Since NASA has repeatedly demonstrated its inability to develop a new rocket (something like $21B wasted in failed attempts over the last 20 years), it certainly makes sense to outsource launch services to the free market instead of trying to relive the Apollo era.
However, since there is a lot of interesting exploration and science that NASA could continue to do that no profit incentive exists for (deep space probes, space telescopes, etc.), so recommending the complete dismantlement of NASA goes too far.
NASA should fund commercial launch providers and buy launch services, and focus its substantial budgets on some really exciting exploration.
Launching things into orbit is a solved problem, no need to solve it again. There is an infinity of unsolved problems NASA could attack once they get over their fixation with building new rockets.
Demonstrating the capability of private industry is SpaceX, who spent $250M in NASA funds to develop and fly a large launch vehicle and a capsule. (econgeeker's details are wrong but the low cost is correct, and Orbital is the firm that is using Russian technology)
$250M is nothing compared with the $20000M NASA planned to spend on its launch vehicle and capsule program.
>there is a lot of interesting exploration and science that NASA could continue to do that no profit incentive exists for (deep space probes, space telescopes, etc.),
A lot of the historical "voyages of discovery" were financed by rich people looking for glory, newspapers looking for exclusive stories, and companies looking for good PR.
I would first note that more 'voyages of discovery' were prompted by the desire to establish new or improved trade or resource exploration routes, and we've pretty-much established that there's no one to trade with and nothing to exploit within reach.
And I would like to see the cost comparisons, but I'd bet that just as pan-oceanic trips were an order of magnitude more expensive than explorations before, space journeys (especially manned), would require an exceptional economic incentive to be at all viable.
From my reading of the relevant wikipedia page is looks like ESA gets the private company EAD Astrium to develop Ariane launchers and Arianespace, which is also a private company, to actually launch them and market them for commercial launches:
Arguements about government ownership of EADS aside - the important part is that ESA is free to launch on Ariane, Soyuz, Chinese or any other rocket without it becoming a congressional matter.
However, since there is a lot of interesting exploration and science that NASA could continue to do that no profit incentive exists for (deep space probes, space telescopes, etc.), so recommending the complete dismantlement of NASA goes too far.
NASA should fund commercial launch providers and buy launch services, and focus its substantial budgets on some really exciting exploration.
Launching things into orbit is a solved problem, no need to solve it again. There is an infinity of unsolved problems NASA could attack once they get over their fixation with building new rockets.
Demonstrating the capability of private industry is SpaceX, who spent $250M in NASA funds to develop and fly a large launch vehicle and a capsule. (econgeeker's details are wrong but the low cost is correct, and Orbital is the firm that is using Russian technology)
$250M is nothing compared with the $20000M NASA planned to spend on its launch vehicle and capsule program.