September 2011 SPACE QUARTERLY 11
CCDEV2 Updates
Commercial Crew Development Program Status By Randy Attwood
WITH THE COMPLETION OF THE LAST SPACE shuttle flight last July, the only two countries with crew access to Low Earth Orbit today are Russia and China. All astronauts traveling to the International Space Station must get there on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, launching from and returning to Kazakhstan. This fact is not lost on American politicians and members of the public. Shutting down the space shuttle was a blow to the American ego. Not having a replacement launch system and spacecraft made the whole thing worse. The problem was in part money – there isn’t enough in the annual NASA budget to fund flying the shuttle as well as developing its replacement. A new program called Constellation was announced in 2004 by the Bush administration to build a replacement spacecraft and booster to take astronauts not only to Low Earth Orbit, but to the Moon and beyond. Beset by technical problems and budget shortfalls from the start, the program was officially terminated earlier this year. In its place, NASA turned to the commercial market for access to space. The Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program would provide funding for companies to help them develop spacecraft to launch crew to the International Space Station. The CCDev program would be run in phases. The first phase—CCDev1—provided financing to five companies. The first installment was a total of $49.8 million distributed to the following companies: » Blue Origin received $3.7 million » The Boeing Company received $18 million » Paragon Space Development Corporation received $1.4 million » Sierra Nevada Corporation of Louisville received $20 million » United Launch Alliance received $6.7 million
CCDev2 funding was announced last April. The second installment of $269.3 million was awarded to the following companies: » Blue Origin received $22 million » The Boeing Company received $92.3 million » SpaceX received $75 million » Sierra Nevada Corporation received $80 million Blue Origin is developing the New Sheppard spacecraft. Boeing is building its CST-100 – an Apollo inspired type capsule. Sierra Nevada is working on its Dream Chaser winged spacecraft. All will use a United Launch Alliance Atlas V to launch their spacecraft. SpaceX has already orbited and recovered its Dragon spacecraft, launched on its Falcon 9 booster last December and currently leads the program in its development efforts. In the next four articles, Space Quarterly takes a look at each company and the status of each of its programs. It should be noted that while this program is currently funded and a third round of funding is expected this fall, it is not guaranteed that the program will go forward. Congress can be very fickle and with budget shortfalls and partisan politics dominating in Washington, nothing is certain. Should there not be a third round of funding then at least two of the current participants would stop work on their efforts. This includes Boeing and Sierra Nevada. Blue Origin and SpaceX would continue on, but the pace of progress of both would be slowed as they fund further development themselves.