ArianeGroup successfully tests solid rocket booster
Capitalism in space: ArianeGroup today successfully tested the solid rocket booster that it will use on both its Ariane 6 and Vega-C rockets in the 2020s.
The test success is good news for ArianeGroup, but this quote is actually more significant:
A compromise reached in May by European Space Agency members funding launch vehicle development will keep production of the P120C in Italy, allowing Avio to produce up to 35 boosters annually. A previous arrangement would have split production between Colleferro, Italy-based Avio and MT Aerospace of Augsburg, Germany.
The economies of scale provided by using the same booster for two rockets and concentrating production in one place are a key aspect of reducing the price for Ariane 6 missions by 40 to 50 percent compared to the Ariane 5 in use today.
Faced with stiff competition from SpaceX, the European Space Agency (ESA) gave ArianeGroup the power to structure operations more efficiently rather than cater to the pork desires of the agency’s many member nations.
Whether either Ariane 6 or Vega-C can compete with SpaceX’s reusuable rockets however remains doubtful. I expect that almost all of ArianeGroup’s customers in the next decade will be ESA member nations, required to buy its more expensive services.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Capitalism in space: ArianeGroup today successfully tested the solid rocket booster that it will use on both its Ariane 6 and Vega-C rockets in the 2020s.
The test success is good news for ArianeGroup, but this quote is actually more significant:
A compromise reached in May by European Space Agency members funding launch vehicle development will keep production of the P120C in Italy, allowing Avio to produce up to 35 boosters annually. A previous arrangement would have split production between Colleferro, Italy-based Avio and MT Aerospace of Augsburg, Germany.
The economies of scale provided by using the same booster for two rockets and concentrating production in one place are a key aspect of reducing the price for Ariane 6 missions by 40 to 50 percent compared to the Ariane 5 in use today.
Faced with stiff competition from SpaceX, the European Space Agency (ESA) gave ArianeGroup the power to structure operations more efficiently rather than cater to the pork desires of the agency’s many member nations.
Whether either Ariane 6 or Vega-C can compete with SpaceX’s reusuable rockets however remains doubtful. I expect that almost all of ArianeGroup’s customers in the next decade will be ESA member nations, required to buy its more expensive services.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Pretty amazing that they hope to cut the price by 40-50%.
Shows how much pork costs ….not that I should boast since I live in the Garden State…
TRENTON, N.J. — At $2 million a mile, New Jersey spends eight times the national average on its state-controlled highways, a heavy toll that is driving the tax-supported roadway fund dry and forcing officials to rethink how roads are built.”
I should hope so – not that I expect any results. The answer will be, “Tax the rich!” (which will mean anyone who has an income). NJ has reached The Thatcher Point. “Eventually you run out of other peoples’ money to give away”
“triple the roughly $675,000 spent by the next-highest state, Massachusetts, and more than eight times the national average of $162,200”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/10/12/why-it-costs-you-2-million-a-mile-to-build-a-nj-road/17125069/
I am so glad I moved out of the NY metropolitan area in 1998. So, so, so glad.
Can somebody give me a net-cost per mile, for the “super-train” in California?
Ref: Highway construction:
It’s worse than Col Beausabre reports. (although I don’t know where the “$2 million/mile” figure comes from,)
I’m in Michigan and we rank 13th for ‘cost-per-lane-mile’ at $42K –so a standard divided highway (2 lanes each way, 4 total) in Michigan would come in at $168K/mile, but that also doesn’t include land, engineering, or any over-passes or exits.
[Arizona btw is ranked 12]
Comprehensive charts (and a lengthy PDF Report) are at:
>https://midwestepi.org/2017/05/03/what-are-road-construction-costs-per-lane-mile-in-your-state/
–For highways, you have construction cost + right-of-way-acquisition cost + engineering cost + required over-passes & Exits.
“We’ll Take the High Road”
1957 American Road Builders Association
https://youtu.be/wnrqUHF5bH8
31:27