By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 18 at 9:15 am ET The House Science Committee is holding its markup of a NASA authorization bill this morning (the meeting has been delayed two hours to 11:15 am EDT.) The bill will, presumably, be approved by the full committee, although it may be on a party-line vote as was the case in last week’s subcommittee markup.
However, there may be a little excitement in today’s markup. Space News reported late yesterday that Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD) will introduce an amendment that would create a commission to study whether to close NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. The “Center Realignment and Closure Commission” would look at consolidating rocket development and test activities currently conducted at Marshall and the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi, as well as relocating all Marshall activities to either Stennis or the Johnson Space Center. It’s unclear what prompted Edwards, the ranking member of the space subcommittee, to consider such an amendment; last week, when she introduced an alternative version of an authorization bill in the subcommittee, she courted Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL), whose district includes Marshall, by highlighting the increased authorized spending levels for the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket in her version of the bill.
While Edwards’s amendment may be a long shot to be approved by the committee, something that may have greater odds of passage is a change to section 215 of the authorization act, which calls for the use of “cost-type” contracts for future phases of NASA’s commercial crew program. Full committee vice-chairman Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) criticized that provision in the subcommittee’s markup last week and said he understood his concerns would be addressed before the full committee takes up the bill. Asked about the status of those efforts yesterday at the Future Space 2013 conference in Washington, Rohrabacher instead summarized his objections to that provision without providing an update on any efforts within the committee to address his issues with it.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 18 at 7:08 am ET The House Appropriations Committee, as expected, approved a Commerce, Justice, and Science (CJS) appropriations bill Wednesday, sending the legislation on to the full House on a voice vote. The committee accepted a few amendments during the full committee markup, none of which affected NASA, leaving the funding levels in the earlier version of the bill and accompanying report unchanged. “They’ve been treated very, very fair,” Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), chairman of the CJS subcommittee, said of NASA in comments to Florida Today after the markup.
NASA, though, would beg to differ. “While we appreciate the support of the Committee, we are deeply concerned that the bill under consideration would set our funding level significantly below the President’s request,” the agency said in a statement released just before the markup by NASA associate administrator for communications David Weaver. “We are especially concerned the bill cuts funding for space technology – the ‘seed corn’ that allows the nation to conduct ever more capable and affordable space missions – and the innovative and cost-effective commercial crew program.”
Those commercial crew and space technology cuts are also worrying to the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF), an industry group. “Less funding for the commercial crew program simply equates to prolonged dependence on foreign launch providers,” said CSF president Michael Lopez-Alegria in a statement. CSF executive director Alex Saltman added that the organization hopes to work with appropriators to increase funding for those programs in later stages of the appropriations process.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 17 at 3:00 pm ET Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL), chairman of the space subcommittee of the Senate Commerce Committee, announced Wednesday that he will be formally introducing later in the day the Senate’s version of a NASA authorization bill that will differ sharply from the House version.
Nelson, speaking at the luncheon of the Future Space 2013 conference in Washington on Wednesday (delayed slightly, he said, because he showed up to the wrong building on Capitol Hill), said he and Sen. John D. Rockefeller (D-WV), chairman of the full committee, would be filing a NASA authorization bill today. The bill would authorize $18.1 billion for NASA in fiscal year 2014. “You will see a robust approach, a balanced approach,” he said of the bill, without going into much detail about its contents, “providing the resources for the SLS, for Orion, likewise for commercial crew, likewise for science and planetary science.”
The authorization bill “has a great deal of symmetry” with the Commerce, Justice, and Science (CJS) appropriations bill that a Senate appropriations subcommittee approved yesterday and which the full committee is scheduled to take up tomorrow. It stands in sharp contrast, though, to House legislation, where bills currently under consideration authorize NASA at $16.865 billion and appropriate $16.598 billion for fiscal year 2014. Those funding levels, he said, “would absolutely be lethal for NASA. You couldn’t have the balanced approach.”
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 16 at 10:13 pm ET In contrast to their House counterparts, Senate appropriators appears to be more generous with NASA, at least at the overall level. A summary of the Commerce, Justice, and Science (CJS) appropriations bill, marked up with little fanfare by the CJS subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee Tuesday morning, reveals the committee is proposing $18 billion for NASA in fiscal year 2014.
“The $18 billion in the bill for NASA will preserve a NASA portfolio balanced among science, aeronautics, technology and human space flight investments,” the summary states. “Moreover, it will keep NASA in the forefront of innovation, inspiring private companies to build new crew transportation and spawning a new satellite servicing industry that can revive, refuel, and rejuvenate defunct communications satellites.”
The summary doesn’t break out how that spending is allocated among the various accounts, but the summary does note that NASA’s science account would get $373 million more than the House version (or $5.154 billion, slightly above the administration’s request) and $597 million more for exploration (to $4.2 billion, again above the administration’s request.)
Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), chairwoman of both the CJS subcommittee and and the full appropriations committee, said nothing about the NASA budget in her opening statement at the brief markup session, but Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL), the ranking member of the subcommittee and full committee, did mention the budget. “These funds will give NASA the ability to maintain key schedules for ongoing missions and activities, including development of a heavy-lift launch vehicle while funding ongoing activities of the International Space Station and other important research activities.” Shelby added that he worked with Mikulski to include language in the appropriations bill to provide “greater accountability and budgetary transparency to the commercial crew program, to ensure that taxpayers are getting the best value for their dollar.”
Shelby, though, revealed that he will not vote for the full appropriations bill, because the total funding in the bill is too high. “For that reason, and that reason alone, I will vote against the bill at the full committee,” he said.
The full Senate Appropriations Committee is scheduled to take up the bill in a markup session Thursday morning, one day after the House Appropriations Committee marks up their bill.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 16 at 9:21 pm ET On Tuesday, the House Appropriations Committee released the committee report accompanying its version of a Commerce, Justice, and Science (CJS) appropriations bill for fiscal year 2014, in advance of the bill’s markup by the full committee on Wednesday morning. The report adds details on spending levels for key programs within the accounts specified in the bill, as well as other provision. A summary of the appropriations in the overall $16.6-billion appropriations for NASA, as compared to the administration’s bill:
| Account |
Request |
House CJS draft |
Difference |
| SCIENCE |
$5,017.8 |
$4,781.0 |
-$236.8 |
| - Earth Science |
$1,846.0 |
$1,659.0 |
-$187.0 |
| - Planetary Science |
$1,218.0 |
$1,315.0 |
$97.0 |
| - Astrophysics |
$642.0 |
$622.0 |
-$20.0 |
| - JWST |
$658.0 |
$584.0 |
-$74.0 |
| - Heliophysics |
$654.0 |
$601.0 |
-$53.0 |
| SPACE TECHNOLOGY |
$742.6 |
$576.0 |
-$166.6 |
| AERONAUTICS |
$565.7 |
$566.0 |
$0.3 |
| EXPLORATION SYSTEMS |
$3,915.5 |
$3,612.0 |
-$303.5 |
| - SLS/Orion |
$2,730.0 |
$2,825.0 |
$95.0 |
| - Commercial Spaceflight |
$821.0 |
$500.0 |
-$321.0 |
| - Exploration R&D |
$364.0 |
$287.0 |
-$77.0 |
| SPACE OPERATIONS |
$3,882.9 |
$3,670.0 |
-$212.9 |
| - ISS |
$3,049.0 |
$2,860.0 |
-$189.0 |
| - Space and Flight Support |
$834.0 |
$810.0 |
-$24.0 |
| EDUCATION |
$94.2 |
$122.0 |
$27.8 |
| CROSS AGENCY SUPPORT |
$2,850.3 |
$2,711.0 |
-$139.3 |
| CONSTRUCTION, ENVIRO |
$609.4 |
$525.0 |
-$84.4 |
| INSPECTOR GENERAL |
$37.0 |
$35.3 |
-$1.7 |
| TOTAL |
$17,715.4 |
$16,598.3 |
-$1,117.1 |
House appropriators differed from their authorizing counterparts on the House Science Committee in several areas. While authorizers sought to to cut Earth science funding to $1.2 billion, appropriators are offering more than $1.65 billion for the program: still less than administration’s request of nearly $1.85 billion but still more generous than what authorizers proposed. Appropriators weren’t nearly as generous for planetary sciences, but still offer more funding for it than the original request. The $500 million for commercial crew is also less than both what authorizers proposed ($700 million) or the administration’s request ($821 million).
The report, like the House authorization bill, blocks any spending on NASA’s proposed Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM). “The Committee believes that NASA should take the time to complete further concept studies, pursue the support of Congress through the authorization process and line up support from potential international partners before seeking new resources to carry out the mission,” the report states. “In the interim, the Committee’s recommendation does not include any of the requested increases associated with the asteroid retrieval proposal.”
The report language is critical of the administration’s proposed $1.2 billion for planetary science. “NASA has once again proposed damaging and disproportionate reductions in the Planetary Science budget without any substantive justification,” the report states. At that proposed funding level, “NASA would be unable to meet the major scientific goals of the Planetary Science decadal survey in a timely manner; lose its role as the international leader in the field; drive uniquely qualified and promising talent out of the field, perhaps permanently; and increase the risk level on existing projects due to the inefficient phasing of funds.”
The committee is also concerned that NASA’s work on the Space Launch System (SLS) is not progressing fast enough towards a version with a 130-ton payload capacity. “As a result, the program would likely reach a plateau with the achievement of the 70 metric ton capability,” the report states. “For this reason, the Committee continues to urge NASA to allocate additional funds to SLS elements like advanced booster risk reduction, J2–X engine development and/or upper stage development, all of which are required for the program to progress beyond the initial configuration.”
The report also calls for moving on to Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR)-based contracts for future phases of the commercial crew program and says NASA should make “strategic decisions about the number of industry partners to retain in the certification phase” (which could be interpreted as a call for a downselect to perhaps a single company.) “The overriding purpose of the Commercial Crew Program (CCP) is to restore domestic access to the Inter- national Space Station (ISS) as quickly and safely as possible, and the Committee expects that NASA will manage CCP funds in a manner that is consistent with that goal,” the report states, adding that the $500 million it appropriates to the program should be sufficient to conclude the current phase of the program and “a portion” of the follow-on certification contracts phase.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 16 at 7:04 am ET While House and Senate appropriators are working on fiscal year 2014 appropriations bills to fund NASA, the agency is still working with Congress for agreement on an operating plan for fiscal year 2013 (which, yes, ends in just two and a half months.) As first reported by The Planetary Society, NASA planetary sciences division director Jim Green said Monday that Congress had rejected an operating plan NASA submitted to Congress in May. The reason for the rejection wasn’t reported, but it’s widely speculated that the issue is that the plan sought to reprogram additional planetary sciences funding provided in the final FY13 appropriations bill elsewhere in the agency, returning planetary to the $1.2 billion in the administration’s original request. The revised draft of the operating plan, under development, “will more closely align planetary funding to congressional intent,” according to the Planetary Society report.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 16 at 6:48 am ET There are no summer doldrums in Congress this week as two committees in the House and Senate work on versions of appropriations bills that are likely to fund NASA at differing levels, while a NASA authorization bill moves on in the House.
At 10 am EDT today, the Commerce, Justice, and Science (CJS) subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee will markup its version of an appropriations bill that funds, among other agencies, NASA and NOAA. The committee has not released any details about that bill, but the expectation is that, for NASA, it will differ from the House version both in the overall amount and the allocation among the various programs.
At 10 am EDT Wednesday, the full House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to markup its CJS appropriations bill, which breezed through a subcommittee markup last week. This should also be an opportunity for the committee to release the report accompanying the bill, which goes into more details about allocations of funds within the various accounts and additional provisions.
At 9:15 am EDT Thursday, the full House Science Committee will markup the NASA Authorization Act of 2013, which the space subcommittee passed on a party-line vote last week. The bill’s approval by the full committee appears likely (if, again, along party lines); one thing to look for is if the full committee addresses concerns raised by the committee vice chair, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), in last week’s subcommittee markup about a provision calling for the use of FAR-based “cost-type” contracts in the next round of the commercial crew program.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 12 at 9:05 am ET Wednesday’s markup of a NASA authorization bill by the space subcommittee of the House Science Committee played out as expected. Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD), ranking member of the subcommittee, offered the version of an authorization bill she introduced earlier this week as an amendment in the form of a substitute to the Republican-led bill. After debate, the subcommittee voted down the Edwards bill along party lines, with all Republicans voting against the amendment and all Democrats voting for it. The subcommittee then voted in favor of the original bill, again on a strict party line vote, sending it on to the full committee for consideration.
The main thrust of Edwards’s argument was that her bill authorized the appropriate funding levels for NASA, unlike the Republican bill that hewed to lower funding levels to comply with the Budget Control Act. “I’ve yet to find anything in the Budget Control Act that stipulates what funding committees can authorize, because the Budget Control Act doesn’t limit authorization in any way,” she said. “You can be fiscally conservative and still support this amendment.”
Edwards even questioned two Republican members of the subcommittee with NASA facilities in their districts, Mo Brooks of Alabama (MSFC) and Bill Posey of Florida (KSC), asking them if they preferred the higher authorized funding levels for efforts like the Space Launch System and Exploration Ground Systems in her bill. Neither were swayed by her argument, though. “I like the additional funding that is in the minority proposal for the Marshall Space Flight Center and for NASA generally,” Brooks said. “However, it is financially irresponsible because the minority does not come up with a way to pay for it.”
Rep. Stephen Palazzo (R-MS), chairman of the subcommittee, said the authorization had to follow the lower funding profile in the Republican version if the bill had any chance of passage. “Our goal is to bring a workable bill that can pass both houses,” he said as debate on the Democratic bill version concluded. “The reality is, if we ignore the Budget Control Act, which many of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle voted for, the bill is dead on arrival in both the House and the Senate. It would never make it to the House floor, and, ironically, it would not have the unanimous consent it needs to move it in the Senate.”
However, while the bill in its current form may make it to the House floor and pass there, its odds of passage in the Senate in that form seem much lower. Last month Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) was critical of the draft version of the House bill, in particular the overall authorized spending level. “I’m not going to approve of keeping it at 16.8 [billion dollars], because it would run the space program and NASA into a ditch,” he said at a Space Transportation Association luncheon. The Senate has not introduced its version of an authorization bill yet, although appropriators there will be marking up a spending bill on Tuesday.
The Edwards bill was the only amendment the subcommittee considered Wednesday, although after the vote Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), vice-chair of the full committee, called for a revision of one section of the bill regarding commercial crew. Section 215 of the bill calls for the use of Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) “cost-type” contracts for future phases of the commercial crew program. “Forcing commercial crew into a cost-type contract, as Section 215 would do, would undermine all the benefits of the program, all the benefits the program is designed to bring about,” he said. He was also critical of the section’s reliance on advice from the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel (ASAP), saying its experience is based on “older and previous models” of doing business. “We must not open the door to allowing these advisory committees to actually becoming the policy-setting committees.”
Rohrabacher said he voted for the bill on the understanding that this concern would be addressed before the full committee marks up the bill. “Yes, of course we will work with him as we move forward to full committee,” Palazzo said, without expressing support or opposition to Rohrabacher’s concerns.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 11 at 9:42 am ET During an hour-long markup session Wednesday, the Commerce, Justice, and Science (CJS) subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee approved a fiscal year 2014 appropriations bill that would give NASA $16.6 billion. Committee members made no changes to the bill during the markup, and spent most of their time talking about various elements of the bill (or praising member Rep. Jo Bonner (R-AL), who is resigning from Congress next month.)
The specific breakdown of spending proposed for NASA in the bill, beyond the general accounts and other provisions in the bill text, awaits the release of the report accompanying the bill. Most of the comments about NASA for the bill were about funding for the Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion programs, as well as for planetary science. “This funding will keep NASA on schedule for upcoming flight milestones of the Orion crew vehicle and Space Launch System,” Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), chairman of the CJS subcommittee, said in his opening statement.
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) thanked Wolf and ranking member Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-PA) for their support for NASA’s planetary science program, and read a relevant section of the as-yet-unreleased report. “NASA has once again proposed damaging and disproportionate reductions in the planetary science budget without any substantive justification,” Schiff said, reading from the report. “The committee’s recommendation seeks to address these shortcomings while also achieving programmatic balance among projects, destinations, and sizes.” Neither Schiff nor Wolf said what level of funding for planetary science the bill contained, but those comments suggested it was closer to the $1.5 billion in the separate authorization bill than the administration’s requested $1.22 billion.
Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-AL) spoke favorably about the SLS funding in the bill. “I think the real concern that so many have is that the agency continues to request an insufficient amount of funds” for SLS, he said. “The bottom line is, we can’t afford to fall behind other nations in this launch capability.”
The subcommittee also noted the bill’s support for NOAA’s weather satellite efforts, which would provide full funding for the Joint Polar Satellite System ($824 million) and the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite ($955 million) programs. Both Wolf and Rep. Hal Rogers (R-KY), chairman of the full appropriations committee, identified those programs as priorities to be fully funded.
The bill now goes to the full House Appropriations Committee; although no markup has yet been announced, it may be considered as early as next week. Meanwhile, the Senate is set to markup its own version of the bill: the CJS subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee (chaired by Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), who is also chair of the full committee) has a markup session scheduled for Tuesday at 16th.
By Jeff Foust on 2013 July 10 at 6:48 am ET This morning the space subcommittee of the House Science Committee will markup its proposed NASA authorization act. There’s the potential for debate as the bill proposed by the committee’s Republican leadership clashes with one introduced earlier this week by Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD), the ranking member of the space subcommittee. Both the updated “committee print” of the Republican-led bill and the Democratic alternative are available. One quick comparison is to look at the authorized spending levels for fiscal year 2014 in the two bills (amounts in millions of dollars):
| Account |
House GOP |
House Dem |
Difference |
| Exploration |
$4,007.4 |
$4,220.8 |
$213.40 |
| - SLS |
$1,802.4 |
$1,650.0 |
-$152.40 |
| - Orion |
$1,200.0 |
$1,230.0 |
$30.00 |
| - Exploration Ground Systems |
$0.0 |
$318.2 |
$318.20 |
| - Exploration R&D |
$305.0 |
$322.6 |
$17.60 |
| - Commercial Crew |
$700.0 |
$700.0 |
$0.00 |
| Space Operations |
$3,817.9 |
$3,761.7 |
-$56.20 |
| - ISS |
$2,984.1 |
$2,927.9 |
-$56.20 |
| - Space and Flight Support |
$833.8 |
$833.8 |
$0.00 |
| Science |
$4,626.9 |
$5,300.3 |
$673.40 |
| - Earth Science |
$1,200.0 |
$1,846.1 |
$646.10 |
| - Planetary Science |
$1,500.0 |
$1,500.0 |
$0.00 |
| - Astrophysics |
$642.3 |
$642.3 |
$0.00 |
| - JWST |
$658.2 |
$658.2 |
$0.00 |
| - Heliophysics |
$626.4 |
$653.7 |
$27.30 |
| Aeronautics |
$565.7 |
$569.4 |
$3.70 |
| Space Technology |
$500.0 |
$615.0 |
$115.00 |
| Education |
$125.0 |
$136.1 |
$11.10 |
| Cross Agency Support |
$2,600.0 |
$2,850.3 |
$250.30 |
| Construction |
$587.0 |
$609.4 |
$22.40 |
| Inspector General |
$35.3 |
$37.0 |
$1.70 |
| TOTAL |
$16,865.2 |
$18,100.0 |
$1,234.80 |
As expected, the Democratic bill moves to restore Earth sciences funding, adding nearly $650 million to the program compared to the Republican version, while leaving the other science accounts largely unchanged. The Democratic bill also authorizes more funding for space technology, exploration, and cross agency support, while cutting ISS operations slightly. (One difference between the original “discussion draft” and the current version of the Republican-led bill is that that the updated version combined SLS and Exploration Ground Systems into the SLS line item; the earlier draft, as well as the Democratic bill, had them separately, but the House CJS appropriations bill combined them as well.)
While the Republican authorization bill supports less funding for NASA than the Democratic bill, it is still more generous than the proposed House appropriations bill, which would give NASA $267 million less than authorized levels. Appropriators actually provide more money in areas like science and space technology, but would give exploration nearly $400 million less than the authorized level and space operations nearly $150 million less.
The policy differences between the Republican and Democratic authorization bills are also significant. One of the more controversial provisions of the Republican bill, blocking funding of NASA’s Asteroid Redirect (née Retrieval) Mission, is missing from the Democratic bill, as are provisions that would establish a fixed term for the NASA administrator and create a board of directors-like advisory body.
|
|
