Commercial programs vs. ingredients

The accompanying blog series for this table begins with Commercial space and six questions for a good story – Pt. 1 of 3 (wonkish). For the updated blog and table see Revisiting commercial space and NASA.

I will be updating the table of commercial ingredients vs. NASA programs/projects periodically.

For more information on these government commercial space programs/projects see:

• 1996-2001 NASA X-33 (reusable launch vehicle sub-orbital demonstrator)

• 2016 Gateway Power and Propulsion Element (PPE)
  • [NASA Budgets – 2019 $332M, 2020 $421M, 2021 $698.8M]
  • $65M total August 9, 2016 – NASA Selects Six Companies to Develop Prototypes, Concepts for Deep Space Habitats
  • $2.4M total November 1, 2017 for studies – NASA Selects Studies for Gateway Power and Propulsion Element
  • $375M May 2019 – “The contract is a firm fixed-price contract with a total value of $375 million. The contract includes a 12-month base period and a series of options that covers the development, launch and in-space testing of the PPE. The element will be owned by Maxar throughout the contract, at the end of which NASA will have the option to purchase it for use on the Gateway.” -spacenews.com
  • July 23, 2019 NASA to sole source Gateway habitation module to Northrop Grumman
    • $187M thru PDR, habitat, NASA issues contract to Northrop Grumman for Gateway module
  • March 27, 2020 – SpaceX has won a big NASA contract to fly cargo to the Moon, “NASA has set aside a total of $7 billion over a period of 12 to 15 years for logistics supply and is expected to eventually select at least one more company for commercial delivery services. Each selected company is guaranteed a total of two missions. In effect, this contract is likely worth a few billion dollars to SpaceX, although the bulk of the funding probably will not come before the first missions fly in the mid-2020s.” -arstechnica.com
  • February 9, 2021 – NASA Awards Contract to Launch Initial Elements for Lunar Outpost, “NASA has selected Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, California, to provide launch services for the agency’s Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) and Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO), the foundational elements of the Gateway. … The total cost to NASA is approximately $331.8 million, including the launch service and other mission-related costs.”

• 2018 Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) (cargo landers)
  • (Zero funds) Lunar CATALYST
  • November 29, 2018 – NASA selects nine companies for commercial lunar lander program – “NASA is providing no development money for any of the CLPS companies” -spacenews.com

• 2020 NASA Human Lander System (HLS) program, for crewed landers
  • [NASA Budgets – 2020 $654.1, 2021 $928.3M – excluding “cis-lunar” budget line]
  • April 30, 2020 – Blue Origin wins lion’s share of NASA funding for human rated lunar lander – “NASA has selected Blue Origin, Dynetics and SpaceX to move forward with development of human-rated lunar landers, committing nearly $1 billion in funding for a range of moonship concepts” -spaceflightnow.com
  • August 16, 2021 As Artemis Moves Forward, NASA Picks SpaceX to Land Next Americans on Moon –“The firm-fixed price, milestone-based contract total award value is $2.89 billion.“

• March 17, 2021 – NASA’s Plans for Commercialization of Communications and Navigation Services for the Earth and the Moon, Future In Space Operations telecon, Andy Petro , Greg Heckler (NASA HQ)

• March 23, 2021 – The NASA Commercial LEO Destination program (and the Industry Briefing and documents here)
  • [NASA Budgets – 2020 $15M, 2021 $17M]
  • March 23, 2021 – NASA to offer funding for initial studies of commercial space stations – “Those awards, planned for the fourth quarter of 2021 with a combined value of $300 million to $400 million, will cover work from fiscal years 2022 to 2025 to advance the design of proposed commercial space stations to at least the preliminary design review level.” -spacenews.com

• April 14, 2021 – NASA is exploring partnerships for spacesuit development – “We hope to receive industry input on the feasibility of shifting our exploration spacewalk acquisition activities to a service-based model like our procurement for commercial cargo and crew services. This partnership opportunity will allow NASA and industry to work together as commercial space markets in low-Earth orbit and beyond rapidly mature, allowing government investments to accelerate industry and our Artemis exploration plans, together.”

Thoughts? Comments below.