The lander, built by Intuitive Machines, touched down on the lunar surface at around 6:24 p.m. ET, overcoming a late-stage glitch with its onboard laser instruments.
You do realize these “commercial companies” such as SpaceX are funded by government contracts right?
Yes, but it will be cheaper for NASA to outsource cargo and crew transport than if they did everything themselves. Just look at the success of the NASA’s Commercial Resupply Services and Commercial Crew programs. Cygnus, Dragon, and Falcon 9 are way cheaper than Orion and Ares I would have been for low earth orbit.
This leaves NASA with more resources to devote towards interesting science and exploration missions. I don’t see why lunar exploration would be any different.
Yet, compare the results of having SpaceX build out launch services currently serving the bulk of world launch traffic, to the Artemis program. The commercial service developed practical reusability that NASA didn’t, refined the service to a fraction of traditional cost, and scaled up far beyond what NASA did. Sure NASA funded and supervised but letting SpaceX do it their way was a great investment and NASA never have delivered the same results. Compare that to the Artemis program, currently expecting to cost $1B/launch with limited usefulness and only four planned launches
I think space is one example where private industries actually can and do deliver cheaper, even if you just blame it on risk avoidance and Congressional interference at NASA.
More importantly, we do have a high value commercial market in satellites. We do have a global market in cooperation with other country’s space development, which are readily served by commercial launch services with only oversight by NASA.
I have no idea what the next phase of commercial development in space will be, but satellites are a resounding success
This argument gets made a lot when talking about privatisation. Lots basic and essential services have gotten privatised over we decades, and none of them got better or cheaper.
The only way you can benefit from privatizing something is when you make others pay for it. In this case, SpaceX is burning other people’s venture capital like rocketfuel. I prefer that over spending public money, but unfortunately, they’ve also spent 1.9billion on a moon lander, with nothing to show.
Lots basic and essential services have gotten privatised over we decades, and none of them got better or cheaper.
This seems like a rather broad statement. Are there really zero cases where a privatized service got cheaper? Do you disagree with the example of NASA’s CRS and CCP programs in my previous comment?
but unfortunately, they’ve also spent 1.9billion on a moon lander, with nothing to show
I think stating that they have nothing to show is slightly disingenuous. They’ve done multiple successful suborbital hops with upper stage prototypes, and two (partially successful) launches of the full stack. I’m eagerly awaiting IFT-3, which could happen as early as March.
Yes, but it will be cheaper for NASA to outsource cargo and crew transport than if they did everything themselves. Just look at the success of the NASA’s Commercial Resupply Services and Commercial Crew programs. Cygnus, Dragon, and Falcon 9 are way cheaper than Orion and Ares I would have been for low earth orbit.
This leaves NASA with more resources to devote towards interesting science and exploration missions. I don’t see why lunar exploration would be any different.
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Yet, compare the results of having SpaceX build out launch services currently serving the bulk of world launch traffic, to the Artemis program. The commercial service developed practical reusability that NASA didn’t, refined the service to a fraction of traditional cost, and scaled up far beyond what NASA did. Sure NASA funded and supervised but letting SpaceX do it their way was a great investment and NASA never have delivered the same results. Compare that to the Artemis program, currently expecting to cost $1B/launch with limited usefulness and only four planned launches
I think space is one example where private industries actually can and do deliver cheaper, even if you just blame it on risk avoidance and Congressional interference at NASA.
More importantly, we do have a high value commercial market in satellites. We do have a global market in cooperation with other country’s space development, which are readily served by commercial launch services with only oversight by NASA.
I have no idea what the next phase of commercial development in space will be, but satellites are a resounding success
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This argument gets made a lot when talking about privatisation. Lots basic and essential services have gotten privatised over we decades, and none of them got better or cheaper.
The only way you can benefit from privatizing something is when you make others pay for it. In this case, SpaceX is burning other people’s venture capital like rocketfuel. I prefer that over spending public money, but unfortunately, they’ve also spent 1.9billion on a moon lander, with nothing to show.
This seems like a rather broad statement. Are there really zero cases where a privatized service got cheaper? Do you disagree with the example of NASA’s CRS and CCP programs in my previous comment?
I think stating that they have nothing to show is slightly disingenuous. They’ve done multiple successful suborbital hops with upper stage prototypes, and two (partially successful) launches of the full stack. I’m eagerly awaiting IFT-3, which could happen as early as March.