Resilient architecture pathways to establish and operate a pioneering base on Mars

We outline an architecture pathway to establish a permanent base on Mars that can support a 50-person crew. After base establishment, a long-term colony is formed with a gradual reduction in support and supplies from Earth. A steady cadence of missions is used to validate new technologies, build capabilities, reduce risks, and minimize costs. The missions prior to 2050 include assembly of an interplanetary vehicle in lunar vicinity, a deep space mission, a Mars orbital mission, and two Mars surface missions. We also examine the logistics associated with the base's growth in personnel, capability, and operations to the year 2100. Using a human exploration cost tool developed at Purdue, we find a peak yearly spending of $14.9 billion in 2030 with an average cost of $11.8 billion per year until 2050 and $8.2 billion per year after 2050. Assuming a starting budget of $9 billion per year (2016 NASA human spaceflight budget), an 8.8% increase per year from 2018 to 2024 would be required to meet the peak yearly costs. Unfortunately, such an increase is unlikely given NASA's relatively flat inflation-adjusted budget over the past 20 years. In addition, while commercial launch vehicle costs are dropping due to the emergence of reusable launch vehicles (e.g. SpaceX's Falcon 9), hardware costs are yet to reduce within NASA and their contractors, which suggests one or more of the following scenarios: 1) NASA must change how program costs are managed, 2) the publicized timeline for humans landing on Mars must slip, or 3) a new Mars architecture paradigm must be found.