Orbital Tourism

With suborbital commercial flights scheduled to commence relatively soon, a new study says the orbital tourism industry could be worth $100 billion in a few decades if the price of a ticket for a two week stay can be brought down to $500,000 apiece, or less.

To do that, the study says, requires the development of a completely reusable two-stage-to-orbit craft capable of carrying 40 passengers. Such a craft, according to the study, would lower the cost of reaching orbit to the point that $500,000 tickets would be profitable in a world with enough wealthy people to buy thousands or tens of thousands of such tickets per year. Key to such a craft would be the scramjet-- an engine that operates like a high performance jet in atmosphere and becomes a powerful rocket when the atmosphere is left behind.

The study could be too conservative. As reported in this blog recently, a British firm is currently developing the Skylon, a single-stage-to-orbit reusable space plane. A manned version of the earliest Skylon would carry 30 people. Skylon, too, is propelled by a scramjet-- and that engine is set for critical tests this summer. Assuming all goes well, the company plans to have Skylon in commercial service by 2020.