America's investment in space transportation during the past four decades has been erratic, alternating from periods of plenty to want. There has been no sustained effort to develop next-generation technologies to make space travel routine and affordable. After building the Saturn rocket, research dropped to a trickle. The same pattern befell the Space Shuttle program. And now we are again repeating the mistakes of the past. When the X-33 and X-34 programs for the most part conclude in FY 1999, U.S. investment in space transportation again takes a nose-dive.

The failure to maintain investments in space transportation has led to dire consequences. America, once preeminent in launch technology, now retains only 30 percent of the global marketplace. Our expendable launch systems lag behind foreign competition and the cost to access space remains prohibitively expensive. Transporting a payload to orbit runs about $10,000 per pound. Each flight of the Space Shuttle is a staggering $400-$500 million.

In FY 1999, NASA is initiating an ongoing program, called Future-X, to develop and demonstrate advanced transportation technologies, patterned after its successful aeronautical R&D program. The effort has great potential. But only minimal funding is being provided by the Administration, limiting progress. As a consequence, exorbitant space launch costs will continue to retard advancements in exploration, science, and commercial enterprises.

Future-X Program

The Future-X Program is organized into two tiers: Pathfinder missions and Trailblazer missions. In combination, they are designed to move critical technologies from the laboratory to the marketplace. The program will validate advancements in space transportation to improve performance, operations, reliability, safety, maintainability, and reduce costs.

Future-X embraces the "build-a-little, test-a-little" philosophy. It will focus on high risk, high payoff technologies for Earth-orbit, orbital transfer, and interplanetary space transportation systems. Projects will include government in-house experiments as well as industry-led experiments. While cost sharing is encouraged, it is not a prerequisite for participation in the program.

Pathfinder Missions

These are small-scale, narrowly-focused flight demonstrations and experiments to provide proof-of-concept for cutting-edge technologies. The projects will normally extend 24-30 months and cost less than $100 million. Transportation technologies under consideration include the development of durable thermal protection systems, advanced aerobraking techniques, vehicle health management systems, ultra-high temperature leading edges, in-flight cryogenic refueling, alternative propulsion systems, and tethers for upper stage satellite deployment;

Trailblazer Missions

These are more ambitious and costly programs that involve the construction of a demonstrator vehicle to gather data on an array of new technologies functioning as an integrated flight system. Examples of possible X-vehicles are a solar-electric/chemical propulsion reusable transfer vehicle to carry payloads between low Earth orbit (LEO) and geosynchronous Earth orbit (GEO), an intercontinental space plane, and an Earth to orbit reusable vehicle with a combined cycle propulsion system.

The Future-X Program will encourage private industry investment by reducing the technical risks to space transportation. It will put the U.S. on a path toward affordable, reliable access to space, and allow industry to recapture lost markets.

The Administration's FY 1999 budget only allocates $17 million for the entire Future-X program, enough money to "establish an ongoing ground-based program and a series of Pathfinder flight experiments." To fully fund the program, $40 million is needed for Pathfinder experiments and $15 million to begin studies on Trailblazer missions.

Advanced Space Transportation Program (ASTP)

The ASTP supports long-range, basic research to develop advanced space transportation technologies. The program has three core areas:

• Airframe Systems -- The research focuses on airframe technologies, such as the development of highly integrated lightweight, long-life cryogenic tank structures, low-cost design and manufacturing methods, and the development of tools and processes for rapid cycle system design and analysis;

• Propulsion Systems -- The research supports the development of new propulsion system materials and designs. Examples include failure-tolerant rocket engines, lightweight engine components, and air-augmented rocket propulsion cycles;

• Long-term Space Transportation Research -- The long-term research is directed toward high risk, breakthrough technologies such as pulse detonation engines, high-energy propellants, and advanced propulsion concepts and materials.

Once core technologies are developed in the ASTP, they then will be validated, as required, by flight experiments in the Future-X Program. Funding for ASTP in FY 1998 is $26.1 million. The Administration budgeted only $28.3 million for FY 1999. Overall, the level of support for space transportation is grossly inadequate and should be commensurate with investments in aeronautical research, which exceed $850 million annually.