A two-part pricing policy is investigated as the most feasible method of pricing the transportation services to be provided by NASA's SSTS. Engineering cost estimates and a deterministic operating cost model generate a data base and develop a procedure for pricing the services of the SSTS. It is expected that the SSTS will have a monopoly on space material processing in areas of crystal growth, glass processing, metallurgical space applications, and biomedical processes using electrophoresis which will require efficient pricing. Pricing problems, the SSTS operating costs based on orbit elevation, number of launch sites, and number of flights, capital costs of the SSTS, research and development costs, allocation of joint transportation costs of the SSTS to a particular space processing activity, and rates for the SSTS are discussed. It is concluded that joint costs for commercial cargoes carried in the SSTS can be most usefully handled by making cost allocations based on proportionate capacity utilization.
Pricing of NASA Space Shuttle transportation system cargo
1979-05-01
Miscellaneous
No indication
English
Space Conference - NASA considers cargo shuttle
Online Contents | 2005
NASA policy on pricing shuttle launch services
NTRS | 1977
|Space Shuttle cargo processing.
NTRS | 1980
|NTRS | 2010
|NTIS | 2010
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