Astronauts Visit Asteroid on Future Mission. Photo Credit/Lockheed Martin
NASA began the New Year with a stir last week, when it furnished Congress with a legislatively required blueprint for a Space Launch System, a new heavy lift rocket, and a Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle — essentially a combination of rocket launcher and capsule for astronauts suited to human deep space exploration as well as crew transportation to and from the International Space Station.
Congress was displeased by NASA’s conclusion that it could not achieve an operational spacecraft with the projected budget, just under $11 billion, and on the deadline, Dec. 31, 2016, spelled out in the three-year NASA Authorization Act of 2010. The $6.9 billion for the rocket and $3.9 billion for the capsule covers only the first 36 months of development.
The report was required under the terms of the act, which was signed into law by President Obama on Oct. 11.
However, Congress and the White House have not agreed on a 2011 spending measure for most federal agencies, including NASA. Like other arms of the government, NASA is restricted to spending at 2010 levels and on programs outlined in 2010 appropriations measures, requirements that prevent the agency from starting unfettered development of the new rocket and crew capsule.
In response to the NASA blueprint, the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee informed NASA in has no choice but to follow the provisions of the 2010 Authorization Act. The legislation calls on the space agency to harness space shuttle propulsion technology as well as substantial investments in the previous Administration’s Constellation program to cut costs and compress schedule, rather than investing first in new propulsion technologies.
The legislation also calls on NASA to make use of existing personnel and contracts to help save time and money.
In the meantime, NASA has solicited technology advice from 13 companies under six-month study contracts valued at $7.5 million.
Who’s on the right side of this squaring off between the Legislative and Administrative branches?
Correctness may come at the expense of a looming reality.
When the final shuttle mission lands this year, in April or perhaps this summer, the U. S. government will be out of the human space launch business for the first time in three decades.
Shuttle Discovery awaits final mission. Photo Credit/NASA Photo
Russia’s Soyuz will be the only spacecraft able to reach the station with astronauts. China, which can also launch astronauts, is not part of the U. S.-led space station partnership.
NASA intends to nurture an imaginative and able U. S. commercial space agency with funding in the expectation that at least one private company will be able to reach the space station with astronauts. However, that milestone may be at least five years away, according to space agency forecasts.
Meanwhile, NASA’s Office of Inspector General tossed a considerable log of its own on the simmering debate, when it issued a letter to Congress last week outlining the consequences of the budgetary impasse. Even though the 2011 fiscal year began Oct. 1, must federal agencies are operating under a 2010 Continuing Resolution that will remain in force until at least March 4.
According to IG Paul Martin, who is legally responsible for preventing waste, fraud and abuse, NASA will spend $215 million through February on the Constellation Program, which most in Congress and the White House agree in principle should be cancelled in favor of work on the STS and MPCV. The total expenditure is projected to reach more than $575 million by Sept. 30, the end of the 2011 fiscal year.
“In sum, it appears that NASA has taken steps to concentrate its spending on those aspects of the Constellation Program it believes may have future applicability, and that these efforts have helped reduce the potential inefficient use of taxpayer dollars. However, based on what we have learned from Agency officials, as NASA moves closer to making final decisions regarding how best to move forward in designing and building the next generation space system, it will become increasingly more difficult for the Agency to continue to juggle the inconsistent mandates of the Authorization Act and the appropriations legislation so as to avoid wasting taxpayer funds,” Martin wrote lawmakers. “As one senior NASA official described it, ‘There’s a point coming up soon where we would just be spending money to spend money.'”
Those in Congress who provide NASA oversight are not happy with recent developments and the frustration is bi-partisan.
Among the most vocal, were U. S. Sen. Bill Nelson, of Florida, a Democrat who chairs the Senate Science and Space Subcommittee, and U. S. Kay Bailey Hutchison, of Texas, the ranking Republican on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. Hutchison and Nelson teamed to forge much of the 2010 Authorization bill. In a joint letter, they urged NASA Administrator Charles Bolden to follow the provisions of the Authorization act.
In the House, U. S. Rep. Ralph Hall, of Texas, the Republican chair of the Science, Space and Technology Committee, urged Congressional appropriators to bring spending in line with the Authorization Act and pledged new hearings on the issue.