Space Politics
Because sometimes the most important orbit is the Beltway…
Archive for December, 2005
December 31, 2005 at 9:33 am · Filed under NASA
An editorial in Saturday’s New York Times reviews the situation NASA faces in the new year, primarily the predicted funding shortfall in the shuttle program (which the Times pegs at $3 billion, at the low range of estimates that go as high as $6 billion). The editorial notes that the new authorization legislation endorses (but obviously does not fund) additional money for the agency, and the Times likes the provision of the bill that requires NASA spend at least 15 percent of ISS research funding on non-exploration programs. However, the Times makes it clear where its priorities lie should additional money not be approved: “From our perspective, the costly shuttle and the space-station complex look more expendable than pathfinding robotic probes of the solar system and a transition to new manned space vehicles.”
December 30, 2005 at 6:47 pm · Filed under White House
The White House announced today that President Bush has signed into law HR 2863, the DOD appropriation bill (which includes supplemental funding for hurricane relief) and S. 1281, the NASA authorization bill.
Jim Muncy passed along to me earlier today an interesting bit about HR 2863, which provides NASA with $350 million to begin repairs to Stennis and Michoud: to help pay for the hurricane relief bill, Congress included a one-percent rescission for all non-Defense agencies, which meant NASA had to give up about $170 million, for a net increase of only $180 million, even though NASA has estimated its hurricane repair costs to be $760 million. This has caused some juggling of NASA’s budget, including the transfer of $85 million from the commercial ISS resupply program in 2006 to cover hurricane costs; it helps explain why the funding profile for the program is backloaded.
December 30, 2005 at 6:20 am · Filed under Other
If you’re bored of football games and parties this New Year’s holiday weekend and looking for some alternatives, you may want to read the new Notice for Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) on crew and passenger requirements for commercial vehicles released Thursday by the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST). This NPRM was developed by AST, with industry input, as a requirement of the Commercial Space Transportation Amendments Act, signed into law a year ago. I have not had a chance to read the document (about 120 double-spaced pages long) yet, but an AP article summarizes some of the key points of the document, many of which are simply common sense: safety training for passengers, FAA pilot certificates for pilots, and no weapons allowed on board the spacecraft, among other things.
December 29, 2005 at 6:41 am · Filed under Other
I stumbled across a transcript from a press conference held Tuesday by Anatoly Perminov, head of Roskosmos. If you skim past the introduction, where Perminov goes through some launch statistics from 2005, Perminov had a few interesting things to say about Russia’s space program and its plans for the future:
- Roskosmos plans to issue a request for proposals for the Kliper spacecraft on January 18. Only three organizations will be allowed to bid for the project: Energia, Khrunichev, and NPO Molniya. Since Kliper has been an Energia project, and since Roskosmos effectively controls Energia, this bidding process may be little more than a formality.
- This year was the first year when the government fully funded all of Roskosmos’ programs “in spite of the lag in financing over the past years”.
- Roskosmos and NASA signed an agreement late last week to cover NASA’s purchases of Russian flight services. NASA will pay cash for seats on Soyuz flights and cargo on Progress spacecraft, but Perminov declined to state how much NASA is paying: “we too have our commercial secrets.” He added that he hopes in the first half of 2006 to reach “a comprehensive agreement with NASA on ISS until the year 2011″.
- A “waiting list” of space tourists and astronauts from other countries who want to fly on Soyuz spacecraft has formed. Perminov said Russia is looking at ways to increase the Soyuz production rate.
- Perinov said that Roskosmos can meet the accelerated deadline for the replenishment of the GLONASS satellite navigation system requested by President Putin earlier this week, but that this “will require additional funding and we are going to make relevant proposals.”
- The Russian Defense Ministry is in the process of handing over all the infrastructure at the Baikonur Cosmodrome to Roskosmos, a process that will be completed by the end of 2007.
While Perminov put the best spin possible on these developments, one thing he said made it clear that the Russian space program is far from the glory days of the old Soviet era:
I repeat, we can no longer engage in competition. It is impossible to compete, given the current level of financing. We are lagging behind in many spheres such as unmanned spacecraft, interplanetary research, exploration of other planets. Nothing can be done about it.
December 28, 2005 at 6:51 am · Filed under Other
There were a few space policy-related items published over the holidays:
In an op-ed in Tuesday’s Washington Post, Paul Spudis restates the case for going back to the Moon. His commentary is summarized in these sentences from the introduction: “The moon is important for three reasons: science, inspiration and resources. All three are directly served by the new lunar return architecture. This program has the potential to make significant contributions to our national economy and welfare.” There’s nothing necessarily new here, but it’s a good restatement of the arguments for human lunar exploration.
On the other hand, the Toledo Blade dropped a lump of coal in the stockings of space supporters in a Christmas Day editorial. Rather than focus on human exploration of the solar system, Mars in particular, the Blade argues that NASA should focus on safely flying the shuttle and completing the ISS (which is exactly what NASA is focused on, many would argue.) “Right now, most Americans would rather NASA and the Bush Administration limit their horizons in the short term,” the editorial claims. Later: “Many Americans, we feel sure, would say that first we help our hurricane victims, then we think about colonizing Mars.” Given that “colonizing” Mars is relatively far in the future, regardless of spending on hurricane relief, the Blade’s argument is a little dull here.
The Blade editorial also notes the gap of potentially $6 billion between the expected costs to fly out the shuttle and what has been budgeted for the program through 2010. The Palm Beach Post examines this issue in more detail,including the possibility of flying the shuttle after 2010. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) told the Post that he would support extending the program if the ISS is not complete by 2010 or if the CEV is not expected to fly until after 2012. Nelson’s colleague, Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), agreed with him, saying she would also support a shuttle extension “even if it means expanding NASA’s budget.” Hutchison: “We can’t continue to cut, cut, cut NASA’s budget and expect to make it to the moon and Mars.” However, NASA’s budget has not been “cut, cut, cut” in the last few years—far from it, especially when compared to many other non-defense discretionary programs. The problem lies elsewhere, perhaps with NASA’s cost estimation processes.
December 28, 2005 at 6:23 am · Filed under Other
Space News reports online [subscription required] late Tuesday that the White House has changed course and endorsed a dedicated Landsat mission. A December 23 memo from OSTP director John Marburger (not yet available on the OSTP web site) directed the NPOESS program to remove a Landsat-type instrument and instead gave NASA responsibility for building a new Landsat spacecraft. The decision comes after a confluence of events, including problems with the existing two Landsat spacecraft (one of which is over 20 years old and recently suffered a solar array problem), general problems with the NPOESS program, and concerns that NPOESS was not a suitable platform for a Landsat-class imager. The report doesn’t give any indication of the expected cost of the new Landsat spacecraft or its scheduled deployment.
December 22, 2005 at 11:18 am · Filed under Congress
The Senate approved by unanimous consent yesterday the compromise version of the NASA authorization legislation (S. 1281) hashed out last week in conference and approved Saturday by the House. The bill had been held in the Senate for several days by Sen. Jim Talent (R-MO), reportedly over hypersonics research funding; the Reuters article linked to above doesn’t mention the hold or how it was resolved. The bill now goes to the president for his signature.
December 20, 2005 at 6:37 am · Filed under Other
Postings here will be less frequent through the end of the calendar year, as I’ll be taking some time off. I’ll make note of any major developments during the next couple of weeks, but otherwise keep a lower profile until after the New Year.
December 20, 2005 at 6:33 am · Filed under Congress
The House passed very early Monday a defense spending bill, attached to which was $29 billion in Hurricane Katrina relief spending. That includes $350 million for NASA to begin repairs at the Michoud Assembly Facility and Stennis Space Center. The OMB had asked for $325 million for such efforts in its FY2006 reallocation package request back in October. However, NASA had originally requested $760 million, and some state legislatures, as well as the Aerospace Industries Association, fought to try and get the full amount funded. “It is vital that Congress addresses the need to repair these two facilities because of their importance to our space program,” the AIA’s John Douglass said earlier this month. “We cannot continue the nation’s international leadership in space exploration when hampered by facilities that are not operating at 100 percent.”
December 20, 2005 at 6:14 am · Filed under Other
It would seem that the federal government is in no hurry to give its seal of approval to the United Launch Alliance, the Boeing-Lockheed Martin EELV joint venture. When the deal was announced in early May, the companies expected to close the deal by the end of the year, but required approvals from the Federal Trade Commission and the Defense Department have not been obtained yet, and Lockheed officials told AP and Reuters on Monday Lockheed officials said they don’t expect those approvals to come in the final two weeks of this year. The Decatur (Ala.) Daily reported Tuesday that Boeing and Lockheed officials had hoped that the DOD would recommend to the FTC that they approve the ULA after a “high-level meeting” on Friday, but afterwards instead asked for yet more information about the joint venture.
Besides the regulatory approvals, the ULA is still facing a lawsuit from SpaceX, who wants to block the venture as anti-competitive. Meanwhile, on Monday the National Taxpayers Union issued a press release saying that the ULA “unfairly strand[s] taxpayers with a half-billion-dollar-a-year subsidy.” NTU Director of Government Affairs Paul Gessing: “Over the past decade, the Air Force’s Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) initiative has moved from the best of intentions to the worst of results, and now the EELV is poised to go where no rocket program has gone before – toward a near-permanent government bailout of Boeing’s and Lockheed’s launch businesses.”
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