> Electronics, sensors, and consumables fail or run out, which means you need to be able to get there to fix things. Then, as research projects change, you need to change instruments.
So launch another. Launch capacity is getting cheap... let's use it.
Consider that 1% of SpaceX's annual launch capacity is enough to put one Hubble in orbit every year. Instead of sending astronauts to fix the fucked-up mirror, you just launch one with a not-broken mirror.
We as a planet don't even build that many ground-based telescopes with a 2.5m+ mirror each year. Think about how astronomy would change if you could just take every telescope we build today and put it in space.
This scope is not built for space travel. This model for space telescopes from NASA put a price tag on all the major components for building and operating a single space telescope is counted in billions. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20110015780/downloads/20...
A couple of things not covered in other comments are the costs of mission control and end-of-life deorbiting. It is far cheaper to rent a car, drive to an observatory, mount your evolving experiment on scope, and debug it on-site than to put the same experiment in orbit. Terrestrial telescope mission control is ad hoc and usually in a heated/air-conditioned shack on the mountaintop.
So launch another. Launch capacity is getting cheap... let's use it.
Consider that 1% of SpaceX's annual launch capacity is enough to put one Hubble in orbit every year. Instead of sending astronauts to fix the fucked-up mirror, you just launch one with a not-broken mirror.
We as a planet don't even build that many ground-based telescopes with a 2.5m+ mirror each year. Think about how astronomy would change if you could just take every telescope we build today and put it in space.