alt Hacker News> while it has received to date $3B
SLS still gets $2.5B every year, around $30 billion total so far (at least billion every year since 2011) and cost 40% more than they said it would: https://www.planetary.org/space-policy/cost-of-sls-and-orion
Starship being able to otherwise fund itself except for the Artemis R&D project is good for the government.
Yes, starship funding itself as a workhorse for lifting to LEO is a good thing for the US.
That is not the point I made though. The question is why money was spent on starship as a lunar vehicle - that being the main criticism I have seen in the media (e.g. SmarterEveryDay video). Of course that could turn out to be misplaced, but there's no point denying that that is the main criticism.
> SLS still gets $2.5B every year, around $30 billion total so far
Not relevant to the HLS contract either.
But a) it is more like $40B and b) we don't have full numbers yet to make this comparison apples to apples. SLS costs come from the shorter timeline, the expensive shortcuts like ultralightweight shell, H2 fuel, disposable design, the crew rating, and the profit paid to manufacturers. We still don't know the equivalent numbers for starship: how long the timeline will be, the cost of taking the same payload to TLI, if the heavy structure will ever work as a lunar lander, if the booster can be used with an H2 upper stage / lander alternative, if the fully reusable architecture will work for lunar missions (depends on refueling performance), and finally how much profit SpaceX will make on these government missions (which depends on the market).
If those problems are all solved, and SpaceX gives NASA a good price, then we could see starship emerging as the best value somewhere between 2030 and 2035. Solving them in time for Artemis IV 2028 seems very unlikely now though.