A SpacePolicyOnline.com summary of the August 5, 2009 meeting of the Augustine committee that is deliberating the options for the human space flight program is now available. Look on our left menu for “Our Meeting Summaries” or simply click here.
The House and Senate have cut the funding requested by the Department of Energy (DOE) to restart production of plutonium-238 (Pu-238) that is needed to power some NASA space science and lunar exploration spacecraft.
Pu-238 is needed to fuel radioisotope power sources (RPSs) that supply power for systems and instruments on spacecraft that cannot rely on solar energy because they travel too far from the Sun or land on surfaces with long “nights” or other characteristics that make solar energy a poor or impossible choice. Under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, only DOE is allowed to possess, use and produce nuclear materials and facilities. Thus, NASA must rely on DOE to produce these power sources and the fuel.
The National Research Council (NRC) issued a report on Pu-238 production for NASA missions in May 2009. It urged the government to restart Pu-238 production immediately or imperil NASA’s lunar and planetary exploration plans. The NRC report emphasized that “the day of reckoning has arrived” and immediate action is required, estimating that it would cost at least $150 million to reestablish production.
“Previous proposals to make this investment have not been enacted, and cost seems to be the major impediment. However, regardless of why these proposals have been rejected, the day of reckoning has arrived. NASA is already making mission limiting decisions based on the short supply of 238Pu. NASA is stretching out the pace of RPS-powered missions by eliminating RPSs as an option for some missions and delaying other missions that require RPSs until more 238Pu becomes available.”
Pu-238 does not occur in nature, and the United States has not produced any since the late 1980s. It purchased Pu-238 for NASA missions from Russia during the 1990s, but those supplies reportedly are now exhausted. The NRC based its estimate of NASA’s Pu-238 requirements on a letter NASA sent to DOE on April 29, 2008 detailing space science and lunar exploration missions planned for the next 20 years.
The day the NRC report was released, DOE announced that it was requesting $30 million in FY2010 to implement that recommendation.
However, the House cut that to $10 million when it passed the FY2010 Energy and Water appropriations bill (H.R. 3183) on July 17. The Senate went even further (S. 1436), zeroing the request.
In its report on the bill (H. Rept. 111- 203), the House Appropriations Committee complained that DOE had not explained how it would use the funds.
“While the Committee supports the re-start of Pu-238 for space missions and national security user applications, the Department has not provided a clear plan for how the $30,000,000 request will be utilized. The Committee is also concerned that the Department’s request does not address how major users of Pu-238, like the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, are partnering and contributing to this effort. The Committee recommends $10,000,000 for Pu-238 production start-up and directs the Department to provide its start-up plan, including the role and contribution of users, within 90 days of enactment of this Act.”
The Senate Appropriations Committee report (S. Rept. 111-45) expressed similar reservations.
“The Committee recommends no funding for this program at this time. The Committee understands the importance of this mission and the capability provided to other Federal agencies. However, the Department’s proposed plutonium reprocessing program is poorly defined and lacks an overall mission justification as well as a credible project cost estimate. Sustaining the plutonium mission is a costly but an important responsibility. The Committee expects the Department to work with other Federal agency customers to develop an equitable and appropriate cost sharing strategy to sustain this mission into the future.”
If those decisions are not reversed during conference negotiations, NASA may have to revamp its plans significantly. If funding is not approved in the FY2010 budget, “a delay of one year could force a delay in the New Frontiers 4 schedule, and delay of two years or more could force a delay in the schedule of Discovery 14, the first lunar rover, and subsequent missions,” according to the NRC.
Read It’s More Than a 90-Day Job , a SpacePolicyOnline.com editorial about the need to give the Augustine panel the time it needs to formulate a solid foundation for choices about the future of the human space flight program.
Augustine Panel member Ed Crawley’s Powerpoint slides from today’s meeting of the panel can be downloaded here. They summarize the distilled set of options that the Augustine panel will have “costed” in order to provide information to the panel to further narrow the list. They are expected to present three or four options to the White House and NASA at the end of the month. The next meeting of the panel is on August 12 (also in Washington, DC).
Other presentations from today’s meeting are on the panel’s website.
Check back with SpacePolicyOnline.com later today for more information on what transpired at the meeting.
Agendas for the Augustine panel meetings on August 5 and August 12 in Washington, DC are now available. Among the experts who will brief the panel on August 5 are representatives of four of the five National Research Council “Decadal Surveys.” These studies are performed about every 10 years (a decade) looking out for the next 10 years in a particular space science discipline. Three are underway right now. Two are updates of previous decadals (astronomy and astrophysics, and planetary sciences), and one is being done for the first time — biological and physical sciences in space. The chair or members of each of those will brief the Augustine panel, along with representatives of the earth science decadal (completed in 2007). The fifth space science decadal, solar and space physics, is not on the agenda.
The Augustine panel completed a marathon three-day set of public meetings across the South this week. The meetings in League City, Texas, Huntsville, Alabama and Cocoa Beach, Florida gave the first hints as to what panel members are thinking at this phase of the process. In addition to briefings on various aspects of the Constellation program, each of the panel’s four subgroups reported to the full panel for the first time.
Thanks to NASA TV, the public across the country had front row seats to the interaction among the panel members. The intense but friendly questioning made it clear that no decisions have been made by the panel despite news stories to the contrary.
As the panel prepares to return to Washington, DC for two more public meetings (August 5 and August 12) and complete its report to the White House and NASA by the end of the month, where does the debate stand?
The reports by Sally Ride’s subgroup on near-term issues, and by Ed Crawley’s “Beyond Low Earth Orbit” subgroup, were particularly thought provoking, but it was clear they were speaking only for themselves. The presentations were rich with content and should be posted on the panel’s website (http://hsf.nasa.gov) soon. Here are a few key points that were made.
Sally Ride’s ISS/Shuttle Subgroup
Dr. Ride’s subgroup was tasked with looking at the future of the space shuttle and the International Space Station (ISS), and “the gap” between the end of the shuttle and the availability of a replacement. She opened her presentation by saying that she hoped her subgroup (herself, Leroy Chiao, Charlie Kennel and Les Lyles) would not become known as the “gloom and doom” subgroup.
The reason for her caution quickly became clear. Analysis by the Aerospace Corporation that was briefed by Dr. Ride and later by Gary Pulliam from Aerospace shows that the existing Constellation program (referred to as the POR or “Program of Record”) is likely to slip by 1 _ years just for budgetary reasons if the current budget is maintained; may slip another two years for technical reasons; and if funding is diverted to the ISS program to keep it operating until 2020, another half-year slip to Constellation could result. Dr. Pulliam offered many caveats to those conclusions, including that Aerospace had only three weeks to do its analysis and that there are ways to mitigate those delays, but the message was clear – if the President wants to return humans to the Moon by 2020, more funds will be needed and soon.
During the presentations from Dr. Ride and other subgroup members, it seemed that they were making a few recommendations:
However, during the Q&A, she emphasized that the subgroup only wanted to get these issues on the table and was not making recommendations. She also cautioned that not all of the money that people are assuming will be “freed” by terminating the shuttle and ISS will materialize because many institutional carrying costs simply will be transferred to the Constellation program. She expressed concern that other subgroups were building budgets based on expected savings that may not be there.
One of her comments during the question and answer period summed up her subgroup’s message:
“You can’t expect the agency to achieve grand and glorious goals if you’re not going to give them the resources that are required to do it. If our group showed nothing else we hope it showed that NASA has not been given the resources to support this Vision that now two Presidents have been supporting and that our Congress has been supporting. These are the people that should be giving the agency the money and the agency has not been given the money and we are looking at the result of that.
“So to try to fit a program into this budget that already isn’t enough and to make it more grand and glorious is almost falling into the same trap of saying, yeah, we really want to do something cool, because we all love this stuff and we want to be doing cool things, so you give us 20 bucks and we can do anything. I think that part of our job is going to be to not let the administration and Congress put NASA back in this box …”
Underscoring the lack of agreement on the panel, Mr. Augustine told Dr. Ride that at end of her presentation, he thought he saw a way forward: add budget to fly out the remaining 7 shuttle flights in a reasonable risk environment, learn to live with the gap, and keep ISS for 5 more years primarily to support future beyond LEO flight activities. “But after these clarifying discussions, I’m not sure I do” see that path, adding “We fortunately don’t have to make a decision today.”
Ed Crawley’s Exploration Beyond Low Earth Orbit Subgroup
Dr. Crawley’s subgroup was tasked with identifying and analyzing options for human space flight beyond Low Earth Orbit (LEO). In addition to Dr. Crawley, the subgroup members are Wanda Austin, Bo Bejmuk, Chris Chyba, and Jeff Greason. They identified five options in addition to the existing Constellation Program of Record, and invited the Constellation program itself to offer options.
The five options identified by the subgroup were:
The Constellation program offered two options to its current plan:
Of the eight options, Dr. Crawley recommended that six be retained for consideration by the full panel:
The subgroup’s report sparked considerable debate among the panel, and there certainly was interest in the Flexible Path option. However, it did not appear to this observer, at least, that the panel had made up its mind to recommend that choice as some news articles later suggested.
During the course of these meetings, panel chair Norm Augustine revealed that the White House has agreed that the panel may present four options: two that can be funded within the existing budget, and two that are outside of that constraint. As various presentations over the three days made clear, the existing budget is insufficient to complete the Constellation program currently on the books.
Though time is in short supply for the panel, the space community seems to have confidence that under Mr. Augustine’s leadership, a useful report will emerge from the panel’s intense efforts.
The question remains as to what will happed to it thereafter. As those who are seeking a solution to the NPOESS troubles are finding, the White House does not move quickly. The NPOESS Independent Review Team headed by Tom Young completed its report months ago and the White House’s response has been to set up another task force to continue to look at that problem. One can only hope that the Augustine panel recommendations lead to action instead of more study. Perhaps since human space flight is in the hands of a single agency, decisions can be made more expeditiously.
Today begins the traditional August holidays for many in Washington. Although the Augustine panel on the future of human space flight is in full bore, and the Senate is in session for one week more, the schedule of activiities is pretty slow for the next four weeks. Following are those meetings that have been announced to date. If any others come along of particular note, an update will be issued. For now, the only notable August events are two half-day public meetings of the Augustine panel, and meetings of hard-working National Research Council committees.
Augustine Panel Public Meetings in August
August 5
8:00 – noon EDT Carnegie Institution of Science, 1530 P Street, NW, Washington, DC
August 12
1:00-5:00 pm EDT Ronald Reagan Building, 1300 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, DC
National Research Council Space-Related Meetings in August
NRC Decadal Survey on Biological and Physical Sciences in Space
August 19-21 Panel Meetings NAS Building, 2100 C Street, NW, Washington DC
Several panels of the NRC Decadal Survey on Biological and Physical Science in Space will meet simultaneously in a “jamboree” at the National Academy of Sciences building, 2100 C Street, NW, Washington D.C., from August 19-21, 2009. Some sessions of these meetings may be closed.
NRC Decadal Survey on Astronomy and Astrophysics (Astro 2010)
August 5-6 Panel on Cosmology and Fundamental Physics Seattle, WA
This meeting is closed in its entirety.
August 25-27 Panel on Optical and Infrared Astronomy from the Ground, Washington, DC, Some sessions of this meeting may be closed.
NRC Committee on NASA’s Suborbital Research Capabilities
August 19-20 Boulder, CO Some sessions of this meeting may be closed.
Mike Griffin’s July 26, 2009 letter to the Augustine Panel on the future of the human space flight program is available here. One of the points he makes is the following:
“In closing, when we talk about offering programmatic “options”, I think we miss a key point, because such options are always couched in terms of “or” arguments — humans or robots, moon or Mars, NEOs or moon, and so on. Our goal should be broader than any single option.
“Quite simply, the goal of the United States should be to be the leader in creating tomorrow’s spacefaring civilization. To do that, we have to replace “or” with “and”, we have to be prepared to exploit what we find and to take advantage of the options we create. If that is the real goal, then because we cannot do everything at once, it we must discuss the order of progression. But we must recognize that a single-point focus on any one destination, even Mars, is not of great long-term value.”
White House Science Adviser John Holdren told the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee yesterday that he had directed creation of a task force to monitor progress and results on issues surrounding the NPOESS program.
“I have directed the formation of a Task Force within the Executive Office of the President (which will include representatives from the Office of Management and Budget as well as the National Security Council) that will meet regularly with NOAA, NASA, and the Department of Defense (DoD), the three agencies partnering on the program, to monitor progress and results in addressing key issues facing the success of this program.”
Space Shuttle Endeavour landed safely at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at 10:48 EDT today.