Have you seen any articles on what was learned in the design and manufacturing and if NASA believes that similar cost and time overruns can be avoided on follow ups?
Really curious if $10 Billion is just what it actually costs to build this incredible machine, or if the pioneering work will mean that we can do a better job making things like it now.
It really is worth pointing out, again, that it’s $10 billion…for the entire estimated lifetime cost of the project. Amortized out over 20 years? I’m not saying it’s nothing…but given the US federal budget, it’s kind of nothing.
Compared to, oh, let’s say, $1.6 trillion dollars…
I too would like to see a debrief on “what went wrong”…if there is anything that really went wrong. I mean, there isn’t exactly an off-the-shelf solution for an infrared space telescope deployed to a phenomenally distant orbit. One might reasonably expect a few cost overruns, when you’re making mirrors that have no real precedence anywhere in human history.
Yes it's about $1.66 per US citizen per year during the 20-year development.
I've already personally received way more value than that just following the "entertainment" of following along with the construction and launch. I would gladly pay that much again for a repeat endeavor.
Now that it looks like JWST will be able to perform actual science, I think we'll all get a lot more than $1.66/year of value out of it.
$30 per person basically. Jeeze I would straight up donate to a NASA gofundme that asked for that to do it again. Even had it straight up failed, $30 per person seems like a reasonable stake.
The baseline take on what happened with Webb is that too many low-readiness technologies were included when the mission was approved and went into “Phase A” which means that development starts.
The entire astrophysics community suffered as a result of the ensuing suckout of resources. Lessons have been learned because a lot of careers were impacted.
There’s several successors to Webb on the horizon, and current thinking is to mature the technologies needed before such missions enter Phase A and is in effect committed to.
For a concrete reference on this, see the (very large) National Academies survey, which charts the course for NASA astrophysics over the next 10 years:
Yeah, it would make more sense to send several telescopes, each a bit better than the one before, but I guess it was easier to get funding for "this revolutionary telescope" than for "this would be like Hubble but a bit better."
We spent nearly 30 years planning, designing and deploying this. I don't believe there's an agency anywhere that can effectively cost out a project of that scope given that entire new industries can rise and old ones fall in that time.
For perspective, $10 billion is like 1% of a single year budget in the US and I believe the estimate includes the entire lifetime operating cost of the instrument.
If it did in fact just "cost that much" I would probably "not be that bothered."
If they could get a bigger cargo bay on a rocket, a lot of the risky folding mechanisms could have been removed. They could have used a design closer to the Hubble, Spitzer or Neowise.
The next telescope being planned out is LUVOIR which be even bigger so they will still need to continue with folding mechanisms given the bigger size. They may need to eventually think of modular telescopes that are assembled in space.
Really curious if $10 Billion is just what it actually costs to build this incredible machine, or if the pioneering work will mean that we can do a better job making things like it now.