Space Politics
Because sometimes the most important orbit is the Beltway…
Archive for August, 2005
August 29, 2005 at 7:59 am · Filed under Other
As you might expect in the doldrums of August, there wasn’t much news on the space policy front last week; good news for me while I spent the week on vacation. A few items of note:
- NASA is looking for more money in its FY2007 budget proposal for the Mars Scout program, an effort to develop low-cost Mars mission analogous to the Discovery program of planetary science missions. Phoenix, the first Mars Scout mission, is scheduled for launch in 2007, with the second Mars Scout mission planned for 2011. The experience from Phoenix told NASA Mars managers that the original cost cap of $325 million is too low, and instead are looking for something at or above $400 million.
- Ongoing cost overruns with the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) could degrade the telescope’s effectiveness, New Scientist reports. One proposed way to cut $150 million from JWST is to polish the telescope’s mirror segments once instead of twice. That would prevent the telescope from making effective observations at wavelengths below 1.7 microns unless it took much longer exposures. While JWST was designed primarily to observe at infrared wavelengths, astronomers had hoped to use the telescope down to 0.6 microns, in the middle of the visible band. This could lead to pressure on NASA and Congress from astronomers who do work at visible wavelengths to either preserve this capability on JWST and/or ensure that a Hubble servicing mission is restored.
- ATK, which arguably has the most to gain or lose on NASA’s pending decision for new crew and cargo launch vehicles, has enlisted a number of former astronauts as lobbyists. Six former astronauts—Daniel Barry, John Blaha, Charles Bolden, Daniel Bursch, Franklin Chang-Diaz, and Thomas Jones—have registered as lobbyists representing the company. Another former astronaut, Scott Horowitz, already works for ATK; he was pushing for a SRB-derived CEV launch vehicle even before he left NASA last year.
August 20, 2005 at 9:48 am · Filed under Congress
The member organizations of the Space Exploration Alliance, including such activist groups such as the National Space Society and the Mars Society, kicked off this week an effort to organize visits to Congressional district offices during the August recess. The primary purpose, according to NSS and Mars Society documents, is to urge their support for the Vision for Space Exploration. In particular, a talking points document calls for full funding for the VSE, acceleration of the development of the CEV, support for NASA’s launch vehicle plans, and passage of an amendment for the Iran Nonproliferation Act to permit NASA to purchase ISS services from Russia. (It’s noteworthy that the document states that “NASA’s plans for human and cargo launch vehicles are on the right course” even though those plans have not been disclosed except in the broadest brush strokes and rumors.)
It’s also interesting that the Alliance member organizations waited until the middle of the month, a couple of weeks after the recess started, to start publicizing this lobbying effort. Congress returns right after Labor Day, so there’s not much time for interested space activists to schedule those meetings.
Speaking of August recess, I’m going on a break of my own over the next week. I don’t plan on posting much if anything until the week of August 29.
August 20, 2005 at 9:35 am · Filed under Other
I don’t talk much about Australian space policy because, well, there’s not much to talk about. However, this AAP article caught my eye: Australian-born NASA astronaut Andy Thomas, fresh from his STS-114 shuttle mission, is calling on Australia to invest more money on space efforts. Thomas called on Australia to work in particular on small remote sensing satellites that could have security applications: “Relatively inexpensive satellites could be made and launched from Australia and used to scan its vast coastline for illegal immigrants and fisherman, as well as terrorists attempting to sneak into the country, he said.” Thomas added that “he feared the federal Government would baulk at investing in a space program because of its initial expense.”
Thomas may want to check out AstroVision Australia Ltd, a Sydney-based company that is planning a commercial remote sensing satellite that could, among other things, monitor coastlines and shipping. Unlike Thomas’ proposal, AstroVision plans to use a relative large satellite in GEO to provide imagery, with the Australian government as a likely major customer.
August 19, 2005 at 2:01 pm · Filed under NASA
On the heels of its extended editorial Sunday about the future of the ISS, the New York Times published another space-related editorial Friday, this time on the space shuttle. The editorial cites NASA’s decision to delay the STS-121 launch to next March, as well as the release of the Stafford-Covey final report and the much-discussed appendix by several members of the panel. The editorial goes over well-hashed arguments about the shuttle, suggesting that the delay and the report “ought to force the administration and Congress to take a much harder look at how long the shuttles should keep flying – or perhaps whether they should be flying at all.” I would expect that the future of the shuttle program to (again) be the subject of Congressional hearings this fall. It’s possible that these issues could affect the NASA authorization bill, which the Senate has yet to approve.
However, the Times’ suggestion that the shuttle be retired is mild compared to what Steve Forbes suggests in an editorial in his eponymous publication [free registration required]. In a proposal no doubt welcomed by any remaining libertarians, he calls for nothing short of dismantling the space agency:
One inescapable response: Abolish the National Aeronautics & Space Administration (NASA) or drastically scale back its mission. Since the moon landings over three decades ago, NASA has become an obstacle to advancing space exploration and travel. If NASA had been in charge of developing the automobile, we’d still be riding horses.
Some of his suggestions aren’t terribly new, such as endorsing tax breaks for private space exploration. However, he also argues that the “shuttle program should be turned over to the private sector”, and the ISS, too. Unfortunately, he doesn’t bother to develop a reasonable business plan for private operations of the shuttle.
August 17, 2005 at 12:57 pm · Filed under NASA
In an op-ed piece in today’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution, former Congressman Bob Barr sounds off on the current state of NASA. In short, he’s not too happy:
The glorious space dreams of the 1960s have become penny-pinching exercises in bureaucracy in the 21st century. Bureaucracy and budget cuts have held back needed funding for new programs, but something even greater has been hampering the space program – absence of vision. In the 1960s we had a clear vision to accomplish a goal, used the proper resources and did the job right. The program today appears to have become a bureaucratic stepchild on life support.
He goes on about the agency’s perceived reliance on “duct tape, Elmer’s glue and Scotchgard”:
The space program needs to be on the front end of technology as it once was. The benefits to society of an efficient space program are numerous. If the program cannot be the best, with the best technology, the best manpower and the best resources, then perhaps our country should forgo it altogether. [Emphasis added] Why should we subject ourselves to the embarrassment of repairing 35-year-old technology with pliers and a hacksaw?
Barr goes on to say he is generally supportive of the Vision for Space Exploration, but warns that the “‘culture’ of space exploration needs to be changed to prevent future projects from being employed past the point of antiquity.” Not surprisingly, Barr also advocates privatization of “a significant portion” of NASA, although he doesn’t identify which programs should be transferred to the private sector.
August 15, 2005 at 8:08 pm · Filed under Other
One of the biggest complaints in the space business community, particularly among entrepreneurs, is the headaches created by export control regulations, specifically International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). There is an existence proof now, however, demonstrating that these hurdles can be overcome: SPACE.com reports that the State Department has issued an agreement—presumably a technical assistance agreement (TAA), although the specific term is not used in the article—between US-based Scaled Composites and UK-based Virgin Galactic regarding the development of SpaceShipTwo.
The agreement is not a surprise: Virgin and Scaled had been dealing with the export control paperwork for months, as Virgin Galactic’s Will Whitehorn mentioned in Congressional testimony back in April. What Whitehorn doesn’t reveal in the SPACE.com report, though, is how much effort getting the TAA cost the companies in terms of time and money, other than a passing mention that the work was spread over five months. That’s not necessarily a huge issue for a well-capitalized venture like this; whether this has smoothed the path for future entrepreneurs whose pockets are not nearly as deep as Branson’s, though, remains to be seen.
August 15, 2005 at 8:00 am · Filed under Other
A couple of items from this week’s issue of The Space Review:
- Reporting on the just-completed Mars Society Conference in Colorado, Tom Hill notes that NASA’s Chris Shank had little new to say about the upcoming exploration architecture. The Mars Society is planning to hold next year’s conference in the Washington, DC area featuring a one-day “Congressional Blitz” on Capitol Hill.
- Taylor Dinerman critiques a recent essay in Le Monde that featured an “International Aeronautics and Space Administration” carrying out the first human mission to Mars. He is skeptical that such an international space agency is a good idea. He also touches upon the Iran Nonproliferation Act in his article, wondering if any attempt to amend the legislation to aid NASA will be done in broad public view or tucked away as a provision of a much larger, unrelated bill.
August 14, 2005 at 3:54 pm · Filed under NASA
Over the last couple of weeks there have been plenty of newspaper editorials about the space shuttle, ISS, and space policy in general. In some respects watching these editorials has been entertaining, as they shift from congratulating the shuttle one day to criticizing it the next when news of the foam shedding came to light. It’s worth a broader examination, but not here and not today.
What is worth discussing today is an editorial in the Sunday New York Times titled “Is the Space Station Necessary?” It’s worthwhile in part because it appears in the Sunday Times, one of the most widely-read newspapers in the US. Second, the Times doesn’t skimp on the discussion: the editorial is double the size of the typical one found in the pages of the newspaper, and goes into some detail about the rationale for continuing the ISS program.
The editorial concludes that the two primary reasons for continuing the station—commitments to international partners and scientific research—are highly suspect. On the former, the Times editors believe that, contrary to conventional wisdom, the international partners might be looking for a way out of the program: “There are credible reports that even space authorities in some partner countries are appalled that the high cost of operating the station will eat up their own budgets, constraining other space ventures.” On the latter, the Times believes that while good science can be done on the ISS, the “real problem is that the value of the work is not commensurate with the cost of the station-shuttle complex.”
Do these arguments hold water? Regarding the science, it’s a judgment call: what value do you place on ISS research? On the international partners issue, the Times may be overreaching by lumping them all together: does Russia, for example, feel the same as Europe, Canada, or Japan? The Times also seems ignorant of the effects of the Iran Nonproliferation Act when it writes: “If the shuttle fleet remains grounded for a long time, the station will have to stay as is and rely on smaller Russian spacecraft to carry up crew members and cargo. That seems like a sensible approach over all.” Of course, NASA will be denied access to those Russian spacecraft starting next year unless INA is amended. One good piece of advice: “…right now we should at minimum be hearing administrators explain how they will plan for the lowest number of shuttle flights possible, while they work on development of a successor spacecraft and automated vehicles to carry loads into orbit.” We should be hearing more about that in the weeks to come as NASA rolls out its exploration architecture.
August 14, 2005 at 3:15 pm · Filed under Other
You may recall earlier this year the on-again, off-again strategic “roadmaps” review of NASA programs initiated by former administrator Sean O’Keefe, but sharply curtailed by Michael Griffin shortly after taking office. While some of the roadmaps were curtailed or dropped altogether, the science ones (with the exception of lunar exploration) were completed in May and delivered to the National Research Council for review by its Space Studies Board (SSB), under a Congressional mandate. The SSB completed its review and quietly issued a report on its analysis earlier this month. (How quiet? While the National Academies issued a brief notice about the report’s release August 5, only recently had I found evidence on the SSB’s web site that the report was indeed publicly available.)
In general, the SSB panel charged with the review was pleased with the content of the science roadmaps: “It found that the proposed roadmaps have significant scientific merit and that, with a few notable exceptions, their near-term recommendations are generally consistent with the decadal-scale studies produced by the NRC.” Specifically:
Read the rest of this entry »
August 10, 2005 at 9:13 pm · Filed under White House
Space News reported this afternoon that the Defense Department has signed off on a NASA proposal to develop shuttle-derived CEV and heavy-lift launch vehicles. In an August 5 letter to White House officials NASA administrator Michael Griffin and Air Force undersecretary Ronald Sega said that they had agreed that NASA will use shuttle-derived technology to develop a CEV launch vehicle by 2010, followed by a shuttle-derived heavy-lift vehicle. The letter was required by the space transportation policy issued at the beginning of this year, which states that NASA and the DoD would submit a joint recommendation on heavy-lift launch options to the White House.
The announcement is not very surprising: all indications over the last several weeks suggested that NASA was leaning very strongly in the direction of shuttle-derived vehicles (versus EELV-derived alternatives) and that the DoD was willing to agree to such a proposal. In a presentation at last month’s Return to the Moon conference in Las Vegas, Chris Shank, special assistant to the NASA administrator, used slides that featured illustrations of shuttle-derived CEV and heavy-lift vehicles, and later said the DoD was amenable to the concept. Griffin himself, of course, has long advocated shuttle-derived solutions.
The letter includes a couple other decisions about launch vehicle usage:
- NASA and the DoD will use EELV-class vehicles “for all intermediate and larger payloads for national security, civil, science, and International Space Station cargo re-supply missions in the 5-20 metric-ton-class to the maximum extent possible.” However, if other competing vehicles become available, they would also be eligible for such launches.
- NASA and the Air Force will perform a study on phasing out the medium-class Delta 2. The Air Force is already phasing out the Delta 2 in favor of EELVs, although NASA still uses the Delta 2 for many science missions.
- The military would consider using the shuttle-derived heavy-lift vehicle for any potential future applications, but has no interest in using the shuttle-derived CEV vehicle as a backup to the EELV (a concept that had been quietly batted around in recent months as a way to provide assured access while allowing the DoD to downselect to a single EELV family.)
None of these developments are terribly surprising, but the letter—assuming the White House does not object for some reason—clears away any remaining uncertainty about NASA’s future plans.
Next entries »
