giveitawhirl2008 wrote:
I guess it's really a dumb question, considering the history of
energia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energia

But the thought has croseed my mind: if a deep-pockets entity built a
lifter that could put up 200,000 lbs, or greater, might not someone
decide, 'hey, we could build a space station to lauch on that thing,'
or 'hey, we could use that to send up and assemble moonships or
Marsships [or such]?"

With the heavy lifter already developed and available at some
particular price per lauch, then someone ELSE could concentate on
applications: space stations for tourists, interplanetary craft, etc.

A lot depends on cost.

Is it going to cost me $10 to launch or $10B.

That really drives my plans. At $10 I can build a big dumb capsule and not
worry about optimizing anything. At $10B I'm going to to want to optimize
my payload so much as to make IT cost-ineffective.


--
Greg Moore
Ask me about lily, an RPI based CMC.