By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 9 at 7:40 am ET While members of the Texas Congressional delegation are gearing up to defend NASA against budget threats, real or perceived, supporters of NASA’s Langley Research Center in Virginia are planning similar action. The Daily Press newspaper reports that the president of Hampton University is planning a luncheon to “get the community’s leadership re-engaged in the process to head off any potential budget cuts”.
Anna McNider, a “volunteer lobbyist” with a organization called the NASA Aeronautics Support Team, is concerned: “The state of NASA today is as bad as it’s been in the last 10 to 15 years.” However, she appears to be looking a little too far ahead:
McNider said that with NASA’s involvement with the International Space Station concluded, and no currently operating space shuttle, the center’s available workload is going to continue to decline.
Last I checked, NASA was still involved in the ISS and the space shuttle still had 9-10 more missions to fly. In any case, she said, “The push has been the need to take care of things at home – atmospheric science (climate change research) and aeronautics.” Langley, of course, is a major aeronautics center and nearby Hampton University has a center devoted to atmospheric sciences.
One other note: while McNider might be a “volunteer lobbyist”, the NASA Aeronautics Support Team does have some professional support: the organization has spent $110,000 to date this year on lobbyists Van Scoyoc Associates, and in the past several years has paid the firm as much as $240,000 a year.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 7 at 4:26 pm ET An addendum to yesterday’s post about NASA administrator Mike Griffin’s speech Friday on the space agency’s commercialization efforts. Since the speech was part of a ceremony recognizing Armadillo Aerospace for winning the largest prize awarded to date in NASA’s Centennial Challenges to date, one would expect Griffin to talk about prizes in general, and that he did.
Griffin said he favored the use of prizes in general, but did not believe they were always the best solution for the agency. “For example, I think it would be fruitless for the American taxpayer to sponsor multi-billion prizes manned missions back to the Moon or to Mars as some prominent members of the chattering class have suggested,” he said, an apparent reference to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who has proposed such mega-prizes (giga-prizes?) before. “The high upfront cost and technical complexity of such missions to me renders them unrealistic for a private concern to undertake at this time. It’s an interesting thought experiment, but it’s not an idea which would gain much traction in the real world, in my opinion.” He added that if establishing a human presence on the Moon was a national priority, the US government should be actively pursuing it. “We should either care enough to make it happen, or not bother.”
So when are prizes most effective for NASA or other government agencies? According to Griffin, it’s when such agencies “are actively seeking individuals and companies who would not normally participate in a traditional government procurement process.” He added: “Prizes entice the kind of people who are repelled by the cumbersome nature of government processes.” He cited examples ranging from Charles Lindbergh to Peter Homer, who won a prize in NASA’s astronaut glove prize competition last year.
“Those of us on the government side of the space business must recognize a fundamental truth: if our experiment in expanding human presence beyond the Earth is to be sustainable in the long run, it must ultimately yield profitable results, or there must be a profit to be made by supplying those who explore to fulfill other objectives,” Griffin concluded. “We should reach out to those individuals and companies who share our interest in space exploration and are willing to take risks to spur its development.”
Also: audio of Griffin’s and other’s speeches is on the Commercial Space Wiki, thanks to Ken Davidian. And you’re bored, here’s a collection of images of the event, including the obligatory oversized check photo op.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 7 at 11:35 am ET A snippet from President-elect Obama’s interview this morning on NBC’s “Meet the Press”, talking about the “incredible bully pulpit” of the White House and hosting events there:
Part of what we want to do is open up the White House and remind people that this is the people’s house… When it comes to science, elevating science once again, and having lectures in the White House, where people are talking about traveling to the stars or breaking down atoms: inspiring our youth to get a sense of what discovery is all about.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 6 at 3:43 pm ET On Friday NASA hosted a ceremony recognizing Armadillo Aerospace for winning Level One of the Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge, one of the agency’s Centennial Challenges prizes. There were congratulatory speeches, the presentation of an oversized check, and photo opportunities. Mixed in with all this were some new announcements about commercialization efforts by NASA by administrator Mike Griffin, who popped in to give a brief speech during the event. (“I apologize I can’t really stay longer,” he said. “I’m not actually one to pop into a ceremony, offer up a bunch of congratulatory platitudes, and hand out a big check. I think that’s Ed McMahon at Publishers’ Clearinghouse.”)
Griffin called parabolic flight services, like those provided by Zero Gravity Corporation, “another real opportunity for us to turn to the commercial sector to meet our requirements,” in this case for reduced gravity research and related applications, a market Zero-G had been trying for some time to access before winning a NASA contract early this year. Griffin said that NASA has completed several flight tests with Zero-G to see if their service can meet NASA’s needs for flight experiments; those test flights included several experiments funded under NASA SBIRs.
“Tests aren’t yet complete, but project managers are confident that Zero-G can meet our needs,” Griffin said. “Thus, we’re planning for the transition of all microgravity flight activities from the NASA C-9 to commercial aircraft.” The C-9 will be retained for space shuttle training work, and as a backup to Zero-G, but Griffin said that “our primary path will be commercial.”
Griffin’s announcement of the commercialization of parabolic flight services came after he discussed another commercialization effort within NASA, purchasing suborbital flight services from emerging companies for scientific research or even astronaut training. Griffin spoke the same day as the deadline for two requests for information on human-tended suborbital science and other research. There has been some concern in the industry that NASA was dragging its heels on this, particularly after one of its biggest proponents, associate administrator Alan Stern, left NASA earlier this year. His replacement, Ed Weiler, appeared to some to be less than enthused about the concept.
Griffin, though, indicated that he continued to support the idea of purchasing such services when companies start flying. “When the capability becomes available, we will purchase seats for various science payloads, microgravity experiments, and perhaps even astronaut training,” he said. “We’re not interested in doing ‘junk science’ just to fly it, and we’re not interested in subsidizing suborbital space tourism development as we are, in the same fashion, doing with COTS… But we do plan to leverage this new capability when it emerges to improve the science that we can conduct as we do today on sounding rocket missions or to lower our costs. You should see more about this initiative in next year’s budget request.”
That interest in purchasing parabolic and suborbital flight services, though, does not extend to one popular proposal in the entrepreneurial space community: accelerating the option in the COTS program for crew transportation, known as Capability D. “I’ve been asked on many occasions for my opinion on commercial crew transportation to ISS,” Griffin said. He said that commercial cargo transportation is “our more critical need”, given the lack of cargo alternatives to the station once the shuttle is retired, but that NASA can continue to acquire crew transportation from Russia.
“While I certainly wish I had more money to invest in developing COTS crew capability—along with many other things I wish I had more money for—I think it’s unwise to raid other accounts to increase our bet on COTS crew capability,” he said. Advocates of COTS-D, though, will likely note that the $400 million NASA will spend on the two-year Mars Science Laboratory launch delay—to apparently be paid for by raiding the accounts of other Mars and planetary missions—would be more than enough to fund the Capability D option in SpaceX’s existing Space Act agreement.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 6 at 2:38 pm ET In an editorial in Saturday’s edition, the Houston Chronicle sounds the alarm: NASA’s budget in under attack. “There is talk in Washington that those mind-boggling outlays for the nation’s economic recovery could come at NASA’s expense – significant cuts in the space agency’s budget,” the editorial claims. Later: “But one wonders: Why is such a battle necessary? Why would NASA be targeted for cuts?”
However, it’s not at all clear that the agency is being “targeted” for cuts. The editorial appears based on an article earlier this week about how members of Texas’s congressional delegation were gearing up to protect the agency’s budget. But the article doesn’t gave any specific evidence that the agency is being singled out, only that there are “expectations that billions of dollars will be shifted from various federal agencies into new programs to stimulate the economy” and that “NASA’s supporters are bracing for a hard look by the new administration and Democratic-controlled Congress at the space agency’s $20.2 billion budget.” (Of course, that $20.2-billion figure is only the agency’s authorized budget for FY2009; the final appropriated amount—what really matters—may be significantly less.)
Those stimulus efforts, like the massive public works projects proposed by President-elect Obama today, are likely to run into the hundreds of billions of dollars. If those efforts are going to be even partially offset by cuts elsewhere, those cuts are more likely to be broadbased: across many or most programs, rather than targeting a few. And who knows: given that Obama promised $2 billion extra for NASA during the campaign, the agency could even be targeted as one that would escape any cuts.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 4 at 6:34 am ET As expected, President-Elect Obama named Bill Richardson as his pick for Commerce Secretary on Wednesday. The only real surprise to come out of yesterday is that Richardson is once again clean-shaven. Richardson’s interest in commercial space in particular has previously been noted here.
Another Cabinet pick yet to be announced, though, is Transportation Secretary. Last month some space advocates got concerned about reports that Congressman James Oberstar was being considered for the job, given Oberstar’s past opposition to the 2004 Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act and a failed attempt the following year to undo some of the provisions of that legislation. However, MinnPost.com reported last week that Oberstar is unlikely to take the job, even if offered. Oberstar’s spokesman said that the congressman would enjoy more power in his current position as a committee chairman than as a cabinet secretary, where “he’d have to keep his vision in line within the views of the administration.” An administration that now will include one person who vowed just over a month ago to ensure it would be “pro-commercial space”.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 3 at 7:56 am ET An article in today’s Houston Chronicle reports that the Texas congressional delegation “is launching a campaign to combat potentially deep budget cuts for NASA” that some fear will be necessary to cover the costs of government bailouts and stimulus packages. The specific of the campaign seem vague, other than “building alliances” with other members of Congress and counting on lobbying efforts from industry. Just how much effort most members of the Texas delegation, particularly those with no particular ties to NASA, isn’t made clear in the article. (Also look past some minor errors, like NASA’s “$20.2 billion budget for the current year”—that’s the authorized amount, which has little bearing on what the agency is likely to get—or calling newly-elected Alabama congressman Parker Griffith a Republican.)
The more important news in the article, though, is something that has been rumored for some time but not widely discussed, at least in space advocacy circles. One of the strongest NASA supporters in the Senate, Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), is expected to resign her seat some time next year in order to run for governor. Hutchison’s interest in the job is clear: she considered running against current governor Rick Perry in the Republican gubernatorial primary in 2006 before choosing to stay in the Senate. She has worked in particular with Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) to try and win additional money for NASA—an effort that has had mixed outcomes in the Senate and no additional money for NASA overall.
But, in an era where hundreds of billions of dollars in proposals to boost the economy are being considered, could NASA be a recipient and not a donor? That’s the suggestion Robert Hopkins offers in a Chronicle op-ed published this weekend. Hopkins, former chief of strategic communications at NASA, offers some suggestions for specific efforts that could “meet the new administration’s broader economic, innovation and environmental goals”, ranging from additional support for ISS research to development of commercial low Earth orbit transportation systems to Earth observation. “NASA must be seen as a part of our nation’s economic and innovation solution,” Hopkins writes. “The Obama administration must recognize that an investment in NASA and space exploration is an investment in the future well being of our nation.”
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 2 at 6:56 am ET With a change of administrations coming to Washington, there has been some hope in the space community that this might lead to some reform of export control policies that have hampered the ability of US space companies to do business with foreign customers. In the space policy his campaign released in August, Barack Obama proposed some degree of ITAR reform, including “a review of the ITAR to reevaluate restrictions imposed on American companies, with a special focus on space hardware that is currently restricted from commercial export”.
However, as I noted in an article in Monday’s issue of The Space Review, actually enacting any reform may be harder than some think. As one Congressional staffer said on a panel about ITAR at a space policy conference in Washington last month, “It’s very difficult to tell somebody after the [Chinese] ASAT test that we have be sitting back and being looser about these things.” More limited reform, including a closer evaluation of what “space-qualified” components should be on the US Munitions List (and thus governed by ITAR) and which should be under the less restrictive control of the Commerce Department, may be possible, although it would still require action by Congress.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 December 2 at 6:56 am ET In Monday’s issue of The Space Review, the same group of Canadians who published a detailed discussion of Canada’s future in space provide a condensed version. This version has the same theme: despite relatively small budgets compared to the US or Europe, Canada can take advantage of opportunities available now, provided the right goals and vision. This is particularly timely given the present uncertainty about the Canadian government: the Liberals and NDP have proposed a coalition government to oust the current Conservative government. If successful, that could mean, among other things, a greater role for one of the newest Liberal MPs, former astronaut and CSA president Marc Garneau.
Last week at ESA’s ministerial meeting, the space agency got pretty much everything on its wish list, from funding for a new Ariane 5 upper stage engine to a new series of Earth observation satellites under a joint program with the EU, GMES/Kopernikus. And while ministers didn’t fully fund ExoMars, ESA’s ambitious Mars rover mission, they did commit to enough funding that makes it possible to carry out the mission with international participation, either from the US or Russia. However, Taylor Dinerman argues in The Space Review that GMES/Kopernikus in particular gives ESA an uncomfortable dual civil-military role, since the satellites will have applications not just for Earth sciences but also security.
By Jeff Foust on 2008 November 26 at 7:00 am ET The CBC talked this week with Marc Garneau, the first Canadian in space, former president of the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), and newly-elected member of Parliament. Garneau, the “science and technology critic” for the minority Liberal party, was asked what a Canadian space policy should be, given that he advocated for one prior to being elected. While stating that he would have to coordinate his own personal views with those of his party, now that he was an elected official, he did offer some ideas of why Canada should have a space policy:
[A] space policy should essentially answer the fundamental question, which is what can space offer to us here in Canada? We have a whole bunch of government departments here in Ottawa, but there’s never been a coherent space policy put together. We were the third country in space, but it’s been more ad hoc than it should be, and a space policy can bring it all together. Ultimately, it will decide our priority. Is earth observation our first priority? Is developing our space manufacturing sector our first priority or is space science our first priority?
If the Canadian government does decide to pursue a space policy, one source of insight could be this open letter to Canada’s space community published earlier this month by several Canadian graduates of the International Space University. As they write:
In order for Canada to continue to be a leading space-faring nation, our government must adopt bold new measures and methods. This is not merely a matter of redistributing the space agency’s funding, or identifying new niche technologies. Instead, the agency must be prepared to create new goals that are clear, achievable, and visionary, re-imagine what space agencies are for and how they work, and embrace the unique opportunities that are available to our nation. The opportunity currently exists for a transformation that can dramatically increase the effectiveness of the CSA, provide new opportunities for Canadian industry, and allow our country to continue to play a truly pioneering role in space.
Among their recommendations for action are:
[T]he use of innovative program management and funding structures, including the introduction of prizes, adopting a new vision that clearly establishes the role of the CSA in enabling humanity’s future in space, creation of policies and programs that promote new entrepreneurial space ventures and increase the number of space firms in Canada, proactive and high-profile interaction with researchers and students at universities across the nation, and a coordinated effort to improve the efficiency of cross-border space business with our largest trading partner, the United States.
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