Big Sky Debate Page


LIVING OFF THE LAND IS CRITICAL TO MAKE THE TRIP ECONOMICALLY FEASIBLE-Zubrin '97



Download 1.79 Mb.
Page11/32
Date18.10.2016
Size1.79 Mb.
#2940
1   ...   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   ...   32

LIVING OFF THE LAND IS CRITICAL TO MAKE THE TRIP ECONOMICALLY FEASIBLE-Zubrin '97

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; The Case for Mars The Plan to Settle the Red Planet and Why We Must; 1997; Kindle Edition; Location 161]


A piloted Mars mission is not about building enormous interplanetary cruisers—it’s about moving a payload capable of supporting a small crew of astronauts from the surface of Earth to the surface of Mars, and then moving that or a similar payload back again to return the crew. Provided we take full advantage of the leverage afforded by the use of local resources to reduce mission logistics to a manageable level, such a task is not at all beyond our technical or fiscal means. Travel light and live off the land—that’s the ticket to Mars.

SOLVENCY: MARS DIRECT WILL BE LOW COST
THE KEY TO MARS IS DOING IT ON THE CHEAP-Portree '97

[David S.F.; The new Martian chronicles; Astronomy; August 1997; page 32]


The key to reaching Mars is doing it smart and doing it cheap. In 1989, during the 20th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, President Bush challenged NASA to figure out how to put human beings on Mars. The space agency came back with an elephantine 30-year plan that involved construction bays and fuel depots in low-Earth orbit and carried a jaw-dropping price tag of $450 billion.

What drove up the cost of the project was the size of the spacecraft needed to reach Mars, and what drove up the size of the spacecraft was all the fuel and other consumables it would need to carry with it on so long a trip. But while Mars is indeed remote--at its farthest it's 1,000 times as distant as the moon--it has a lot of things the moon doesn't, most notably an atmosphere. And that makes all the difference.


OVER TIME AND MISSIONS, THE COSTS OF MARS EXPLORATION AND COLONIZATION WILL DECREASE-Zubrin '97

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; The Case for Mars The Plan to Settle the Red Planet and Why We Must; 1997; Kindle Edition; Location 173]


Over time, many new exploration bases will be added, but eventually it will have to be determined which of the base regions is the best location to build an actual Mars settlement. Ideally this will be situated above a geothermally heated subsurface reservoir, which will afford the base a copious supply of hot water and electric power. Once that happens, new landings will not go to new sites. Rather, each additional hab will land at the same site. In time, a set of structures resembling a small town will slowly take form. The high cost of transportation between Earth and Mars will create a strong financial incentive to find astronauts willing to extend their surface stay beyond the basic one and a half year tour of duty. As experience is gained in living on Mars, growing food, and producing useful materials of all sorts, astronauts will extend their stay times to four years, six years, and more. As the years go by, the transportation costs to Mars will steadily decrease, driven down by new technologies and competitive bids from contractors offering to deliver cargo to support the base. Photovoltaic panels and windmills manufactured on site and new geothermal wells will add to the power supply, and locally produced inflatable plastic structures will multiply the town’s pressurized living space. As more people steadily arrive and stay longer before they leave, the population of the town will grow. In the course of things children will be born, and families raised on Mars—the first true colonists of a new branch of human civilization.
WORKING MORE QUICKLY TOWARDS A MARS GOAL MEANS A CHEAPER OVERALL MISSION-Wolfgang '11

[Ben; Future bright to NASA chief; Bolden: U.S. 'recommitting' itself to human space flight; The Washington Times; 4 July 2011; page A5]


During the 1960s, as NASA was moving full steam ahead on its lunar missions, every experiment and technological breakthrough was geared toward making the moon landing a reality, Mr. Zubrin said. That approach helped save money, he argues.

The faster you do something, the cheaper it will be, he said.



LACK OF MONEY ISN'T THE BARRIER FOR A MARS MISSION; FOCUS AND DIRECTION ARE ENOUGH-Zubrin '03

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; Mission to Mars: The Red Planet beckons, says The Mars Society's ROBERT ZUBRIN. Now is no time for Canada to drop out of a project that may be humanity's greatest challenge; Globe & Mail; 23 August 2003; Page A19]


Nor is cost the central issue: NASA's average budget from 1961 to 1973, when it built up from near-zero space capability to storm space and reach the moon, was $17-billion (U.S.) in 2003 dollars. That's only 9-per-cent greater than NASA's current budget of $15.6-billion. The problem is not lack of money, but lack of focus and direction. As a result of operating without a central goal, the U.S. space program has floundered, and funds have been spent at a rate comparable to that of the 1960s without producing anything approaching commensurate results.
FOCUS AND DECISION MORE IMPORTANT THAN MONEY IN A MARS MISSION-Zubrin '09

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; The moon–mars initiative: Making the vision real; Futures; October 2009; page 541]


But we need to understand what the real goal is, and go for it. We need to understand that Mars, and not the Moon, should be our goal. We can make it to that goal, provided we directour resources in that direction. It is not a matter of money, but of willingness to focus and make decisions. The $6 billion per year currently being wasted to fund the mistakes of the past is more than enough to open the way to Mars. We just need to decide to do it.
MARS DIRECT IS AFFORDABLE AND A LOWER LAUNCH RATE THAN THE SHUTTLE PROGRAM-Zubrin '99

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; Sending Humans to Mars; Scientific American Presents; 1999; page 46]


Thus, under the Mars Direct plan, the U.S. would launch two heavy-lift booster rockets every other year: one to dispatch a team of four people to inhabit Mars and the other to prepare a new site for the next mission. The average launch rate of one a year is only about 15 percent of the rate that the U.S. currently launches space shuttles and is clearly affordable. In effect, the live-off-the-land strategy used by the Mars Direct plan removes the prospect of a manned mission to Mars from the realm of megaspacecraft fantasy and renders it a task comparable in difficulty to the launching of the Apollo missions to the moon.
MARS DIRECT WOULD COST A FRACTION OF PREVIOUS NASA ESTIMATES FOR A MARS MISSION-Zubrin '99

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; Sending Humans to Mars; Scientific American Presents; 1999; page 46]


In 1990, when my colleague David A. Baker and I (we were then both at Martin-Marietta) first put forward the basic Mars Direct plan, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration viewed it as too radical to consider seriously. But over the past couple of years, with encouragement from Michael Griffin, NASA's former associate administrator for exploration, as well as from the current head of NASA, Daniel S. Goldin, the group in charge of designing human missions to Mars at the NASA Johnson Space Center decided to take another look at our idea.

In 1994 researchers there produced a cost estimate for a program based on an expanded version of the Mars Direct plan that had been scaled up by about a factor of two. Their result: $50 billion. Notably, in 1989 this same group assigned a $400-billion price tag to the traditional, cumbersome approach to a manned mission to Mars based on orbital assembly of megaspacecraft. I believe that with further discipline in the design of the mission, the cost could be brought down to the $20-billion to $30-billion range. Spent over 10 years, this amount would constitute an annual expenditure of about 20 percent of NASA's budget, or around 1 percent of the U.S. military's budget. It is a small price to pay for a new world.



HIGH DOLLAR ESTIMATES FOR MARS INCLUDE A LOT OF UNNECESSARY TECHNOLOGY PROJECTS-Oberg '99

[James; Missionaries to Mars; Technology Review; January/February 1999; page 54]


One credible explanation for the hideous $450 billion price tag for Bush's SEI was offered by one of the conference organizers. space engineer and Mars enthusiast Bob Zubrin. Basically, Zubrin in believes, the representatives of the different NASA centers got together, listed all of the dream projects they had always wanted to do, and all agreed to scratch one another's backs. As a result, most of the price tag was devoted to open ended developmental projects whose utility for a Mars expedition was questionable at best.
MARS DIRECT WILL EVENTUALLY DRIVE COSTS DOWN EVEN FURTHER OVER TIME-Zubrin '96

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; Mars on a shoestring; November/December 1996; page 20]


Every two years, a pair of Ares boosters will blast off, one delivering a hab to a prepared site, the other an earth return vehicle to open up a new region for the next mission. Over time, a network of exploratory bases will be established, turning large areas of Mars into human territory. But eventually one base region will be chosen as the site for building an actual Mars settlement. Ideally, this will be situated above a geothermally heated reservoir to supply hot water and electric power. In time, a set of structures resembling a small town will slowly take form.

The high cost of transportation between earth and Mars will create a strong financial incentive to find astronauts willing to extend their tours to four years, six years, and more. But over time, the transportation costs to Mars will steadily fall, driven down by new technologies and competitive bids from contractors offering to deliver cargo to support the base. Photovoltaic panels and windmills manufactured on site from Martian materials will add to the power supply, and locally produced inflatable plastic structures will multiply the town's pressurized living space. With more arrivals and longer stays, the population of the town will grow. In the course of things, children will be born, and families raised, on Mars--the first true colonists of a new branch of human civilization.


MARS DIRECT USE ACCESSIBLE SCIENCE MAKING THE TRIP MUCH MORE AFFORDABLE-Portree '97

[David S.F.; The new Martian chronicles; Astronomy; August 1997; page 32]


For the past decade--ever since NASA's 1989 proposal laid its half-trillion-dollar egg--the space community has been intrigued by a mission scenario known as the Mars Direct plan. Developed by engineers at Martin Marietta Astronautics, a NASA contractor, Mars Direct calls not merely for visiting the Red Planet but also for living off the alien land.

As early as 2005, when Earth and Mars are in their once-every-26-months alignment, the plan envisions launching a four-person spacecraft to Mars--but launching it with its tanks empty of fuel and its cabin empty of crew. Landing on the surface, the craft would begin pumping Martian atmosphere--which is 95% carbon dioxide--into a reaction chamber, where it would be exposed to hydrogen and broken down into methane, water and oxygen. Methane and oxygen make a first-rate rocket fuel; water and oxygen are necessary human fuels. All these consumables could be pumped into tanks inside the ship and stored there.

Two years later, when Mars and Earth are again in conjunction, another spacecraft--this one carrying a crew--would be sent to join the robot ship on the surface. The astronauts could work on Mars for 18 months, living principally in their arrival craft, and then, at the end of their stay, abandon that ship, climb into the robot craft and blast off for home. "Fly several of these missions," says Robert Zubrin, author of the book The Case for Mars and one of the engineers who developed the plan, "and you leave the surface scattered with a series of warming huts that serve as the beginnings of a base."

What makes the Mars Direct plan remarkable is how unremarkable the science behind it is. The spacecraft in which the astronauts will live are descendants of the same pressurized vessels NASA has been building since the Mercury days. The boosters that will lift the ships off the ground are reconfigured engines cannibalized from the shuttle. The technology needed to distill the Martian atmosphere is the stuff of first-year chemistry texts. For this reason, Zubrin believes, Mars Direct could be surprisingly affordable: about $40 billion for five missions, or less than half the cost of the Apollo program in today's dollars.


MARS DIRECT REDUCES COSTS-Zubrin '09

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; The moon–mars initiative: Making the vision real; Futures; October 2009; page 541]


In essence, by taking advantage of the most obvious local resource available on Mars – its atmosphere – the plan allows us to accomplish a manned Mars mission with what amounts to a lunar-class transportation system. By eliminating any requirement to introduce a new order of technology and complexity of operations beyond those needed for lunar transportation to accomplish piloted Mars missions, the plan can reduce costs by an order of magnitude and advance the schedule for the human exploration of Mars by a generation. Indeed, since a lunar-class transportation system is adequate to reach Mars using this plan, it is rational to consider a milestone mission, perhaps 5 years into the program, where a subset of the Mars flight hardware is exercised to send astronauts to the Moon.
MARS DIRECT IS A MORE LIKELY SCENARIO FOR SUCCESS AND LOW COST-Manzey '04

[Dietrich; Institute of Psychology and Ergonomics, Technical University of Berlin; Human missions to Mars: new psychological challenges and research issues; Acta Astronautica; August-November 2004; page 781]


The distance between Earth and Mars is enormous, with Mars never getting closer than about 60 million kilometers. This makes every attempt to fly to Mars an extreme complex undertaking. A first suitability study of a human flight to Mars already was published in 1953 [1]. According to this “Marsproject” an armada of 10 spacecrafts was envisioned to transport some 50 people to the martian surface for a stay of 400 days. Since then numerous studies have been addressed, the technical possibilities for a human flight to Mars, and reference scenarios for a Mars mission have been developed in the US, Europe and Russia [2, 3 and 4]. In most of these studies, two different approaches for a flight to Mars are distinguished. The first one involves a transfer flight on a high energy trajectory that will last 160–250 days, a stay on the martian surface of a maximum of about 60 days and a flight back of again 160–250 days. Beside high costs of energy, the main disadvantage of this approach is the comparatively short-term stay on the surface which relates to constraints for a return flight due to the constellations of Earth and Mars. Thus, a second scenario seems to be more likely. This scenario involves a round-trip to Mars of about 1000 days including transfer flights on low energy trajectories lasting 200–300 days. After arrival at Mars the crew has to stay there for about 400–500 days without any possibilities for rescue or re-supply until an appropriate launch window opens for a low-energy flight back. Such an approach has been proposed in “The Mars Direct Plan” by Robert Zubrin, and has also been chosen for recent reference mission scenarios developed by NASA and ESA [2, 3 and 5]. All of these plans envision a crew of six astronauts traveling to Mars in a habitat of about 300–400 m3 which might be considerably enlarged on the martian surface by use of inflatable elements or additional elements sent by separate cargo flights, respectively.
SOLVENCY: SMALLER CREW IS PREFERRED
LESS CREW MAKES CREW SELECTION LESS COMPLEX-Salotti '11

[Jean Marc; Professor of Computer Science, Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Cognitique, Institut Polytechnique de Bordeaux; Simplified scenario for manned Mars missions; Acta Astronautica; September-October 2011; page 266]


Another problem is to maximize the skills of the crew. The most important skill is the ability to use and repair the numerous systems onboard the spacecraft. Since there are many sensors and many devices for the production, processing or exploitation of different elements (oxygen, water, carbon dioxide, propellant, etc.), we suggest sending two persons with primary skills in chemistry, thermodynamics, mechanics and electricity. They would have to perform a long training phase for the use of onboard systems and other relevant domains, especially medicine, biology and astronautics. Eventually, a doctor with a long training in other domains might be preferred. As it is also stated in the DRA report, we have to find efficient solutions to mitigate health problems due to long stays in microgravity [9] and [17]. Zubrin and Wagner [21] suggests spinning the spacecraft to simulate the Martian gravity. A more simple solution is to bring a centrifuge onboard [1] and [2]. Some experiments have been conducted on Earth. For instance a centrifuge is currently used at MEDES (Institut de médecine et de physiologie spatiale in Toulouse, France), but the concept has not been tested in space. We assume in this paper that a small centrifuge would be onboard and would help in minimizing the physiological effects of microgravity. Other counter measures would also help in maintaining muscular strength and crew health. Even if the skills of the astronauts enable a good exploitation of the spacecraft, we also have to consider scientific skills to perform experiments in space and on the surface of Mars. The 4 astronauts of our scenario can work together on the surface of Mars but in comparison with a crew of 6 with different specialists, there would be a lack of expertise in some domains with a possible negative impact on scientific returns. However, if that drawback enables strong simplifications of the scenario, which in turn would make manned missions less risky and affordable, is that not the most suitable option?
A SIMPLER, MORE COST EFFECTIVE MISSION TO MARS IS POSSIBLE WITH SMALL CREWS-Salotti '11

[Jean Marc; Professor of Computer Science, Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Cognitique, Institut Polytechnique de Bordeaux; Simplified scenario for manned Mars missions; Acta Astronautica; September-October 2011; page 266]


An efficient tradeoff between Mars Direct and Von Braun scenarios can nevertheless be made. In our scenario, we propose a single habitable module for the entire mission, the use of the same propulsion system for the landing and the return to Mars orbit and a duplication of the mission as it was suggested by Von Braun. In order to make that scenario simple and feasible, we propose a crew of 2 per vehicle. That scenario is very interesting for several reasons:

• A crew of 2 astronauts minimizes the needs in terms of mass and size of the spacecraft, which have a great impact on the mass of heat shield and propellant for landing on the surface of Mars. The entry, descent and landing stage is thus simpler and probably safer.

• If we choose a short number of astronauts per vehicle, the mass of accommodations and consumables is reduced. For the outbound stage, it might be possible to take in each vehicle a chemical unit and associated power systems for in situ propellant production. There is no need to send other spacecrafts to Mars. In addition, compared to the DRA scenario, the risk of landing too far from the ERV is eliminated.

• The preliminary automatic mission that is required in Mars Direct or in the DRA to produce propellant before the arrival of the crew can be avoided. Each vehicle would indeed carry its own system to produce propellant, which would serve as a possible backup for the second.

• The deployment and maintenance of ISRU (In Situ Resource Utilization unit) and power systems are facilitated. The use of large and flexible solar arrays might even be enabled only if astronauts are present on the surface.

• Finally, if a major incident occurs during the trip, for instance an explosion of an oxygen tank like in the Apollo 13 mission, since two vehicles are sent to Mars and return to the Earth at the same time, it is possible to undertake a rescue mission and proceed to a transshipment of the crew onto the second vehicle.


ADVANTAGE: MARS MISSION WOULD DRIVE INTEREST IN SCIENCE
MARS HAS THE POTENTIAL OF DRIVING INTEREST IN SCIENCE-Zubrin '09

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; The moon–mars initiative: Making the vision real; Futures; October 2009; page 541]


In terms of its social value, Mars is the bracing positive challenge that our society needs. Nations, like people, thrive on challenge and decay without it. The challenge of a humans-to Mars program would also be an invitation to adventure to every youth in the country, sending out the powerful clarion call: “Learn your science and you can become part of pioneering a new world.” There will be over 100 million kids in our nation's schools over the next 10 years. If a Mars program were to inspire just an extra 1% of them to scientific educations, the net result would be 1 million more scientists, engineers, inventors, medical researchers and doctors, making technological innovations that create new industries, finding new medical cures, strengthening national defense, and generally increasing national income to an extent that utterly dwarfs the expenditures of the Mars program.
A MISSION TO MARS WILL CREATE EXCITEMENT FOR SCIENCE EDUCATION ACROSS THE COUNTRY-Wolfgang '11

[Ben; Future bright to NASA chief; Bolden: U.S. 'recommitting' itself to human space flight; The Washington Times; 4 July 2011; page A5]


Aside from the scientific data that can be gained from a Mars mission, Mr. Logsdon and Mr. Zubrin agree on another purpose for an ambitious space agenda: generating excitement across the country, particularly among students who too often lack an interest in science, technology and engineering.

Having some sense of an exciting future in space is clearly important, Mr. Logsdon said.


A MARS MISSION WOULD INCREASE INTEREST IN SCIENCE EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES-Zubrin '99

[Robert; President of the Mars Society; Sending Humans to Mars; Scientific American Presents; 1999; page 46]


Such a program would also serve as an invitation to adventure for children around the world. There will be some 100 million kids in U.S. schools over the next 10 years. If a Mars program were to inspire just an additional 1 percent of them to pursue scientific educations, the net result would be one million more scientists, engineers, inventors, medical researchers and doctors.
JOURNEY TO MARS CRITICAL FOR HUMAN SURVIVAL-Giddings ‘11

[S., Ph.D., To Be Human is to Explore; The Journal of Cosmology, 2011, http://journalofcosmology.com/Mars151.html; retrieved 29 July 2011]


Space is the next frontier, and travel to Mars a small hop to a stepping stone in a grander quest. It would be an honor to represent humankind in its exploration, and those with an adventurous spirit will find this calling -- even with no vision of return. The first human visitors to its surface will watch in awe as they see Earth -- barely larger than a star -- rising from the martian horizon. With this distant view of home, they will begin discoveries on how to make a new life, both for themselves, and for our species.

Like with other settlers, their first challenge will be to find a way to survive and sustain life. They will begin to find resources both on the planet, and within themselves. For the first time in history, they will begin to learn whether and how humans can sustain themselves in an environment utterly different from the cradle of our species, Earth. They will begin a journey that may even be the key to humanity's survival.




A TRIP TO MARS IS CRITICAL FOR UNDERSTANDING THE COSMOS-Giddings ‘11

[S., Ph.D., To Be Human is to Explore; The Journal of Cosmology, 2011, http://journalofcosmology.com/Mars151.html; retrieved 29 July 2011]


These pioneers will confront entirely new challenges of physics, engineering, and mobility. With their fragile toehold, they will then begin to explore the richness of a profoundly different geography and geology, possibly even a biology. They will expand the human psyche to a visceral new understanding, by witnessing the cosmos and the smallness of our planet in views never imagined by our ancestors, and never seen by the human eye. They will give the human family a bold yet terribly humbling perspective on our role in a vast cosmos.

Download 1.79 Mb.

Share with your friends:
1   ...   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   ...   32



The database is protected by copyright ©ininet.org 2024
send message
    Main page
solar system
russian academy
major cities
gospel according
devastating impact
only alternative
solar wind
material included
most user-friendly