Here is our list of space policy related events for the week of September 21-25, 2015 and any insight we can offer about them.  The Senate is in session this week except for Wednesday (Yom Kippur), while the House is in session only on Thursday and Friday.

During the Week

The visit to Washington, DC by Pope Francis Tuesday-Thursday takes the spotlight this week, not because he is expected to say anything about space policy, but because just about everyone’s attention is focused on that instead of other things (like funding the federal government after September 30 — the clock’s ticking! — not to mention finalizing the FY2016 NDAA or the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act).  If you haven’t heard, the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has advised federal agencies to let their employees work from home to avoid the traffic meltdown that’s expected as roads are closed throughout town and Metro is overwhelmed.

Intrepid souls who are willing to venture out anyway have interesting events they can attend, however.  On Tuesday, the Secure World Foundation and the Alliance for Space Development will hold a panel discussion on “Commercial Space Stations in LEO: Preparing for the Future.”  It’s from 12:30-2:00 pm ET and should be over before the Pope’s plane lands at 4:00 pm ET, so you might be able to get in and out without too much trouble (but check local traffic information sources to find out when the roads you need to use will close and the status of Metro).  NAC’s Ad Hoc STEM Task Force meets that day at NASA Headquarters (9:30-3:30) and there’s an interesting talk at the National Museum of American History at 4:00 on the history of agricultural use of Landsat data during the Cold War era (tea and cookies at 3:30).  Travel might be a bit tricky by the time those are over – bring your patience!  On Thursday, the National Academies Space Technology Industry, Government, University Roundtable (STIGUR) meets all day at the Keck Center on 5th Street, NW.  The Pope will be addressing a joint session of Congress Thursday morning and leaves for New York later in the day, so hopefully the traffic tie-ups will be closer to the Hill and not the Keck Center, but give yourself plenty of time if you plan to attend.

On Monday, before he arrives, the Washington Space Business Roundtable is holding a luncheon panel on the Export-Import Bank situation, which could be quite interesting.  Congress has not reauthorized the bank so it no longer can help finance U.S. aerospace exports.  It’s a prickly political issue that could have significant consequences for companies like Boeing, one of the largest users of the bank.  Jeff Trauberman will be on the panel to talk about Boeing’s point of view, along with Ted McFarland from Orbital ATK and other industry representatives.

If you’re lucky enough to be in South Korea rather than Washington, DC, the annual Asia Pacific Satellite Conference and Exhibition is taking place in Seoul on Tuesday-Thursday.

Those and other events we know about as of Sunday morning are listed below.

Monday, September 21

• WSBR Luncheon with Export-Import Bank panel, University Club, Washington, DC, 11:30 am – 1:30 pm ET

Tuesday, September 22

• NASA Advisory Council Ad Hoc Task Force on STEM Education, NASA HQ, Washington, DC, 9:00 am – 3:30 pm ET
• Commercial Space Stations in LEO (SWF/ASD), 1779 Massachusetts Ave, NW, Washington, DC, 12:30-2:00 pm ET
• Farming from Space: Agricultural Surveillance During the Cold War, 1965-1978 lecture by Brian Jirout, National Museum of American History, Washington, DC, 4:00 pm ET

Tuesday-Thursday, September 22-24

• Asia Pacific Satellite Conference and Exhibition, Seoul, South Korea

Thursday, September 24

• National Academies Space Technology Industry, Government, University Roundtable (STIGUR), Keck Center, 500 5th Street, NW, Washington, DC, 8:15 am – 5:00 pm ET
• NASA News Conference with Upcoming ISS Crew, Johnson Space Center, Houston, TX, 2:00 pm ET (watch on NASA TV)

 

Here is our list of space policy related events for the week of September 14-18, 2015 and any insight we can offer about them.  The House and Senate are in session this week.

During the Week

As of today (Sunday), no space-related hearings have been announced for the coming week (although Rep. Honda is hosting a morning reception and exhibit on Earth and geoscience research on Thursday)  Whether any progress will be made on a Continuing Resolution (CR) to fund the government beginning October 1 or reaching a compromise on either the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act or the FY2016 National Defense Authorization Act is anyone’s guess.  Stay tuned.

Off the Hill, there are a number of interesting events, starting tomorrow morning (Monday) with a press event at the National Press Club to mark the half-way point for Scott Kelly and Mikhail Kornienko’s “year in space.”  Kelly will participate from the International Space Station (ISS) via videolink.   His twin brother, former astronaut Mark Kelly, will be at the Press Club in person along with astronaut Terry Virts who recently returned from ISS.  NASA TV will cover one hour of it, from 9:00-10:00 am ET.

Also on tap this week is the Air Force Association’s Air & Space Conference at the Gaylord National Resort and Conference Center in National Harbor, MD, just outside Washington, DC.  Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James is scheduled to speak tomorrow (Monday) from 10:30-10:55 am ET on “Reinventing the Aerospace Nation.”  She tweeted last week that it would be webcast.  Gen. John Hyten will speak on Tuesday at 2:25 pm ET on “Preserving our Space and Cyberspace Capabilities.”  Secretary of Defense Ash Carter will speak on Wednesday at 9:55 am ET.  Two commercial guys — Brett Alexander from Blue Origin and Antonio Elias from Orbital ATK — are on the agenda for Wednesday at 11:00 am ET speaking about “Space in the Commercial Sector.”  Not clear if those will be webcast.   We’ll add links on our calendar when and if they are made available.

Speaking of Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos is going to make a “significant announcement” at a media event at Cape Canaveral on Tuesday morning, but everything is hush hush other than the fact that the event will take place beginning at 9:45 am ET.   We’re told a decision has not been made on whether it will be webcast.  If we get a link, we’ll add it to our calendar entry for the event.

Those and other events we know about as of Sunday afternoon are listed below.

Monday, September 14

• National Press Club event with astronauts Scott Kelly, Mark Kelly and Terry Virts, National Press Club, Washington, DC, 8:30 – 10:30 am ET (NASA TV will provide coverage 9:00-10:00 am ET)
• Space Policy & History Forum Featuring Charles Miller, National Air & Space Museum, Washington, DC, 4:00 pm ET (RSVP required in advance)

Monday-Wednesday, September 14-16

• Air Force Association Air & Space Conference, National Harbor, MD (outside Washington DC).  Among the speakers are–
  • Monday, Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James, 10:30 am ET
  • Tuesday, Air Force Space Command Commander Gen. John Hyten, 2:25 pm ET
  • Wednesday, Secretary of Defense Ash Carter, 9:55 am ET
  • Wednesday, Blue Origin’s Brett Alexander and Orbital ATK’s Antonio Elias, 11:00 am ET

Monday-Friday, September 14-18

• Euroconsult’s World Satellite Business Week, Paris, France

Tuesday, September 15

• Blue Origin announcement, Cape Canaveral, FL, 9:45 am ET
• MSBR Luncheon Featuring NASA’s Steve Jurczyk, Martin’s Crosswinds, Greenbelt, MD, 11:30 am – 1:30 pm ET
• NASA History Seminar Featuring John Logsdon, NASA HQ, Washington, DC, 12:00-1:00 pm ET

Tuesday-Friday, September 15-18

• Advanced Maui Optical and Space Surveilance Technologies Conference (AMOS 2015), Maui, Hawaii

Wednesday-Thursday, September 16-17

• National Academies Cmte on Astrobiology and Planetary Science (CAPS), Beckman Center, Irvine, CA (some sessions may be closed)

Thursday, September 17

• Earth and Geoscience Research Briefing and Exhibit, 2168 Rayburn House Office Building, 8:00-10:00 am ET (panel 9:00-9:30 am ET)
• 4th AMOS Dialogue (Secure World Foundation), in conjunction with AMOS conference, Maui, Hawaii

Friday, September 18

•  How Engineers Design and Build Space Observatories Google+ Hangout (AAS & AAS), virtual, 3:00-4:00 pm ET

Editor’s note:  This article was updated Sunday afternoon to add the Earth and geoscience research briefing on Thursday and the Google+ Hangout on Friday, and on Monday morning adding Secretary of Defense Ash Carter’s talk at AFA on Wednesday.

United Launch Alliance (ULA) and Blue Origin announced an agreement today for expanding production of Blue Origin’s BE-4 engine that ULA wants to use for its new Vulcan rocket.  The announcement takes place against the backdrop of reports that another rocket engine company, Aerojet Rocketdyne, is trying to buy ULA, which would, at best, complicate the ULA/Blue Origin plan.

ULA and Blue Origin, founded by Amazon.com’s Jeff Bezos, revealed amid much fanfare last fall that they were teaming on ULA’s new Vulcan rocket that is intended to eventually replace the two rockets ULA currently uses, Atlas V and Delta IV.  Congress is insisting that use of Russian RD-180 engines that currently power the Atlas V be discontinued by 2019 for national security launches, the mainstay of ULA’s launch business.   Blue Origin’s BE-4 (Blue Engine 4) is viewed by ULA as the most mature domestically made engine that could replace the RD-180s.  Today’s announcement said that BE-4 “offers the fastest path” to a domestic replacement for RD-180s and will “achieve qualification flight in 2017 to support the first Vulcan flight in 2019.”

ULA and the Air Force are trying to convince Congress to provide more flexibility on the 2019 RD-180 cutoff date since a first flight in 2019 is not the same as having a launch vehicle full certified for launching expensive national security payloads.  The House is sympathetic to that argument in its version of the FY2016 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), but the Senate Armed Services Committee is holding fast to 2019.  The two sides are currently trying to reach agreement on a compromise version of the NDAA.

BE-4 uses an innovative design based on liquid oxygen (LOX) and methane as propellant rather than traditional LOX/kerosene.  ULA President Tory Bruno champions Blue Origin’s engine, but also said earlier this year that the company is keeping Aerojet Rocketdyne’s (AJR) new AR1 LOX/kerosene engine in mind as a backup.  Two days ago the Wall Street Journal reported that AJR is bidding to purchase ULA for about $2 billion.  If that deal were to go through — a big if — it clearly would imperil the use of BE-4 for Vulcan.

Today’s ULA/Blue Origin announcement suggests that those two companies are continuing on course nonetheless.  Bezos said the new agreement is “an important step toward building BE-4s at the production rate needed” for Vulcan.

We’re back to “regular order” this week with our list of upcoming space policy related events only for one week (September 7-11, 2015).  The House and Senate return to work from their summer recess on Tuesday.

During the Week

Monday is a federal holiday (Labor Day), so Congress resumes legislative action on Tuesday, September 8.  It has quite a long to-do list for the month, including funding the federal government before Fiscal Year 2016 begins on October 1.  As pressing as that issue is, the first order of business is the Iran nuclear deal.  Pope Francis will visit Washington, D.C. September 22-24 and speak to a joint session of Congress on September 24 and that also will consume a lot of congressional attention.  

A deal on the budget, therefore, is not likely until the end of the month — if then.  The expectation is that a Continuing Resolution (CR) will be passed to cover the first few weeks of FY2016 since none of the 12 regular appropriations bills have cleared Congress.  The House has passed six,
including those that fund DOD, NASA, NOAA and the FAA’s Office of
Commercial Space Transportation.  The Senate has not passed any yet.

No legislative action on the budget is anticipated this week.  Instead, more voices likely will be raised warning of a possible government shutdown.  The leaders of the House and Senate have repeatedly vowed not to let that happen again.   Most view the 16-day shutdown in 2013 as a costly mistake both financially and politically.  Today some things are different — Republicans control both the House and Senate (the Senate was in Democratic hands in 2013).  But some are the same — the Tea Party wing of the Republican party has a politically volatile topic on which it wants to make a point.  Last time it was Obamacare, this time it is Planned Parenthood.   Another thing that is different is that this is presidential primary season and one of the contenders, Sen. Ted Cruz, was the leader of the 2013 shutdown.  He seems to believe it was a good thing, not the travesty others in his own party and elsewhere portray.  A shutdown could play in his favor in the primary among those who share his views. 

When Congress went into recess, it seemed that the debt limit also would have to be raised soon, adding to the complexity of getting a budget deal.  The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recently calculated, however, that the Treasury Department can get by with the “extraordinary measures” it’s been using since the debt limit was reached in March and now has until mid-November or early December to continue paying bills by not investing in government retirement accounts.  (If you’re a government employee and wonder what exactly is going on with your retirement accounts in this regard, Government Executive has a good summary.  Treasury has done this before; the money eventually gets restored.)

Final action on the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act, versions of which have passed the House and Senate, is possible at any time. The current prohibition on FAA issuing new regulations for commercial human spaceflight during a “learning period” expires on September 30 and both bills would extend it (the Senate bill until 2020; the House until 2025), so there is some motivation to get that done, though it will be a challenge with everything else on Congress’s plate.  As for a new NASA authorization bill?  The House has passed two bills (one for FY2015, which is ending, and one for FY2016 and FY2017), but there has been no action in the Senate.  The Senate Commerce Committee issued a report on August 11 listing the legislation it plans to focus on for the rest of the year and a NASA authorization was not included.  Congress-watchers know, however, that anything can happen at any time.

Perhaps the most notable events this week off the Hill are an interview with the current nine crew members aboard the International Space Station (ISS) on Tuesday morning Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) and the return to Earth of three of them on Friday EDT (Saturday local time at the landing site in Kazakhstan).  This is the first time since November 2013 that nine people have been on ISS at the same time.

Those events and others we know about as of Sunday afternoon are listed below.  Check back to look at our calendar on the right menu of our home page for additions as the week goes on.

Monday, September 7

• U.S. Federal Government holiday (Labor Day)

Tuesday, September 8

• Media interviews with Nine Member ISS Crew, 10:10 am EDT (watch on NASA TV)
• Congress returns

Tuesday-Thursday, September 8-10

• Space 2.0, Milpitas, CA (Silicon Valley)

Wednesday-Friday, September 9-11

• DARPA’s “Wait, What?” Technology Forum, St. Louis, MO

Thursday, September 10

• ESA Media Telecon on Upcoming Launch of Galileo 9/10, 14:00-15:00 CEST (8:00-9:00 am EDT)   Listen on ESA’s website

Friday, September 11

• Soyuz TMA-16M Undocking and Landing: undocking from ISS, 5:26 pm EDT; landing in Kazakhstan 8:49 pm EDT (September 12, 10:49 am local time at the landing site)

 

Editor’s Note: the original version of this article said the House
bill extends the learning period to
2023, but it is 2025.  As introduced, it was 2023, but it was amended
during committee markup to 2025. 

Summer is coming to an end and this will be the last of our “summer vacation” multi-week lists of upcoming space policy events.  This edition covers two weeks, August 31-September 11.  The House and Senate return to work on September 8.

During the Week

This week begins with AIAA’s Space 2015 conference in Pasadena, CA tomorrow (Monday) through Wednesday.   If you can’t be there in person, AIAA is providing a livestream of at least some of the sessions (the event’s website does not indicate which ones).  Four plenary sessions may be of particular interest and hopefully are among those that will be webcast:

• Monday, August 31, 8:00-9:30 am PDT (11:00-12:30 EDT), Executive Vision Discussion (with Jim Albaugh, Robert Lightfoot, Maj. Gen. Robert McMurry, Wanda Sigur, and Gwynne Shotwell)
• Tuesday, September 1, 8:00-9:30 am PDT (11:00-12:30 EDT), The
  Business of Space–How is the Space Business Evolving to Meet Future
  Needs?
• Wednesday, September 2, 8:00-9:30 am PDT (11:00-12:30 EDT), Pioneering Space
• Wednesday, September 2, 1:15-2:00 pm PDT (4:15-5:00 EDT), Future Explorations: Our Solar System’s Origins, Water and Life

Another event of special interest is the launch of Soyuz TMA-18M very early Wednesday morning (12:37 am Eastern Daylight Time–EDT).  This mission is a bit of an anomaly in recent years where two of the three crew will remain on board the International Space Station (ISS) for just one week instead of several months.   ESA’s Andreas Mogensen and Kazakhstan’s Aidyn Aimbetov will return to Earth on September 11 EDT (September 12 local time at the landing site) along with Russia’s Gennady Padalka, who has been on ISS since March.  Padalka launched with NASA’s Scott Kelly and Russia’s Mikhail Kornienko and those two are staying aboard for a one-year mission, but their Soyuz TMA-16M spacecraft can only remain on orbit for six months so it and Padalka — along with Mogensen and Aimbetov — will come back to Earth. Russia’s Sergei Volkov will command Soyuz TMA-18M and replace Padalka.

Mogensen and Aimbetov’s time aboard ISS will be even shorter than expected because last week the decision was made to use the two-day rendezvous trajectory to get there instead of the new six-hour direct ascent route introduced for crew launches on Soyuz TMA-08M in March 2013.  The two-day trip is necessary because the ISS orbit was raised recently to avoid a piece of space junk, changing the orbital dynamics involved in getting there.  The new orbit also caused a one day slip in the launch date (from September 1).  The Soyuz TMA-18M crew now will arrive on September 4, giving Mogensen and Aimbetov just seven and a half days on ISS.  It may be just as well since the ISS will be a bit crowded — for the first time since November 2013, there will be nine people aboard.  On the other hand, ESA said that it means significant replanning of Mogensen’s research activities and some experiments will have to be left for other astronauts to complete in the future.

Aimbetov, by the way, was a last minute addition to the crew after singer Sarah Brightman withdrew from the mission.  A military pilot, he was selected as a Kazakh cosmonaut in 2002 and trained at Star City.  He became a Russian citizen along the way, but is flying as a Kazakh, not Russian, crew member.  He was assigned to the flight in June and Kazakh officials say they are paying $20 million, so he apparently is filling Brightman’s “space tourist” slot, although he has been through the full training regimen.  He will be the third Kazakh cosmonaut (after Toktar Aubakirov and Talgat Musabayev), not counting Soviet cosmonauts from Kazakhstan when it was part of the Soviet Union.

Those events and others that we know about as of today (August 30) for the next two weeks are listed below.

Monday-Wednesday, August 31-September 2

• AIAA Space 2015, Pasadena Convention Center, Pasadena, CA (some events will be livestreamed; note that times listed on the conference’s agenda are in local time)

Tuesday, September 1

• NASA International Space Station Advisory Committee, NASA HQ, Washington, DC, 2:00-3:00 pm EDT

Wednesday, September 2

• Soyuz TMA-18M launch, 12:37 am EDT (NASA TV coverage begins September 1, 11:45 pm EDT)

Wednesday-Friday, September 2-4

• National Academies Committee on Achieving Science Goals with Cubesats, Meeting and Symposium, Beckman Center, Irvine, CA

Friday, September 4

• Soyuz TMA-18M docking, 3:42 am EDT (NASA TV coverage begins 3:00 am EDT)

Tuesday, September 8

• Congress returns: House meets at 2:00 pm EDT for legislative business; Senate meets at 2:00 pm EDT

Tuesday-Thursday, September 8-10

• Space 2.0, Milpitas, CA

Wednesday, September 9

• Exploring Self Defense in Space Scenario Workshop (SWF/SPI), Washington, DC (invitation only)

Thursday, September 10

• ESA Media Telecon on Upcoming Galileo 9/10 Launch, virtual,  14:00-15:00 CEST (8:00-9:00 am EDT)

Friday, September 11

• Soyuz TMA-16M undocking/landing, 5:26 pm/8:49 pm EDT (watch on NASA TV)

Summer will be over before we know it, but for now, our list of upcoming space policy events still spans the next couple of weeks while “business” is slow.   Congress returns on September 8, the day after Labor Day.

During the Week

This week starts off with the docking of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA’s) HTV5 (Kounotori5) cargo spacecraft with the International Space Station (ISS).   The spacecraft was successfully launched on Wednesday and has been catching up with ISS ever since.   JAXA astronaut Kimiya Yui is aboard ISS and will be at the controls of Canada’s robotic Canadarn2 tomorrow morning (Monday) to capture it.   That event is expected about 6:55 am Eastern Daylight Time (EDT).  NASA TV coverage begins at 5:15 am EDT.  JAXA’s coverage begins at 6:05 am EDT.  Installation of HTV5 onto the Harmony node will follow at about 9:45 am EDT.  The crew surely will be happy to get those 9,500 pounds of supplies, equipment and science experiments following the three cargo mission failures (one U.S. Orbital Sciences Antares/Cygnus, one Russian Soyuz/Progress, and one U.S. SpaceX Falcon/Dragon) since last October.   It should be noted, of course, that there also have been five successful cargo missions (three Russian Progresses and two U.S. SpaceX Dragons) during that time, which, if anything, demonstrates just how much resupply from Earth is needed to sustain the crew and their work.

Tomorrow also is the first day of the three-day Outer Planets Assessment Group (OPAG) meeting at the Applied Physics Lab in Laurel, MD.  These “AGs” — assessment groups or analysis groups but NOT “advisory” groups — apparently no longer are officially part of NASA’s advisory process, but are still an opportunity for members of the relevant science community to get together and interact with each other and NASA officials.   The meeting is available virtually via WebEx and telecon.  Among the many interesting sessions, Bob Pappalardo will talk about plans for the Europa mission on Monday at 3:15 pm ET and Alan Stern is scheduled to talk about the New Horizons Pluto mission on Tuesday at 1:30 pm ET.

Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD) is scheduled to speak at a Maryland Space Business Roundtable (MSBR) luncheon on Tuesday.  (The event is listed on MSBR’s website, but the link to the flyer is inactive.  We assume that’s a glitch and the event is going on as planned, but you might want to check with MSBR to be sure).  Edwards is the top Democrat (“ranking member”) on the Space Subcommittee of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee and a strong NASA supporter, especially of projects at Goddard Space Flight Center near her district.  Her interest in space goes much further, though.  Never mind just trying to convince her colleagues to fund NASA’s “Journey to Mars,” she has said publicly that she wants to go there herself.   Right now, though, she is focused on her current job representing Maryland’s 4th congressional district and running for the Senate seat being vacated by Sen. Barbara Mikulski.

On Friday, the Earth Science subcommittee of the NASA Advisory Council will meet telephonically.  An agenda is not yet posted on the subcommittee’s website, but the Federal Register notice says it is an annual performance review of the Earth Science program as required under the Government Performance and Results Modernization Act.  The public is welcome to listen in.

Those events and others coming up the first week of September that we know about as of today, August 23, are listed below.

Monday, August 24

• HTV5 arrival at ISS, grapple 6:55 am ET, installation 9:45 am ET (times are approximate)   Watch on NASA TV (5:15 am ET) and JAXA’s YouTube site (6:05 am ET)

Monday-Wednesday, August 24-26

• OPAG, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab, Laurel, MD (available via WebEx and telecon)

Tuesday, August 25

• MSBR Luncheon Featuring Rep. Donna Edwards (D-MD), Martin’s Crosswinds, Greenbelt, MD, 11:30 am – 1:30 pm ET

Friday, August 28

• NAC Earth Science Subcommittee, virtual, 2:00-4:30 pm ET (available via telecon)

Monday-Wednesday, August 31-September 2

• AIAA Space 2015, Pasadena Convention Center, Pasadena, CA

Tuesday, September 1

• NASA International Space Station Advisory Committee, NASA HQ, Washington, DC, 2:00-3:00 pm ET

Wednesday, September 2

• Soyuz TMA-18M Launch and Docking: Launch, 12:34 am EDT; docking, approx six hours later

Wednesday-Friday, September 2-4

• National Academies Committee on Achieving Science Goals with Cubesats, Meeting and Symposium, Beckman Center, Irvine, CA