Space Station: NASA Plans Its Latest Vast Venture for U.S. Aerospace Funds

One of the best things that ever happened to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was that Skylab, launched in 1973, fell back into the earth’s atmosphere and burned in 1979. If it still existed, it would be a huge embarrassment to the agency’s current request for a space station.

One reason Skylab would embarrass NASA is that it was cheap: about $5 billion in current dollars. NASA’s proposed space station may cost $60 billion to build, let alone operate.

Another awkward aspect of Skylab is that it was considerably larger than the new Soviet Mir space station, launched last year to cries of “the Russians are ahead!” from aerospace lobbyists.

But the most inconvenient thing about Skylab was that, after just three crew visits, NASA stopped sending astronauts there. Skylab floated vacant for five years before it fell. Budget constraints were a factor, but the real reason was that NASA had trouble dreaming up things for space-station astronauts to do.

But don’t let reality get you down. The new NASA demand is for a “continuously occupied” space station that will have men aboard, whether or not there is anything to do.

The new NASA project represents, in many respects, a greater national extravagance than the Apollo moon program. Apollo was expensive, but returned many benefits--scientific knowledge, a triumph of American technical prestige, a testament to human courage. The space station will merely make work for NASA and its contractors. Apollo had clear goals and, after accomplishing them, ended. The space station project has no clear goals (other than funding) and will never stop demanding more money. And the kicker is: The entire Apollo program cost about $40 billion in 1987 dollars. That bought six manned landings on the moon, three manned trips around the moon and numerous test flights. When operating expenses are thrown in, the space station will cost more than Apollo, while its inspiration value will be negligible. Indeed, it may damage the space program if it proceeds just far enough to become a megabucks white elephant--not unlikely.

Let’s examine space station costs, potential uses, politics and then some alternatives:

Costs. In 1984, NASA said the space station would cost about $8 billion. Early this year NASA allowed as how it should have said about $14.5 billion (nearly $16 billion in 1987 dollars). NASA has since adopted a balmy practice of quoting all space station prices in 1984 dollars--allegedly for consistency, actually to soften their magnitude. Though it is not possible to return to 1984 to purchase the space station, NASA documents seem to pretend otherwise.

Two months ago the National Academy of Sciences examined the proposal at White House request and came up with an “interim” cost estimate of $32 billion, or twice NASA’s. After further study, the academy issued a solid number--$30 billion for the first phase of construction. No guess for the entire project.

Do we have the real price tag? Probably not. To calculate the cost of placing the station in orbit, the academy relied on NASA’s operating price for the space shuttle, a low-ball figure that Joe Isuzu could not recite with a straight face. NASA claims a space-shuttle launch costs $78 million. But if NASA’s budget for manned flight is divided by the number of space-shuttle launches in 1985--the last year of normal operations before Challenger--the price was $550 million per launch. Talk about adding dealer prep. At true shuttle costs, the complete facility will cost about $60 billion.

Uses. NASA cites these potential uses for the space station: observatory, space manufacturing site, repair and refueling station for satellites, staging base for assembly of moon or Mars ships and laboratory.

-- Observatory. Telescopes and other devices mounted aboard the station could perform important observations. But these can be accomplished with higher technical quality, and far more cheaply, by satellites. One lesson of Skylab was that men caused the station to jiggle in ways that threw off the fine calibrations of instruments. In the microgravity environment of orbit, one person pushing his feet against the floor can make the building shake.

-- Space manufacturing. Space manufacturing has been a field of flowering promises and no payoffs. Someday commercial space manufacturing will come, but a space station may actually stand in the way. Because human bouncing around disrupts the pristine conditions that space manufacturing is all about, NASA plans to include manufacturing “platforms” in the station complex--unmanned craft that fly alongside but do not touch it. That’s right. In tandem with our $60-billion astronaut luxury hotel we will have devices to simulate unmanned conditions.

-- Repair and refueling of satellites. Possible, but not cost-effective. Most satellites have little value by the time they wear out. A few military-reconnaissance and special NASA satellites are worth servicing: A space tug will have to be built to convey these to the station’s orbit, however, which may make this “saving” an expensive proposition--rather akin to driving your mail to the recipient’s door in order to save postage.

-- Staging base. Again possible but not cost effective. In order to be serviced by the space shuttle, the space station must be placed in a low orbit the shuttle can reach. Such orbits are ill-suited for vehicles bound for the moon or the planets.

-- Laboratory. Two basic types of work may be performed on a space station: scientific experiments and biological studies of the effects of weightlessness.

The general scientific experiments could be done aboard the space shuttle. In fact, former White House science adviser George A. Keyworth once campaigned to have the space-shuttle fleet essentially converted into a fleet of orbital workshops--first, to get the shuttle out of the dangerous and profligate business of launching cargo; second, to obtain the benefits of a space laboratory right away, at far lower cost than building a space station. Keyworth’s efforts were beaten back by former NASA Administrator James M. Beggs, who persuaded President Reagan that the space station was something he could claim credit for (Reagan did, in his 1985 State of the Union address) but not pay for, since the bulk of costs would fall on future Presidents.

Biological studies on the extended effects of weightlessness have been the focus of the Soviet manned-space program, with mini-space stations in orbit for 16 years. Results have been discouraging. Soviet scientists have found no antidotes for the muscle atrophy, motion sickness and bone decay that accompany prolonged stays in space.

Do we need to duplicate that unsuccessful research? The whole concept is a circularity: putting astronauts in space to find out how to counter the damaging effect on astronauts in space.

-- Military. NASA doesn’t list military space-station applications. Could there be any? Yes, but hardly of the cost-effective variety.

The best evidence of this shortage of military space-station applications is Mir. Surely the Soviets would love to use their new facility for military advantage, but apparently they aren’t. A good guess is that they cannot think of any military applications other than reconnaissance, already done by satellites.

Politics. In the wake of Challenger, logical thinking about space policy seems to have been suspended. NASA is insisting that all space-station components be launched via shuttle, rather than by cheaper expendable boosters, and assembled in orbit by astronauts. At least 32 missions would be required, more than the entire shuttle fleet has flown.

In addition to being more expensive, orbital assembly of multiple shuttle-launched space station components will be riskier than building a few big pieces on the ground and launching them with what the U.S. space program most desperately needs--a new large throwaway rocket employing basic technology to keep costs low. NASA officials maintain that although such a “big, dumb booster” would save money once developed, now is not the time to invest in a new vehicle-development program. Yet the agency will invest at least $1 billion developing a “lifeboat” spacecraft for bringing the space station crew back to earth quickly in an emergency. This is more than would be required for a big, dumb booster.

It’s safe to say that nearly all U.S. scientists not employed or funded by NASA oppose the space station, fearing that to finance it, money for cost-effective space science will be starved out.

Now, in a delightful reversal, Sen. William Proxmire (D-Wis.), whom scientists long despised as a Philistine for his “Golden Fleece” awards, has become the scientists’ champion.

Proxmire chairs a Senate subcommittee with jurisdiction over NASA. He has vowed to kill the station, and recently said, “NASA has fallen prey increasingly over the years to an institutional imperative that requires it to consider the needs of its eight space centers first, and national goals second.”

Unrealistic thinking about the space station is an expression of NASA’s cultural change, a descent from the progressive, goal-oriented agency of the 1960s to a defense-contractor mentality making staff and budget preservation the driving considerations.

Lately the line spouted by NASA backers and aerospace lobbyists is that what the agency needs is a sign of White House “leadership.” “Leadership” is a code word for a big budget increase.

The space program does need a demonstration of White House leadership--of a better kind. True leadership would entail converting the shuttle to a limited role as an orbiting science workshop; postponing the space station until a valid requirement came along; developing new, low-cost “dumb” expendable boosters for almost all missions, and starting work on a small, practical “spaceplane” that could carry people and their supplies into orbit for those missions when men are truly needed.