Relatively unaffected. The almost-retired Atlas 5 RD-180 engines are Russian, but they seem to have all the engines needed to finish out its remaining missions. Still fucked in the way that Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin has not delivered the engines for the replacement Vulcan rocket yet. These engines are almost 5 years overdue now. They are "confident" that they'll launch "this year" after having said the same thing for last year and the year before. Confidence-inspiring for sure.

Northrup Grumman: Fucked. Fucked every which way every day of the week. Their Antares launch vehicle runs on Russian RD-181 engines, and the first stage is manufactured in Ukraine. Said factory was flattened by Russia within the first 48 hours of the invasion. Word going around is that they have enough hardware for two more launches, and then that's it.

Arianespace: Kinda screwed. Arianespace has three rockets, going from the light Vega, the medium Soyuz (contracted from Russia), and the heavy Ariane 5. Vega's upper stage is manufactured in Ukraine, so its status is wholly unknown at the moment. Russia has terminated its Soyuz contract with the company and withdrawn all Russian personnel from French Guiana. And like the Atlas 5, the Ariane 5's future has already contractually come to an end. Still a number of launches to come, but the rocket is effectively retired. It is to be replaced by the Ariane 6, but like the Vulcan this rocket is several years overdue.

SpaceX: Completely unaffected.

There are of course a number of smaller US launch providers, but at this point in time none of them have flight hardware to take on anything remotely close to the payload weight class covered by the above.

Without SpaceX, the US launch capabilities would be gone. There is absolutely no redundancy whatsoever right now. Old Space has fucked around for years, and now they are truly finding out.



Science missions
International Space Station: In effect, nothing has changed here yet. However, the head of Roscosmos has been making a lot of troubling comments in the past week, including threatening to abandon the ISS and risk letting it fall on populated Western cities. A major problem here is that there are currently only two ways to boost the space stations orbit (required every so often because of atmospheric drag), and those two are Soyuz, and the US-based Cygnus spacecraft which launches on the aforementioned doomed Antares. Elon Musk has declared that SpaceX would be able to find a way to boost the station, which I have no doubt he can do, but as of right now the station may or may not survive past 2023 when the Russian contract is up for renewal. NASA has said they are indeed exploring contingencies, but they will continue to attempt working with the Russian science divisions on the subject. US astronaut on station launched on a Soyuz is still scheduled to come home on said Soyuz later this month.

ExoMars: The ESA/Roscosmos collaborative Mars lander mission, while being delayed a few years due to issues, was looking good for launching during the Mars launch window later this year. ESA has already announced this is unlikely to ever happen now, as they have taken a far harder stance on Russia than NASA has so far.

Venara: Roscosmos and NASA were collaborating on a Venara Venus exploration mission, but that has already been canned. NASA probably won't care much as they have two Venus missions of their own coming up this decade.

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And it looks like OneWeb is finally being impacted as well: https://twitter.com/lorengrush/statu...93356097175553

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Rogozin has decided to hold the OneWeb payload ransom and has given the UK government two days to change their mind and give up their stake in the project: https://twitter.com/thesheetztweetz/...59445074206723

The only remaining link of cooperation between Roscosmos and the west is now the ISS. I think it's safe to say that no one will ever invest in cooperating with the Russian space program ever again.

[Easo]

Roskosmos and Russia in general does not have enough cash for their own space station (with or without sanctions), there are more important things. It is just wishful thinking. They could, potentially, go with China, but that's debatable as well. Also - time it will take. Decade is the minimum for the first couple modules, at best.

As for Russian space program - sattelite launches will still happen for other countries. Less, sure, but they are not going to stop.

And Rogozin? He is a walking meme, for all kinds of Russians, even those currently cheering for war.

[Nerraw]

As for Russian space program - sattelite launches will still happen for other countries. Less, sure, but they are not going to stop.

Roscosmos has seized the payload, AND is keeping the money already paid for all the planned OneWeb launches in 2021. Who in their right minds would risk entrusting Roscosmos with their payloads?

[Hammerfest]

I wouldn't worry too much about the ISS.

[cubby]

Roscosmos has seized the payload, AND is keeping the money already paid for all the planned OneWeb launches in 2021. Who in their right minds would risk entrusting Roscosmos with their payloads?

It seems like, at a high cursory glance, that the way forward is SpaceX and pushing other U.S. based private agencies to build their own payload engines here. Russia has to be out for the foreseeable future.

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I wouldn't worry too much about the ISS.

Maybe you missed this post...

Soooooo. Things have changed a little bit recently, and it's not looking great for most space actors at this point:
International Space Station: In effect, nothing has changed here yet. However, the head of Roscosmos has been making a lot of troubling comments in the past week, including threatening to abandon the ISS and risk letting it fall on populated Western cities. A major problem here is that there are currently only two ways to boost the space stations orbit (required every so often because of atmospheric drag), and those two are Soyuz, and the US-based Cygnus spacecraft which launches on the aforementioned doomed Antares. Elon Musk has declared that SpaceX would be able to find a way to boost the station, which I have no doubt he can do, but as of right now the station may or may not survive past 2023 when the Russian contract is up for renewal. NASA has said they are indeed exploring contingencies, but they will continue to attempt working with the Russian science divisions on the subject. US astronaut on station launched on a Soyuz is still scheduled to come home on said Soyuz later this month.

If Russia skips out on all ISS obligations, the boost is in jeopardy - and even if it isn't immediately necessary, it's still eventually needed - and there is no solution outside of Soyuz. So, mr. cryptic one-line no-sources-in-your-posts, what isn't there to worry about again?

[Hammerfest]

Maybe you missed this post...

No, I got it.