Session
Technical Session X: Program Management
Abstract
The dramatic cost reduction of the Earth orbiting spacecraft has become the established fact, over the period roughly coinciding with existence of this conference. 10-15 years ago, the median cost of the spacecraft mission was around $100M (in today's dollars). One-million dollar missions were unheard of, except in the amateur radio community. Today, missions with the total cost of under $10M are common. Besides the well-established amateur radio programs, many low-cost university-led spacecraft programs took place. Plenty of other science, technology, experimental and know-how technology transfer programs have been or are being implemented. The last remaining frontier of the low-cost mantra are the deep space missions. The great progress has already been achieved in reducing the cost of planetary exploration but no credible mission was ever seriously considered under $40M (the lowest-cost examples are Clementine 1 and Lunar Prospector, both well over that limit). The minimum cost of planetary missions is about a factor of ten higher than for Earth-orbiting missions with roughly similar capabilities and lifetimes. Why is that? We will address this question in this paper. The answer to this question appears quite obvious: Of course, the deep-space missions are more difficult than the LEO missions. But we will try to show that this is not inherently true. Step by step, we will analyze and compare requirements between the deep-space and Earth-orbiting missions, note the differences and provide estimates of cost impact. There are some legitimate complications involving the deep space mission requirements that would command the cost premium for a deep-space project when compared with a similar Earth orbiter. But, we will argue that this premium is nowhere as large as commonly perceived. Why is this misconceptions occurring? We do not really know precisely and can only speculate. Knowledge and design aspects of the deep space environment have not been as widely disseminated as those for the LEO environment. Or perhaps, it is for a historical reason: it used to be significantly more difficult and that assumption has never been questioned again. Or, maybe, it is the exclusive-club issue: there are many more teams that have put together the LEO spacecraft, much more than a deep space mission. Or, it is just a fear of distant unknown places.
$3M Planetary Missions: Why Not? - Consideration of Deep-space Spacecraft Mission Requirements
The dramatic cost reduction of the Earth orbiting spacecraft has become the established fact, over the period roughly coinciding with existence of this conference. 10-15 years ago, the median cost of the spacecraft mission was around $100M (in today's dollars). One-million dollar missions were unheard of, except in the amateur radio community. Today, missions with the total cost of under $10M are common. Besides the well-established amateur radio programs, many low-cost university-led spacecraft programs took place. Plenty of other science, technology, experimental and know-how technology transfer programs have been or are being implemented. The last remaining frontier of the low-cost mantra are the deep space missions. The great progress has already been achieved in reducing the cost of planetary exploration but no credible mission was ever seriously considered under $40M (the lowest-cost examples are Clementine 1 and Lunar Prospector, both well over that limit). The minimum cost of planetary missions is about a factor of ten higher than for Earth-orbiting missions with roughly similar capabilities and lifetimes. Why is that? We will address this question in this paper. The answer to this question appears quite obvious: Of course, the deep-space missions are more difficult than the LEO missions. But we will try to show that this is not inherently true. Step by step, we will analyze and compare requirements between the deep-space and Earth-orbiting missions, note the differences and provide estimates of cost impact. There are some legitimate complications involving the deep space mission requirements that would command the cost premium for a deep-space project when compared with a similar Earth orbiter. But, we will argue that this premium is nowhere as large as commonly perceived. Why is this misconceptions occurring? We do not really know precisely and can only speculate. Knowledge and design aspects of the deep space environment have not been as widely disseminated as those for the LEO environment. Or perhaps, it is for a historical reason: it used to be significantly more difficult and that assumption has never been questioned again. Or, maybe, it is the exclusive-club issue: there are many more teams that have put together the LEO spacecraft, much more than a deep space mission. Or, it is just a fear of distant unknown places.
