Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Adam Y.
Errrr..... Three people doesn't not seem that lucrative enough for space tourism.
|
The question is not how many people they can take, but the cost per pound of taking people. Surprisingly, rockets that vary greatly in size are within one order of magnitude for cost per pound of getting to LEO (I think around $1000/lb now.) This means that making a bigger ship that takes more people is not neccesarily the most efficient way to go. The real question is how much will people pay per trip. If they will pay 10,000, costs must be below $100/lb
This article suggests that there are enough people willing to pay significantly more than $10,000:
http://aerospacescholars.jsc.nasa.go...irr/em/8/5.cfm. Regardless, I still believe that the real money and the real reason the X-prize is around is not for space tourism.