Putin slashes Russia’s space budget and says he expects better results:
Russia plans to slash funding for spaceflight activities during the coming three-year period, from 2022 to 2024. The cuts will come to about 16 percent annually, several Russian publications, including Finanz.ru, report. (These Russian-language articles were translated for Ars by Rob Mitchell.)
For 2022, the state budget for space activities will be set at 210 billion rubles ($2.9 billion), a cut of 40.3 billion rubles ($557 million) from the previous year. Similar cuts will follow in subsequent years. The most significant decreases will be in areas such as "manufacturing-technological activities" and "cosmodrome development." Funding for "scientific research and development" was zeroed out entirely.
[...] Putin has reportedly told the Russian space corporation, Roscosmos, that it must increase the reliability of Russian rockets and "master" the next generation of launch vehicles. This directive has come in response to growing competition in the global space launch business, particularly from US-based SpaceX.
I guess Russia is throwing in the towel as far as space is concerned?
(Score: 2) by Username on Tuesday October 12 2021, @09:20PM (7 children)
Well, what R&D is required? The US spent trillions to modify the space shuttle rocket to accept a top payload. Russia doesn't have to do that, they always had rockets designed that way. They tried nuclear rockets too, I remember that one blowing up. Not sure if they have reusable stages. Is one that lands itself really necessary? Cost of fuel to land a rocket vs cost of fishing it out of the sea. They whole landing the rocket seems more like a job for the KGB than R&D anyway. Reinventing the wheel and what not.
(Score: 3, Informative) by mhajicek on Tuesday October 12 2021, @10:25PM
The problem with fishing it out of the sea is that the saltwater severely damages the engines. Parachute landing on land could be ok, but you'd better have a calm wind. Even a 30MPH wind could wreck your rocket on touchdown. SpaceX evaluated all of these options and decided propulsive landing was the cheapest, most reliable way. Fuel is cheap.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Wednesday October 13 2021, @04:05AM (5 children)
In fact it says the opposite of what some people seem to have interpreted the summary as saying: it says that the focus on rocketry R&D is absolute.
Given that reusable launch vehicles have yet to prove them selves significantly cheaper than single use ones, I don't even see why he'd bother obsessing about that particular aspect. If it can't be repurposed for the military it probably is low priority. The military usually doesn't care about getting the shells of its rockets back.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Immerman on Wednesday October 13 2021, @03:29PM (4 children)
>Given that reusable launch vehicles have yet to prove them selves significantly cheaper than single use ones,
How do you figure that? Last I heard the Falcon 9, despite being only partially reusable, was significantly undercutting the competition. And that's despite a near-unanimous consensus that they're operating with *huge* profit margins that are being sunk back into Starship development.
Significantly cheaper to operate does NOT mean significantly cheaper to hire. Not while one company has a monopoly on the new technology, and absolutely no incentive to lower prices beyond what's necessary to undercut the competition.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday October 14 2021, @08:06AM (3 children)
Oh, other ones, yes, they've been cheaper. And you know why they can do that? Because of the over-charging elsewhere.
You've confused "cost" and "price" again.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 14 2021, @02:26PM (2 children)
Pretty sure they're making a profit on *every* launch - otherwise why would they launch at all? It's not like they'd want to give that money away to other customers by subsidizing those launches.
And pretty much every analysis agrees they're making a *huge* profit on every launch. The military contracts may be especially lucrative, but they are lucrative for *everyone* - have you actually looked at the going rate for a military launch?
And I assure you I'm not confusing cost and price - cost is what SpaceX pays, price is what they charge the customer. And the large distance between them is pure profit.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Thursday October 14 2021, @03:30PM (1 child)
However, your second point is properly wrong because the recent (2020) Roscosmos analysis concluded that SpaceX is using predatory pricing to attract customers.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday October 15 2021, @05:05PM
You mean the same Roscosmos that has consistently attacked SpaceX on every front with the flimsiest of excuses for over a decade? And been just as consistently proven wrong?
Hint - when looking for an unbiased analysis of... anything really, don't rely on the testimony of the people who are losing business and/or reputation to it.
By all means - listen to their arguments, they may be raising a legitimate concern worth investigating. But your default assumption should always be that it's a biased and self-serving fabrication. They're human, and such "sour grapes" storytelling is what we do. They might not even be lying, as such, just projecting their own inevitably-flawed assumptions onto a situation where they don't apply.