TWO CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET ACTIONS SLATED FOR LOW COST SPACE LAUNCHER DEVELOPMENT Torrance, California December 5, 1996

Representative Joe Skeen (R-NM) took the opportunity at a recent rocket engine test firing to announce that the Congress has made available a total of $10.5 million for Scorpius low cost launcher development in two different Congressional actions. One makes $7.5 million available for the development and launch of 3 SR-1 sub-orbital rockets to flight test the Scorpius approach to very low cost launch. The second action makes $3.0 million available for the development of an ultra-low-cost 20,000 lb thrust ablatively cooled engine and additional systems work on low cost launchers. The announcements took place prior to a successful 25 sec test firing of a Scorpius 5,000 lb thrust LOX-kerosene engine. The firing took place at the Microcosm Engine Test Facility at the New Mexico Tech Energetic Materials Research Test Center.

Scorpius technology is being developed by Microcosm, Inc., of Torrance, CA. The Scorpius program objective is to create a new family of expendable launch vehicles that will reduce launch costs by a factor of 10. Liberty, the Scorpius light-lift vehicle which could be developed in 2.5 years, will be able to carry 2,200 lbs. of payload to orbit for $1.8 million. The medium lift vehicle, Exodus, could be developed in 1.5 years after the development of Liberty and could deliver 15,000 lbs. to orbit for $8.5 million or up to 25,000 lbs. with an upper stage. A heavy lift vehicle with up to 50,000 lbs. of payload capability could follow. Scorpius' success will reinvigorate America's space launch industry and recapture a vital market that has been lost to foreign competition.

Microcosm estimates that the total development cost for both Liberty and Exodus is comparable to the cost of a single medium lift launch using today's rockets. The Scorpius program uses existing, low cost technology, in a new vehicle design. In another departure from the "old way of doing business," all of the key elements will be verified by low cost testing early in the program. Very little money will be at risk in validating Microcosm's approach.

According to Microcosm President, Dr. James Wertz, "Most launch vehicles to date have been designed for maximum performance -- the Ferraris of the rocket set. In order to get cost down, we're building the launch vehicle equivalent of a Chevy truck." Cost projections to date support being able to achieve the program's ambitious objectives. Wertz, believes that "to make truly dramatic reductions in launch costs as envisioned by the Scorpius program, we must use appropriate technology capable of being manufactured economically. What is even harder, however, is that we must concentrate on cost and reliability and be willing to give up our normal maximum-performance, specification-driven way of buying space hardware." This "getting back to basics" approach is gaining a great deal of support both in the government and private sectors as the only way to make space truly affordable.

The Congressional action represents Phase III follow-ons to previous Phase II Small Business Innovative Research (SBIR) awards. The SBIR program is highly competitive with less than 10% of submitted proposals receiving Phase I funding and less than 30% of those going on to Phase II.

The program is good business for the government seeking to dramatically reduce launch costs and for several organizations specializing in low cost space components, such as Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas which will develop the avionics hardware and Utah Rocketry in Salt Lake City, which will build engines and tanks for the program. Full-scale development will provide a boost to smaller aerospace businesses throughout the U.S. It also provides a means to return the U.S. to the commercial space launch market which has been almost entirely lost to foreign competition.

Key to the potential success of the program is combining low-cost hardware development and testing with a strong systems engineering approach that looks at manufacturability, reliability, and operations for the entire launch system from the very beginning. Microcosm believes that a piece-meal approach looking at one or two elements of launch technology simply cannot have a dramatic impact on cost. Even if the engines were free, other elements would come to dominate the cost and the whole launch system would remain expensive.

Microcosm is a small, woman-owned business oriented toward reducing the overall cost of space missions. Its most widely known products are the Microcosm Autonomous Navigation System (MANS), being flight tested on the TAOS spacecraft currently in orbit and the book Space Mission Analysis and Design, produced by Microcosm and co-edited by Wertz and Dr. Wiley Larson of the U.S. Air Force Academy. In four years the book has been reprinted five times and has become a standard space technology reference. Microcosm has just published a sequel entitled Reducing Space Mission Cost and a related volume, the Microcosm Directory of Space Technology Data Sources.

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