NASA Administrator Charles Bolden unveils NASA Budget. Photo Credit/NASA Photo
President Obama’s proposed budget for 2012 locks NASA spending at $18.72 billion, or 2010 levels for the next five years, while at the same time initiating a delayed transition away from the previous administration’s Constellation program with plans for a new heavy lift rocket and multi-purpose crew capsule for eventual deep space exploration.
The proposed spending plan also funds the commercial space transportation initiative favored by the White House and outlined by Congress along with the new rocket and crew capsule in the 2010 NASA Authorization Act.
Though the president’s strategy envisions eventual human missions to Mars along a flexible path of exploration, the specific destinations and timeframes are unclear, a response to the nation’s economic ills. Overall, the proposed spending levels fall well below amounts anticipated even last year.
Think of the 2012 budget plan as more of a down payment on exploratory missions that supports themes of innovation and education that Obama sounded in his State of the Union address last month to help reinvigorate the economy and U. S. global prominence.
“Tough choices had to be made,” NASA Administrator Charles Bolden told a news briefing on Monday. “That is why this budget prioritizes urgent needs, while continuing the agency’s focus on a reinvigorated path of exploration, innovation and technological development, leading to an array of challenging destinations and missions. Today, we begin to win the future.”
The Authorization Act, a hard fought compromise struck between the House and Senate and signed into law by President Obama last year, envisioned NASA spending of $19 billion in 2011; $19.45 billion in 2012; and $19.96 billion in 2013. While it did not set funding levels for 2014-2015, he measure directed NASA to complete work in a heavy lift rocket and capsule suitable for human missions to distant destinations by the end of 2016.
Earlier this year, NASA informed Congress that schedule was too aggressive.
“The president’s budget gives us a foundation to send astronauts beyond Earth orbit,” Doug Cooke, NASA’s Associate Administrator for Exploration, told a follow up news briefing. “Exploration will be driven by capabilities we develop over time, but beginning with the first essential steps.”
The White House spending plan anticipates the retirement of the shuttle program this year, following two and possibly three more missions to complete the assembly of the International Space Station and equip the six person orbiting lab with the supplies it needs to operate well beyond the final flight of the winged orbiters.
The budget proposal supports an extension of space station operations from 2016 through at least 2020, a goal that seems to have bi-partisan political support as well as backing from NASA’s international partners.
And it funds NASA-sponsored development of multiple commercial spacecraft capable of taxing astronauts as well as cargo to the space station, The first trips by astronauts to the station aboard U. S. commercial spacecraft are possible in the 2014 to 2016 timeframe, according to NASA’s best estimates.
Congress failed to reach an agreement of a 2011 budget. Like most federal agencies, NASA has been spending at last year’s levels since the end of the 2010 fiscal year on Sept. 30. Operations continue under a series of budget continuing resolutions, the most recent of which will expire on March 4.
Just last week, the House Appropriations Committee proposed legislation cutting $100 billion from overall 2011 federal spending to help address the federal deficit, a measure that would restrict NASA to $18.42 billion for the current fiscal year.
The proposed 2012 NASA spending plan includes $3.95 billion for exploration activities; $4.34 billion for space operations, reflecting a drop off in shuttle expenses as retirement approaches and increases for the station as research activities accelerate with the end of assembly. Spending on robotic science missions holds at just over $5 billion. NASA plans to spend $138 million annually on educational programs.