RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE NEW POLICY BRIEF ADMINISTRATION NASA’s Space Launch System George W.S. Abbey, Senior Fellow in Space Policy This brief is part of a series of policy recommendations for the administration of President Joe Biden. Focusing on a range of important issues facing the country, the briefs are intended to provide decision-makers with relevant and effective ideas for addressing domestic and foreign policy priorities. View the entire series at www.bakerinstitute.org/recommendations-2021. NASA is currently developing the largest Committee.1 The commercially available rocket the United States has ever built, SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, with two- the Space Launch System (SLS). It will be thirds of the lift capability of the early capable of carrying between 150,000 and version of the SLS, can be purchased for 290,000 pounds to lower Earth orbit. significantly less per launch. Reliability is At the same time, aerospace industrial also an important factor, and due to its companies have and are developing a series launch costs, the SLS is unlikely to fly very of heavy-lift launch vehicles. SpaceX has often—probably only once or twice a year. already flown their Falcon Heavy, a larger With that launch rate, it will be difficult to version of the Falcon 9 rocket. The United build up any demonstrated reliability. Launch Alliance (ULA) is also developing a The SLS has also suffered significant new launch vehicle called the Vulcan that’s cost overruns and schedule delays. A 2020 scheduled to fly in 2021 or 2022. And Blue Office of Inspector General (OIG) report While the SLS is to Origin, a third U.S. aerospace company, is stated the cost of the booster had already have the capability developing the New Glenn, a launch vehicle grown by nearly 30% (about $2 billion) and that will be able to deliver 100,000 pounds that the first launch of the rocket, originally to launch a larger to lower Earth orbit. planned for late 2017, would be delayed to payload than the While the SLS is to have the capability June 2021 or later.2 The lack of transparency commercial rockets to launch a larger payload than the relative to the program’s costs also made it that are currently under commercial rockets that are currently difficult to determine the expected true cost under development and available, a key of the program. NASA had estimated the development and factor for a rocket is launch costs. Due to development costs through its first launch to available, a key factor its high launch costs and the availability have grown to $8.75 billion, when a launch for a rocket is of other, more cost-effective commercial had been assumed in November 2020, an launch costs. launch vehicles, the Biden administration increase of 25%.3 should review the need for the SLS and take That original commitment set the cost these factors into consideration during the of SLS development through the first launch negotiation of the annual federal budget. at $7 billion, a figure that does not include A government cost estimate for flying $2.7 billion in earlier formulation costs for a single SLS rocket was estimated to come the heavy-lift rocket. That commitment to over $2 billion in a recent administration also missed costs associated with other letter to the Senate Appropriations aspects of the SLS program not directly tied RICE UNIVERSITY’S BAKER INSTITUTE FOR PUBLIC POLICY // POLICY BRIEF to the first launch, which had the effect, the somewhat depending on each mission, OIG concluded, of masking the actual cost but if the vehicle does just three flights a growth of the program. It concluded that year, it can get more into space than the costs would grow by 33% through the end SLS for a fraction of the cost. Meanwhile, of fiscal year 2019 and by an estimated 43% Blue Origin’s New Glenn12 and a heavy-lift through the new projected launch date.4 version of ULA’s Vulcan13 are expected to That assessment also did not capture lift about the same weight. ULA and Blue the full cost of the SLS program, such as Origin have not stated a cost to launch funds spent on work for the second or these vehicles. However, even if the rockets later launches. The OIG report estimated each cost $500 million to launch twice a that NASA would spend $17 billion on the year, they have already matched the SLS SLS through the end of fiscal year 2020, of for a lower cost. which $5.9 billion was not included in the SpaceX is also developing another baseline commitment.5 rocket—the Starship—a fully-reusable NASA leadership, the report stated, two-stage-to-orbit super heavy-lift acknowledged their cost management launch vehicle. The Starship will feature approach “is not a good fit for managing a six Raptor engines, three sea-level Raptors long-term human exploration program with for atmospheric flight, and three vacuum- multiple planned missions over decades.”6 optimized Raptors for propulsion in space.14 However, they decided to focus on costs Elon Musk, the CEO of SpaceX, has stated through the first launch early in the SLS that a Raptor could eventually achieve a program, given the uncertainty about long- thrust-to-weight ratio of 200 and that, The commercially term plans. over time, a Starship will be capable to available SpaceX Falcon “While we understand the difficulty launch over 100 tons of cargo. “By any Heavy will be able of setting baselines long into the future, measure, the high thrust variant of Raptor to carry more than total SLS Program cost increases will not will probably have the highest thrust-to- be readily transparent because NASA is not weight ratio of any engine ever,” Musk 100,000 pounds to tracking and reporting all costs against an stated in a tweet on September 1, 2020.15 lower Earth orbit. official baseline,” the report stated. “For SpaceX is quoting that the Super Heavy will example, NASA currently does not have have a gross liftoff mass of over 3 million a cost estimate for the second launch of kilograms. the SLS and is not tracking or reporting The second stage of the large rocket, cost impacts caused by schedule delays or also referred to as “Starship,” is being technical challenges for that mission.”7 designed as a long-duration cargo, Since 2011, Congress has appropriated and eventually, a passenger-carrying approximately $2 billion per year for the spacecraft. It is being used initially development of the SLS rocket.8 There without any booster stage, as part of an are, in addition to other costs that are extensive development program to assess not included, hundreds of millions of the launch and landing of the vehicle and dollars spent annually on ground systems to evaluate design variations associated development for the support of the rocket’s with the vehicle’s atmospheric reentry. launch at the Kennedy Space Center. If The spacecraft was tested on its own at these costs are amortized over 10 launches suborbital altitudes in 2019 and 2020. It will of the SLS vehicle, the cost would be later be utilized on orbital launches with an approximately $4 billion per flight.9 additional booster stage, the Super Heavy. The commercially available SpaceX On these flights, the spacecraft will serve Falcon Heavy will be able to carry more as both the two-stage-to-orbit launch than 100,000 pounds to lower Earth vehicle and the in-space orbital spacecraft. orbit.10 That’s about half of the capability Integrated system testing of a proof of SLS, but SpaceX is quoting a price per of concept for the Starship began in flight that will start at only $90 million.11 March 2019, with the addition of a single It’s possible that the price may increase 2 NASA’S SPACE LAUNCH SYSTEM Raptor rocket engine to a reduced-height prototype. On December 9, 2020, at their ENDNOTES test site in Boca Chica, Texas, a full-size 1. Letter to the Chair and Vice Chair prototype of SpaceX’s heavy-lift Starship of the Senate Appropriations Committee, launch vehicle was flown in a spectacular Executive Office of the President, Office test flight and successfully guided itself to of Management and Budget, October a beachside landing site before exploding 23, 2019, https://www.whitehouse.gov/ 16 at touchdown. The hard landing and wp-content/uploads/2019/10/shelby- explosion were due to unexpected low mega-approps-10-23-19.pdf. pressure in the methane header tank, 2. Office of Inspector General, NASA’s resulting in the vehicle exploding on the Management of Space Launch System landing pad. The successful completion Program Costs and Contracts, Report No. of many test objectives on this test flight, IG-20-012, March 10, 2020, https://oig. however, was a major milestone for the nasa.gov/docs/IG-20-012.pdf. Starship program. More prototype Starships 3. Ibid. have been built, and more are under 4. Ibid. construction as various design variations 5. Ibid. are to be tested. 6. Ibid. The Super Heavy (the booster stage of 7. Ibid. the Starship) will have the capability to return 8. Eric Berger, “NASA does not deny from space and perform a controlled landing, the “over $2 billion” cost of a single SLS powered by its Raptor engines. It will land on launch,” Ars Technica, November 8, 2019, its legs, like the company’s Falcon 9 rocket. https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/11/ Falcon 9 is the first orbital-class rocket in the nasa-does-not-deny-the-over-2-billion- world that has successfully landed over 50 cost-of-a-single-sls-launch/.