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Over the last few years, NASA has been one of SpaceX's biggest supporters and funders. Without the organisation'south support, SpaceX would never have made it equally far every bit it has. But the relationship between NASA and companies like SpaceX or Blueish Origin has been complicated by their divergent goals and timelines for human spaceflight. NASA has its ain heavy booster that it's bringing up, the Space Launch System, and hasn't necessarily been pleased at the idea of SpaceX or anyone else muscling in on its turf.

At least, that'southward been the condition quo upwards until a recent presentation by NASA's head of man spaceflight, William Gerstenmaier. He showed slides with a number of currently operational rockets, rockets expected to exist operational in the near-term, and proposed future designs from a number of companies, Ars Technica reports. He so remarked: "My point of this nautical chart is this is a swell style to exist, and I'm non picking whatsoever one of these, I beloved every ane of these rockets. We volition figure out some style to apply some subset of these equally they mature through the industry and come out the other side."

Gerstenmaier's remarks are a surprising follow-up to statements made past the sometime administrator, Charles Bolden, who saw companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin as competitors to the Space Launch Organisation NASA is building. The SLS has been controversial partially due to its size and cost — while it will take the heaviest throw weight of any rocket expected to be operational in the adjacent decade, Congress hasn't approved sufficient funds for NASA to utilize it often or for much. As Gerstenmaier notes, launching the SLS once per twelvemonth isn't compelling for manned space exploration. It also creates high maintenance costs for a rocket that only occasionally makes it into orbit.

SLS 2

The SLS is supposed to scale up over time, somewhen fielding designs that can lift more than even the Saturn V

At the same time, still, relying on private industry has scarcely been a shine route thus far. SpaceX has lost two high-contour rockets and NASA continues to accept concerns nearly the company's fueling practices and how they might impact the crew of the capsule in an emergency (SpaceX insists that its abort mechanisms would have saved a crew in the company's near recent failure). And at that place's the added question of whether Congress volition approve closer ties between NASA and its potential private partners. The same bill that commissioned NASA to build the SLS likewise contained highly specific text regarding the technology that platform was to be based on and the companies that were to build information technology. Congress has often been derided for using these kinds of requirements to bring jobs to favored districts (the SLS is also known as the Senate Launch Organization, after all).

As things stand today, companies like Blue Origin and SpaceX are still proving they can handle the risks and requirements of manned space flying, while demonstrating a robust delivery to safety equal to or greater than NASA'southward own. In the long term, partnering with private firms might requite NASA more than freedom to focus on greater projects and less pedestrian activities, while other firms handle the heavy lifting of moving cargo from sea level to orbit.