When trying to solve challenging problems my method is to look at the problem from different perspectives. When I look at the solutions produced for space travel and nuclear energy, I don't get the inspiration that a multidisciplinary team came up with that idea. The engineers and scientists from different background should be more efficiently develop ideas if we really want a strong leap in the space and nuclear energy!
That's why we don't see a hybrid space ship design with an airplane first stage. On Earth we need a heavy lifting VTOL airplane to access urban locations for mining, disaster prevention and recovery. VTOL further can be used as the first stage of a space rocket. VTOL would have hybrid propulsion with efficient turbofan engines as well as rocket boosters.
The cost of space travel can be lowered by bigger space ships. We created giant ships, large airplanes to decrease the cost. However the space ships are still very small for the goals we want to achieve. In order to achieve this goal we should utilize the cheapest and most abundant fuels (ex: methane) and cheaper rocket structures for non reusable stages of rocket. The giant ships are made of iron not titanium. Stainless steel can be used... Therefore lost fuel and material in every launch can be economical and easy to source.
Finally we should land explorers on Venus and Mercury not on Mars or the Moon. Setting human foot on an extraterrestrial using chemical rockets is a luxury. Let the robots do the dirty work. After nuclear propulsion we can set foot.
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