China's fourth space center to be completed by 2015

[Kshasty]

China's fourth space center, Wenchang, will be put into service between 2014 and 2015, not in 2013 as it was previously announced, the CCTV channel reported on Tuesday.

Located in a forest of coconut palms on the northeast coast of the Hainan tropical island, Wenchang will be the country's first low-latitude space center. Its latitude of only 19 degrees north of the equator will contribute to lower fuel consumption and maximum payload.

"The construction of the fourth space center, Wenchang, is ongoing. China's first low-latitude space center will be commissioned in 2014-2015," CCTV quoted a local government official as saying.

The life span of a satellite launched from Wenchang will be up to three years longer as more fuel will be saved during a shorter maneuver from the transit orbit to the geosynchronous orbit.
The maximum payload of Chinese rockets will be increased by more than 300 kg, up 7.4% as compared to the other three centers.

The center is likely to be the launch base for China's new-generation Long March 5 large-thrust carrier rocket, which is currently being developed and is expected to be put into service in 2014.

China has recently unveiled comprehensive space exploration plans, including plans to build its own orbital space station and laboratory before 2020. The ultimate goal of the Chinese project is to put a man on the Moon by 2020 and build a space base on the Earth's natural satellite by 2050. http://en.rian.ru/science/20100309/158134505.html

[Craftsman]

1. While our anti science president cuts our space agency down

[Johonny]

4. business appears normal

in my neck of the space business. Go figure.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

5. Except that didn't happen. The budget for NASA was increased

And the steps he took were the steps recommended by a blue ribbon panel. It is a program designed to focus on actual science rather than testing how fast ants can sort screws in space.

The new budget is actually extremely pro-science, if anti-astronaut.

[Craftsman]

6. Pro junk science and anti engineering

[SemiCharmedQuark]

7. Astrophysics is junk science?

It is not anti-engineering. Who do you think built Spirit and Opportunity? Fairies?

[Craftsman]

8. The engineering application is more important to the economy

The apollo program has returned over $9 for every $1 spent in economic development. Astophysics will not do that.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

9. And according to you, that makes it "junk science".

Do you know what that term means?

[Craftsman]

10. When you look at the job situation we need engineering not junk

like enviromental science and astrophysics. Engineering provides jobs.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

11. Enivornmental Science and Astrophysics are junk science according to you

And it's OBAMA that's anti-science?

:rofl:

[Craftsman]

16. Do they help provide jobs for Joe Lunchbucket?

They for the most part do not. If you want Joe Lunchbucket to support NASA and push for mor efunding then you have to show what is in it for him and get him on board. Rockets and Astronauts do that, astrophysics bores him and he sees no need for it.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

18. "Joe Lunchbucket" has nothing to do with whether science is good or not.

Face it-you made a false claim (the claim that Obama is anti-science), got caught, and now you've changed your complaint to jobs.

[joshcryer]

13. So you start with an "anti-science" allegation, and now you changed to jobs.

Which is it?

Fact is every dollar spent in NASA will go to jobs, it's just that the Cx STS-based jobs program was eating the budget to ridiculous extremes. Commercial space will have jobs, you can count on it.

[Craftsman]

17. Science and engineering makes decent paying jobs

With the cancelation fo the F22 and his actions on NASA, he is against engineering and jobs.

[joshcryer]

12. Bullshit. Cx was a jobs program that was killing NASA science and technology.

It would have scrapped the ISS by 2015, it would have killed commercial space (which is why COTS-D was never funded), it would have raped the decadal surveys (so that we had basically a decade without any), and it would have produced ISS 2.0 on the moon at the cost of several hundred billion dollars.

We would not have sent manned flights to Mars until the 2040s. Killing Cx was the best thing to ever happen to NASA.

[Craftsman]

19. I live in the Clear Lake area of Houston, less then 5 miles from NASA

It is a job and science killer. I live next to NASA engineers and scientists. And I go by their expert word.

[DrDan]

2. and we turn ours over to for-profits even though they have yet to demonstrate

any capability to deliver. . .

what-the-heck is going on

major corporate sell-out

[joshcryer]

14. I bet you didn't know that Energia (Russia's Soyuz producer) is a private company.

The fact is that all ISS flights will be relying on a private company to get into space for at least 3 years. China's space is largely commercialized, too, even if they call themselves communists.

[DrDan]

20. no I didn't

[madrchsod]

3. it is china`s century.....

we spent our future on three major wars in the last 50yrs.

i feel sorry for my children and grandchildren......

[joshcryer]

15. If we fund commercial space China will be eating our dust.

If we continue the path that was Cx, which would have left us without significant manned flight for at least 15 years, we will fail, and we will fall into obscurity.

[Duppers]

21. I cannot believe there's some one

posting in DU's Science Forum who'd call good science "junk"!

(I had to log out to see the post because this dumbass is on my ignore list & I was curious.)

Definition:

"Main Entry: junk science
Part of Speech: n
Definition: a term for faulty scientific research, data, and claims created for financial or political gain"

[SemiCharmedQuark]

22. Yep. Astrophysics is "junk science"...that's a new one to me.