How much will the Moon plan cost? We should know in two weeks

A little over three weeks have passed since Vice President Mike Pence asked NASA's administrator, Jim Bridenstine, to bring humans back to the moon by 2024. Since then, Oklahoman has set up nationwide to strengthen his support – testifying in front of Congress, snuggling up against the White House. budget officials, speaking at major space conferences, and last weekend visiting his university, Rice University.

During the visit to Houston Saturday, Ars met Bridenstine to talk about these efforts. We discussed his biggest concern at the moment, which is to create a political momentum to fund the plan. This involves the development of an amendment to President Trump's budget request for fiscal year 2020, which will aim to secure additional funding for the Moon accelerated program. Realistically, said Bridenstine, this amendment will be ready "by the end of the month".

This is an essential document because the White House will have only one chance to respond to this request if NASA wants to have a realistic chance of reaching 2024 goal. To begin funding the development of lunar landing gear, to design new space suits and to develop related plans, this new funding must arrive at the beginning of the fiscal year on October 1, and Bridenstine realizes that this will only happen by a broad political consensus.

Here are some of our slightly edited conversations for clarity:

Q. Why should we be sure that a goal like 2024 is realistic? NASA was only saying last month that it could not do it until 2028.

A. I would say that technologically, it is realistic. It is not easy. There are many risks associated with timing, program risks and technical risks. And so it is not easy, but it is feasible. I think the biggest risk, which has to be removed earlier, is political risk. How do we get money? We must therefore ensure that, to the extent possible, we integrate bipartite and apolitical decisions and processes into the matrix. You've probably already heard of this, but we can not cannibalize part of the agency to feed another part of the agency. We can not cut the direction of the scientific mission to nourish human exploration. We can not cannibalize the International Space Station to feed the Moon's mission. So, if we go in these directions, all of which have been tried in the past, it never works politically. We can no longer do the same thing and blame ourselves that it does not work. So we have to try something different. We need to look at another way of funding that. We are working with the Office of Management and Budget and the National Council of Space to find different alternatives to obtain the resources needed for its realization.

Q. I am less concerned about the Office of Management and Budget than about the Democrats in Congress. Dating from Walter Mondale, some congressional Democrats have generally opposed large space projects, stating that it would be better to spend money on domestic issues. Some have already asked questions about the fact that it 's a Trump vanity project.

A. From my experience as a NASA administrator, I found strong bipartisan support for what NASA does. We have seen it even with the omnibus spending package adopted a few months ago; we saw it with the bus before that. The president's budget request is always aimed at increasing NASA's budget, and even before we can argue for that, Congress has already made us pay more. We found this strong bipartisan support. In order to reach the lunar landing of 2024, we will need a bigger budget. And that absolutely has to go through a bipartisan process in Congress. What I have found is that it is not only partisan. It is a parish. We have 10 centers across the country. If one of these centers, if a senator or a congressman feels that their center is not getting a fair share, they are opposed to what we are trying to achieve. So we have to look at it holistically. The Vice President made it very clear that the first woman on the moon must be reached in 2024, by all means necessary. And "all the necessary means" means creating a support coalition including bipartisanship. That's what we intend to start right away. In fact, we are preparing the budget amendment to send to Congress. If this is not a bipartite budget request, he will be dead on arrival. We all know that.

Part of the "bipartite" approach will involve the use of both the Space Launch System rocket and the Orion space probe, as well as private rockets. Ideally, said Bridenstine, the launch of the Moon will involve three flights of the SLS rocket. The first, in 2020, will fly an unarmed Orion spacecraft around the moon; the second, in 2022, will perform a crew mission around the Moon; the third, in 2024, will transport a crew on a lunar orbit, inside Orion, to set up a landing.

In the meantime, NASA will build a small "bridge" near the moon using private rockets. To do this, NASA will use an "energy and propulsion" element in space and then a small "habitat module" to form the "first" lunar bridge. NASA must also pre-position the lunar lander on the bridge by 2024. This lander can also be delivered to the bridge by commercial rockets.

This lander could comprise three parts: a "transfer" vehicle (to pass from the orbit of the bridge to the low lunar orbit); a "descent" module to bring the crew back to the surface; and an "ascent" vehicle to bring them from the surface to the waiting transfer vehicle, which would bring the crew back to the front door. From there, the astronauts would return home to the Orion spacecraft.

During the interview, Bridenstine tackled these landing gear plans, as well as his relationship with William Gerstenmaier, NASA 's space flight executive at NASA. That's Gerstenmaier who will approve design plans and schedules to bring humans back to the moon.

Q. Does NASA's design decision concern a three-story landing business?

A. The opening is now wide open. We are not necessarily on three distinct stages. If anyone can do it with two, this interests us. We do not exclude anything.

Q. When you first posted the BAA ads for the first time in February, they were more specific to this architecture.

A. We have three BAA now. One is a transfer vehicle. One is a descent module. One is an ascension module. But if people want to share with us ideas that do not fall into one of these categories, we will certainly examine them.

Q. You will have to choose a design very soon, right? This year?

A. Oh yes, absolutely. We will go as fast as possible.

Q. How is your relationship with Gerstenmaier? You often refer to him in your speeches, you tease him a little. It seems to be fun.

A. We have a good relationship. This is an engineer engineer. He has a lot of respect in the community. People trust his judgment of the most important things. He has a long history of development programs at NASA. I tease him because I like him.

Q. If he objected to that, he could also slow you down. Do you feel that he is participating in the Moon 2024 plan?

A. Absolutely. He is quite ready to accelerate, he is doing everything in his power to make it go faster. And it works.

For Bridenstine, this race will not end soon. Next weekend, he will receive a briefing on a study that will assess whether NASA can launch the SLS rocket without launching a "Green Run" test at the Stennis Space Center. This could reduce the development schedule by six months, but the agency would launch without triggering the main stage with its four main drivers. This would exchange a certain margin of safety for the schedule, but the agency seems to decide that it's worth the risk if it means keeping the lunar program on track.

Next, Bridenstine will have to work to finalize the budget amendment by the end of April and begin the process of selling it to Congress, including skeptical Democrats. The agency will have to start selecting landing gear this summer and get congressional funding by early fall. If NASA is to reach the Moon, Bridenstine will have to keep running.