By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 16 at 10:36 pm ET On Wednesday the full House, debating the full-year continuing resolution HR 1, voted 228-203 to approve an amendment that would transfer $298 million from NASA to the Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Services, a program that provides funding for local police forces. The amendment, introduced by Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) was actually debated Tuesday evening by the House and failed by a voice vote, but prevailed in the recorded vote hold over to the next day, with 70 Republicans joining 158 Democrats to approve the amendment.
In the debate Tuesday night (starting on page H890 of the Congressional Record), Weiner indicated he only reluctantly chose NASA as the source of the funding to support the COPS program. “Now, do I like the idea we have to take it from NASA space exploration? I don’t know any of the crime statistics on Mars, and I’m interested, but it’s a bad choice,” he said. “If any of you like space exploration, so do I. In a way, I’m playing the game too. I’m taking from one place to give to another. But I do believe it’s in the interest of all of us to try to set these priorities straight.”
Defending the agency was Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), chairman of the CJS subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. “This bill makes deliberate choices within NASA to strike an appropriate balance between achieving budget savings, procurement support for NASA’s $16 billion in annual contracts, and safety and mission assurance to prevent spaceflight accidents,” he said. “To do this, you would almost guarantee that something could potentially happen.” Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) tried to find a middle ground, saying he supported COPS but that the funding should not be taken from NASA.
The $298 million would specifically come from NASA’s Cross-Agency Support account, a relatively poorly understood part of the agency’s overall budget that covers management and operations of the agency and its various field centers, as well as its safety and mission assurance work. Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) was critical of the growth of that account over the last several years in his comments on the amendment. “This is a cross-agency support budget which has gone up six times, 600 percent in 2 years, and it’s going to go up again here today, and we’re going to slash the heck out of the COPS program. Now, go home and explain that to your constituents,” he said. “You can’t even say, Look up there, because it’s not a satellite. It’s not headed to the Moon or to Mars. You have to say, Hey, it’s the cross-agency support budget at NASA, and when the criminal is breaking down your door, call NASA. That probably isn’t going to work too well.”
Passage of the amendment doesn’t guarantee NASA’s final FY11 appropriations will include that cut. While the House will likely pass HR 1 (debate on the bill continued as of Wednesday evening), Senate appropriators have expressed their opposition to the bill, raising the prospect of an impasse and even a government shutdown if some kind of continuing resolution isn’t passed when the current one expires on March 4.
Also: if you continuing reading the Congressional Record after the end of the debate on the Weiner amendment, there’s also a brief debate on an amendment introduced, and then withdrawn, by Rep. Pete Olson (R-TX) to transfer $517 million of NASA funding from the agency’s climate change research to human spaceflight, continuing a recent theme by Olson and several other members. “The 15 other agencies conducting climate research can pick up the slack while freeing up resources for NASA to make a truly unique contribution, maintaining U.S. dominance in human space flight,” he argued. Olson did not explain why he withdrew the amendment, but Rep. Wolf said he would work with Olson and others in the future “to maintain a robust human space flight program at NASA.”
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 16 at 6:47 am ET I noted here earlier this month the March Storm citizens’ lobbying blitz on Capitol Hill next month. A couple of similar efforts are also planned for the coming weeks. The National Space Society is planning its annual “Legislative Blitz” for February 27 through March 1. Specifics of the effort aren’t clear beyond urging Congress “to enact legislation that appropriates the required funding in compliance with the Authorization Act.” A week later (and a week before March Storm), the Space Frontier Foundation is holding its “Keep the Promise” lobbying program. “The group is inviting all supporters and friends of America’s space efforts to show up and speak up in defense of an innovative budget saving initiatives like NASA’s Commercial Crew program, and warn Congress about the damage it will do if it does not act to support this critical new approach to space,” according to the event’s organizers. And, on March 15-16 (overlapping partially with March Storm), AIAA is holding its annual Congressional Visits Day program. The AIAA hasn’t released specific issues to be discussed beyond raising “awareness of the long-term value that science, engineering, and technology bring to America.”
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 16 at 6:36 am ET People in both Ohio and Florida are abuzz over an item tucked away deep in the Air Force’s budget request for FY12. On page 599 (PDF page 604) of operations and maintenance budget document the Air Force requests $14 million to transport a space shuttle to the National Museum of the Air Force in Dayton, Ohio:
The United States Air Force (USAF) has played a central role in the development of space capabilities that are vital to national security, economic growth, public safety and welfare. As a historic reminder of the USAF contributions in space the USAF has requested an interagency transfer of the Space Shuttle Atlantis to the National Museum of the United States Air Force to be displayed for viewing. One-time funding is provided to pay (NASA) for preparation and delivery of Space Shuttle Atlantis to the National Museum of the Air Force.
That line item in the Air Force budget “suggests that the White House and the Air Force favor the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force as a final destination for Atlantis,” the Dayton Daily News reports. The article adds that NASA administrator Charles Bolden was not aware of the request, though, and that no decision on the disposition of the shuttle orbiters would be made until at least April.
Yesterday, Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), ranking member of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, issued a statement on the administration’s 2012 budget request. Only one sentence of the statement is partially devoted to NASA and NOAA: “The President’s budget request also provides needed funding for NOAA, NASA, and FAA.” The leadership of the committee has not issued a statement on the budget request, but the committee is holding a hearing on the overall federal R&D budget request Thursday at 10 am, with OSTP director John Holdren the sole scheduled witness.
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 15 at 7:12 am ET The FY2012 budget proposal includes $1 billion for the Joint Polar Satellite System, the NOAA/NASA successor to the NPOESS satellite program. The funding, if allocated, would be used to “undertake continued development of instrument, spacecraft, and ground segment development to meet launch readiness dates,” the fact sheet summarizing the budget request states. As Space News reports, NOAA requested a similar amount for FY2011 but without an appropriations bill have not received that funding.
NOAA is also requesting $47.3 million to refurbish the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) satellite for a 2013 launch. DSCOVR started life in the late 1990s as Triana, a spacecraft that would provide full-disk images of the Earth from the Earth-Sun L-1 point; it was dubbed “GoreSat” by critics because the program was instigated by then Vice President Al Gore. DSCOVR would now primarily focus on solar observations, providing data to “support timely and accurate forecasts and warnings of geomagnetic storms.”
The budget request also, as expected, includes more money for the EELV program, Space News reports. The $1.76 billion EELV budget for 2012, $450 million more than what the Defense Department previously projected for 2012, would allow the purchase of four more vehicles. That increase, Air Force officials said, is linked to a move to block buying to reduce per-unit costs.
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 15 at 6:05 am ET Like some members of Congress, a handful of organizations have spoken out about the NASA budget request, although their reactions are more varied. Aerospace Industries Association president and CEO Marion Blakey said she was “disappointed” by the NASA budget because it fell short of previous projections for NASA spending, such as the nearly $19.5 billion projected for 2012 in the FY11 request. “[T]he administration’s request for NASA fails to recognize the return on investment – both now and in the future – that our nation’s space program provides as we strive to innovate, educate and build an America of which we can be proud,” she states, without going into specific detail about specific programs.
“Where’s the innovation?” asks Bill Nye, executive director of The Planetary Society. He is critical of flat or reduced spending for science while “Congress insists on building a new heavy lift rocket based on old designs”. NASA administrator Charles Bolden, he added, “talked about ‘hard choices,’ but what can he do when NASA has not been given a real budget for this fiscal year,” a reference to the lack of a final FY11 appropriations bill.
The Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF), though, appeared satisfied with the $850 million in the 2012 budget request for commercial crew development. “In this constrained fiscal environment, commercial spaceflight is more important than ever,” said CSF president Brett Alexander in the organization’s statement. “Leveraging private investment is the only way NASA can make its dollars go farther in these times of belt-tightening.”
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 14 at 9:49 pm ET Before NASA can “win the future”, they’ll first need to win over members of Congress. And given the reactions from some members of Congress, they’ll have their work cut out for them. Several members of Congress criticized aspects of the budget proposal, primarily because it doesn’t follow the funding levels set forth in the authorization act passed by Congress last fall, particularly for the Space Launch System and Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle.
Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL), one of authors of the authorization bill, expressed his disappointment in a brief comment:
In this time of necessary budget cuts, NASA does well compared to most other agencies. But the president’s budget does not follow the bi-partisan NASA law Congress passed late last year. The Congress will assert its priorities in the next six month.
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX), had a similar reaction:
I am extremely disappointed, however, that the president chose to substantially ignore the carefully orchestrated NASA framework we developed last year. By deviating from this hard fought Congressional compromise, the president is subjecting America’s proud heritage of space exploration to another year of gridlock and drift.
Rep. Pete Olson (R-TX) criticized the budget’s perceived emphasis on climate change research over human spaceflight and said he had a solution:
I have a plan to preserve the human space flight budget by transferring money from NASA’s unneeded climate research programs, while keeping NASA’s overall budget at 2008 levels. Climate research is not a NASA mission and there are plenty of other agencies already doing this work. My plan is a win for America and a win for the taxpayers. I’m working with NASA allies, the House budget and spending committees and the Republican leadership to enact these priorities.
In the same release Olson also claimed that, “We fought this battle last year and won, and I believe we will do so again.”
Rep. Bill Posey (R-FL), who, like Olson, signed a letter last week to House appropriators asking them to transfer climate change funds within NASA to human spaceflight, made a similar call in his own reaction to the budget:
After the Administration let NASA flounder for the past two years, a flawed NASA authorization bill was finally agreed to and signed into law. Now the Administration is proposing to ignore this law, placing a higher priority on global warming research and making cuts to the next generation launch vehicle.
If there’s good news to this reaction, it’s that it’s relatively muted compared to the release of the FY11 budget last February. A number of members who might be expected to respond to the budget proposal haven’t done so formally (at least, not posting a press release.) For example, last year, within a hour of the FY11 budget proposal’s release, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) infamously criticized it as beginning “the death march for the future of US human space flight”. This year, his office didn’t release a statement on the budget, at least as of Monday night.
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 14 at 10:44 am ET NASA would get $18.7 billion in FY2012, almost exactly the same as it got in FY2010, according to a summary of the FY12 NASA budget proposal released this morning by the White House. That amount is about $750 million less than what the administration projected last year for the agency in FY12. Compared to 2010 science would get about $500 million more and exploration would get nearly $200 million more, while a new “Space Research and Technology” account would be created with just over $1 billion in FY12 (space technology had been included with aeronautics in the FY11 proposal.) Those increases would come at the expense of space operations, whose budget would decrease by nearly $1.8 billion compared to 2010, presumably to reflect the retirement of the shuttle.
The document is scant on additional details, although it does mention the budget “Initiates development of a heavy-lift rocket and crew capsule to carry explorers beyond Earth’s orbit”. It also makes mention of commercial crew development, although again without additional details. More detailed budget details will come this afternoon when NASA holds its FY12 budget briefing.
One other thing: if you look at page 199 of the summary charts, you’ll see the administration’s long-term budget projections for NASA. They show a budget declining to $18.0 billion in 2013 and 2014 before slowly rising. (One should take such projections, especially more than a few years in the future, with a grain or two or 20 of salt.) The projection for FY15 for NASA is $18.1 billion; last year the projection for FY15 was $21 billion.
Update 1:30 pm: More detailed budget information is now available on NASA’s web site. Some highlights:
- Most agency programs are held flat in the notional outyears beyond 2012, even though the administration’s projections decrease NASA’s budget to $18 billion in 2013 and 2014.
- The presentation about the budget states that “tough choices” were made to achieve cost savings, including “reductions to Earth science and administrative costs, elimination of exploration focused robotic precursors, and maintaining the heavy-lift vehicle and crew capsule at approximately the 2011 authorized level.”
- Commercial crew would get $850 million per year from 2012 through 2016 in the proposal; that works out to $4.25 billion plus whatever it gets in 2011, compared to the $5.8 billion in the administration’s FY11 request. That amount, though, is still enough to support “multiple, competitive, fixed-price, milestone-based agreements”.
- The James Webb Space Telescope is effectively placed in a holding pattern, getting $375 million in the budget request with no commitment to a specific launch date for the troubled spacecraft. “The revised schedule and lifecycle cost will be reflected in the 2013 Budget request,” the presentation states,
- Keeping the Space Launch System and Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle at 2011 authorized levels in 2012 and beyond “provides a solid foundation from which to advance the development of these important systems.” The presentation doesn’t state when they anticipate fielding these systems, which the authorization act states must enter service by the end of 2016.
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 14 at 5:51 am ET Later today the Obama Administration will release its fiscal year 2012 budget proposal, with NASA planning a press conference this afternoon to discuss details of its proposed budget, adopting the “win the future” theme that the president rolled out in his State of the Union address last month. The atmosphere this year is very different than the rollout of the FY11 budget proposal, which the vehicle the administration used to make sweeping changes to the agency; any changes in this budget request are more likely to be evolutionary rather than revolutionary in nature.
Few details about what will be in the budget proposal have leaked out in advance of today’s official release. The Wall Street Journal does report in today’s edition that the agency is “scaling back” funding for commercial crew development. However, the article doesn’t say what that cutback in commercial crew funding is in respect to. If it’s compared to the 2012 projection in the administration’s FY11 budget request, which called for $1.4 billion, that is almost certainly correct, especially since the NASA authorization act passed last year included only $500 million for commercial crew development in 2012. It would be more newsworthy if the administration’s commercial crew request was less than that $500-million figure, especially since the article also indicates that the budget proposal “would be broadly consistent” with the act. (The article also deadpans that “Commercial-space projects are years behind schedule”; that is correct in some cases, such as when one looks Orbital’s and SpaceX’s progress compared to their original COTS schedules, but then again, government space programs are hardly paragons of punctuality.)
Separately, the Journal reported last week that some military space programs may get budget increases in the 2012 proposal, including the EELV program, as the Defense Department seeks to make more bulk buys to get long-term savings—which could trickle down to other EELV users, such as NASA and commercial providers. However, some in Congress may be skeptical of increased spending on EELV in particular: a Defense News article last week quoted Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD), ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, as suggesting the Defense Department should seek alternatives to United Launch Alliance. “The U.S. is spending more per rocket launch and battling more delays than anywhere else,” he said in the February 10th hearing. “That is because the United States has committed to a two-company alliance to handle all launches, despite the fact that other U.S. companies are showing promise.”
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 12 at 8:27 am ET Late Friday the House Appropriations Committee released its proposed continuing resolution (CR) to fund the government through the rest of FY 2011. As the committee indicated Thursday, it would make deeper cuts than what it released earlier in the week, when it announced $379 million in cuts to NASA relative to the administration FY11 request. Appropriators have tacked on an additional $200 million in cuts to the agency for FY11.
The bill, designated HR 1, makes extensive references to FY 2010 appropriations bills, including specific amounts by exception to 2010 levels. The table below compares the House’s CR for 2011 with the actual FY10 appropriations and the president’s budget request (PBR) for 2011 (all amounts are in millions of dollars):
| Account |
2010 Actual |
2011 PBR |
2011 CR |
| Space Operations |
$6,146.8 |
$4,887.8 |
$5,946.8 |
| Exploration |
$3,746.3 |
$4,263.4 |
$3,746.3 |
| Science |
$4,469.0 |
$5,005.6 |
$4,469.0 |
| Aeronautics |
$501.0 |
$1,151.8 |
$501.0 |
| Education |
$182.5 |
$145.8 |
$182.5 |
| Construction |
$448.3 |
$397.3 |
$408.3 |
| Cross-Agency Support |
$3,194.0 |
$3,111.4 |
$3,131.0 |
| Inspector General |
$36.4 |
$37.0 |
$36.4 |
| TOTAL |
$18,724.3 |
$19,000.1 |
$18,421.3 |
The table above is also available in Excel format with additional columns showing the differences between the CR and both the FY10 appropriations and FY11 request.
Note that while Space Operations, which includes ISS and shuttle, gets the biggest cut compared to 2010 levels ($200 million), the CR represents an increase of over $1 billion from the budget request, reflecting continued shuttle operations for most of the fiscal year (and, presumably, the shuttle flight added in the authorization act last fall.) That increase comes at the expense of exploration (-$517 million compared to the budget request), science (-$536.6 million) and aeronautics and space technology (-$650.8 million). The last is a special case, since the aeronautics line item in 2011 was expanded in the budget request to include space technology programs, but the CR includes funding only at the 2010 level, when that account was exclusively aeronautics.
The CR does not get more specific about how the funds should be allocated within these accounts, including a proviso that the NASA administrator submit to Congress a spending plan 60 days after the CR’s enactment. The CR does include a section striking the language in the FY2010 appropriations bill that prevents NASA from terminating Constellation projects, no doubt much to the relief of the agency. There is also one specific provision restricting NASA spending: neither NASA or the Office of Science and Technology Policy use any funding in the CR to “develop, design, plan, promulgate, implement, or execute a policy, program, order, or contract of any kind to participate, collaborate, or coordinate in any way with China or any Chinese-owned company” without authorization in a future law. It also prevents NASA from spending any money “to effectuate the hosting of official Chinese visitors at facilities belonging to or utilized by” NASA. That language is most likely the work of Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), chairman of the appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over NASA and also a major critic of cooperation with China.
Update: in a statement, Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI), chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, was sharply critical of the proposed CR. “The priorities identified in this proposal for some of the largest cuts – environmental protection, healthcare, energy, science and law enforcement – are essential to the current and future well-being of our economy and communities across the country,” he said. That suggests this CR is the latest, but not final, round in the debate about FY11 spending.
By Jeff Foust on 2011 February 11 at 7:04 am ET Two hearings on Capitol Hill yesterday covered, or at least referred to, NASA’s current budget situation, although neither appeared to make any breakthroughs, and other developments suggested that, if anything, the agency’s budget prospects may be worsening.
The Commerce, Justice, and Science subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee conducted a hearing on oversight of NASA and the NSF, with NASA inspector general Paul Martin as one of the witnesses. In his prepared testimony, Martin mentioned his warning to Congress last month about NASA being forced to spend money on Constellation systems that will not be continued under the plan laid out in the agency’s new authorization act. He also warned about cost overruns on the James Webb Space Telescope and finding the money for the additional shuttle flight included in the authorization act, according to Nature News’s summary of the hearing. The subcommittee’s chairman, Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), and others did ask about overlap between Earth sciences research performed by NASA and those by other agencies, but Martin said that was a policy issue he could not address.
While the subcommittee was examining NASA, the chairman of the full committee said more budget cuts would be coming. Rep. Hal Rogers (R-KY) issued a statement Thursday saying he would increase the budget cuts in the committee’s planned FY11 continuing resolution to $100 billion. The committee’s plans earlier this week included $74 billion in cuts, $58 billion in non-security discretionary programs, but some fiscal conservatives wants to see that level increased to the $100 billion previously sought by House GOP leadership. “Our intent is to make deep but manageable cuts in nearly every area of government, leaving no stone unturned and allowing no agency or program to be held sacred,” Rogers said in the statement. No specific details about how the committee will make those additional cuts—including how much for NASA overall, or to specific programs—have been released.
Meanwhile, the House Science, Space and Technology Committee held its organizational meeting Thursday and released its oversight plan, which covers the portions of NASA and other agencies it will be overseeing. Members of the committee also made plans to attend this month’s launch of the shuttle Discovery, with some advice from the committee’s ranking member, Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX): “I just want everybody to know that the schedule is frequently changed because of weather,” she said, according to Florida Today. “Don’t go and be disappointed if you go and it doesn’t take off.”
The committee’s new chairman, Rep. Ralph Hall (R-TX), did make one interesting comment the Florida Today article picked up on. “My goal is to keep our position in space, keep our leadership in space and keep our national and international partners,” he said. “I’m not urging anybody to go to Mars right now or back to the moon, or any place when people can’t go to the grocery store. The economy has to be good. But we’ve got to continue to work toward it and plan for it.”
Hall made a very similar comment later Thursday at a Space Transportation Association reception in his honor. “Space is in trouble,” he said in brief remarks, mentioning in passing proposed budget cuts by House appropriators. “We have to preserve our position in space. We just can’t let it slip away.”
“I don’t know what we really want to do. I want to go to Mars someday and I want to go back to the Moon someday but I don’t think we want to go back when our people can’t go to the grocery store,” he said. “That means that maybe we can’t go in this economy but we have to keep working towards it. Let’s keep planning for it, and let’s keep encouraging people to go, whether it’s commercial or otherwise.”
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