K-1 Vehicle
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The Kistler K-1 is a two-stage, fully reusable aerospace vehicle now in commercial development. It is designed to accommodate a wide range of missions, including payload delivery to low-earth orbit (LEO), payload delivery to high-energy orbits with a K-1 Active Dispenser, technology demonstration flights, microgravity missions, and commercial cargo resupply, recovery, and reboost services for the International Space Station.
NASA is investing in the K-1 to fly crew and cargo resupply demonstration flights to the International Space Station under the NASA COTS (Commercial Orbital Transportation Services) program. If Rocketplane Kistler meets all the milestones, NASA may invest up to $207 million. If the K-1 is successful and NASA is still in the market, NASA could purchase COTS services on the K-1 from 2010 through to 2015. (or longer as Micheal Griffin has suggested that COTS services could become useful for in-space refueling of craft etc). Furthermore Orion is only projected to make two flights a year which would make it nearly impossible to sustain a moon base as proposed in the vision for space exploration.
