A lot of speculation takes place concerning what SpaceX and United Launch Alliance charge for all the various services surrounding the launch of a spacecraft. An announcement late Monday by NASA provides some more information for those who are trying to nail down the costs.
NASA announced four Earth Science satellite launch awards that included a first NASA satellite launch for the SpaceX Falcon 9 and three new launches for ULA’s venerable Delta 2. The SpaceX contract for launch and services is worth $82M; the ULA contract will be $402M for all three satellites. All four rockets will launch into polar orbits from Vandenberg Air Force Base on the coast of California.
SpaceX gets even busier
SpaceX picks up the $82M launch services contract for the Jason-3 mission. Jason-3, a NOAA satellite designed to make highly accurate measurements of ocean surface height, follows Jason-1 and 2. NASA says the mission applications include “ocean and weather forecasting, ocean wave modeling, hurricane intensification prediction, seasonal forecasting, El Nino and La Nina forecasting, and climate research”. NASA and the French Space Agency have collaborated on a series of satellites to gain more accurate measurements of what the world’s oceans are doing since 1992.
from Ars Technica