The Senate Appropriations Committee passed this week its 2012 energy and water appropriations bill, which includes funding for the Department of Energy (DOE). Senate appropriators, though, decided not to fund the administration’s request for $15 million for DOE to restart production of plutonium-238 (Pu-238), an isotope used in radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) for NASA science missions. In the report accompanying the bill, the committee gave no reason for the lack of funding, simply stating, “The Committee provides no funding for the Plutonium-238 Production Restart project.”
That move comes after House appropriators similarly declined to fund Pu-238 production in its DOE bill, although in that case appropriators said in their report that DOE should not share the funding burden with NASA for a program that primarily aids the space agency. The House did include Pu-238 funding for NASA in legislation that the committee passed in July, although that alone may not be sufficient for restarting production.
A lack of Pu-238, because the isotope is no longer produced in the US (although limited quantities of it have been purchased from Russia), has been an area of concern for planetary scientists in recent years, given that many of their proposed high-priority long-term missions require RTGs. The latest planetary science decadal survey, published earlier this year, noted the committee who prepared the report were “alarmed” about the availability of the isotope. “Without a restart of plutonium-238 production, it will be impossible for the United States, or any other country, to conduct certain important types of planetary missions after this decade,” the report stated.
Speaking at a planetary exploration event hosted by The Planetary Society on Capitol Hill on Friday, Steve Sqyures, who led the work on the decadal survey, said they did not let the potential lack of Pu-238 drive the decisions on prioritizing missions. “What we did instead is to turn the problem around and say that these are the missions that ought to be flown, and here is the plutonium-238 need profile that results from that,” he said. He noted the report did recommend the development and use of advanced RTGs that require significantly less Pu-238 than current systems. NASA, Squryres said, is “working very hard with DOE and folks on the Hill to try to come up with a plan for producing the amount of plutonium that’s needed” to meet the missions proposed in the study. That’s proving to be a difficult task.
$15M? Is that all? I guess space exploration is not so important to House Republicans after all. And it’s yet one more thing they are willing to cede to Russia too.
It looks like House Republicans would rather just transfer our whole space program to Russia, and just pay people in the U.S. to work on the SLS public works program. How bizarre.
On a previous thread someone was talking about using nuclear propulsion and many here were trying to remind him about the politics and how realistic was it to push for nuclear. With the obvious need for using nuclear for just unmanned probes and the small amounts required this just reaffirms the enormous task it is to get funding. If this is the process to get funding for just a tiny amount, damn what would it take to get a massive amount for manned operations.
DOE should tell them it’s Pu-239 and we need it for bombs.
@Coastal Ron
Setting aside the dubious proposition that funding any unmanned probe into deep space amounts to taking space exploration seriously, this entire issue is over accounting.
The money involved is too small to be the real reason so this argument is about something else. Did NASA refuse to hire the son of a high up in the Department of Energy?
Coastal Ron – :$15M? Is that all? I guess space exploration is not so important to House Republicans after all. And it’s yet one more thing they are willing to cede to Russia too.
It looks like House Republicans would rather just transfer our whole space program to Russia, and just pay people in the U.S. to work on the SLS public works program. How bizarre.”
The story is about how the Senate Appropriations Committee (Democrat controlled) refused to provide any funding to DOE for Pu-238 production. What is bizarre is that you somehow warp this into an attack on Republicans for ceding a leadership role to Russia. The House at least made the point that if NASA needs it, then NASA should fund it. The Dem Senate didn’t even do that. How is that in the least bit unreasonable on the part of the House? Your one-sided view of the world (GOP – Bad, Libs – Good) does not serve you well.
We can flush billions on SLS without a mission but we will give up the outer solar system for a lack of $15M.
We can flush billions on SLS without a mission but we will give up the outer solar system for a lack of $15M.
This is a pure international treaty political position by the Congresscritters, the reason being it’s still easier to purchase excess Pu-238 from Russia to keep their physicists employed and not selling services to terrorists. Whether they still have excess plutonium for RTGs is another matter altogether, but this is what the Congresscritters believe anyways.
Nobody’s ever claimed Congress has a combined IQ above 25 lately have they?
“Did NASA refuse to hire the son of a high up in the Department of Energy?”
Idiotic.
“Nobody’s ever claimed Congress has a combined IQ above 25 lately have they?”
Congress: plumbing new depths every two years.
There is no Pu-238 left. The Russian reserves are almost nil. Even if not, they will charge a pretty penny for however much we acquire from them. This is an outlandish situation. It is definitely one of the nearest-sighted actions I’ve seen on the part of congress. Time for a complete turnover of the incompetent buffoons.