What's Happening in Space Policy April 23-28, 2017
Here is our list of space policy events for the week of April 23-28, 2017 and any insight we can offer about them. The House and Senate are in session this week.
During the Week
President Trump and his daughter Ivanka will make a 20-minute phone call to NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson aboard the International Space Station (ISS) tomorrow (Monday) morning at 10:00 am ET. It will be broadcast on a number of NASA media assets including NASA TV, Facebook, Ustream and YouTube. The Trumps are phoning Whitson to congratulate her on breaking the record for U.S. cumulative time in space — 534 days (currently held by Jeff Williams). Whitson is in command of the ISS right now. This is her third trip to the ISS. She was the first woman to command ISS during her second visit in 2008 and now is the first woman to command it twice. She also has set a record for the most spacewalks by a woman (8 so far). Her duration record is for CUMULATIVE time in space, acquired over three spaceflights. Scott Kelly holds the U.S. record for CONTINUOUS time in space on a single mission (340 days).
We have no advance knowledge of what the conversation will be about, but might he provide a hint on his plans for human spaceflight? His proposed FY2018 budget for NASA’s human spaceflight program is status quo. NASA Acting Chief Scientist Gale Allen said last week that the agency is expecting flat budgets, not even adjusted for inflation, for the next 5 years, so it seems unlikely that the President has any big changes in mind for the government-funded program. Since the Trump Administration supports public private partnerships for space activities, might an announcement of a COTS-like “commercial station” program be in the works to kickstart a new low Earth orbit (LEO) space station to succeed ISS? NASA has made clear the U.S. government will not be building another LEO space station and is looking to the commercial sector to build LEO facilities for which NASA could be one, but only one, user. Separately, Allen also said that NASA’s study of whether to put a crew on the first SLS/Orion mission is completed and the agency is awaiting a “go forward” plan. Maybe he’ll say something about that. Or perhaps it will just be a friendly phone call.
Apart from that, it’s Groundhog Day in Washington. Once again Congress must pass an appropriations bill by Friday or the government will shut down. (Which is to say that agencies that get their money from the discretionary part of the budget — DOD, NASA, NOAA etc. — will shut down unless they are exempt for reasons of public safety or meet other criteria). The 114th Congress bumped FY2017 funding decisions over into the 115th Congress with a Continuing Resolution (CR) that expires on Friday, April 28. Under the CR, agencies are funded at their prior year (FY2016) levels. FY2017 is more than half over already, but something needs to be done about the remaining 5 months (through September 30).
When President Obama was in office, it was ultra conservative Republicans that threatened (and in one case succeeded) in shutting down the government. With Republicans now in control of the House, Senate and White House, it is largely Democrats who are making the threats. Among their issues is that Republicans want to significantly increase defense spending at the expense of non-defense programs. As an example, Trump submitted a supplemental request for FY2017 last month that would add $30 billion for defense plus another $3 billion to build the border wall with Mexico, all to be partially offset by $18 billion in cuts to non-defense programs (including $50 million from NASA’s space science program and $90 million from NOAA’s satellite programs). Many Democrats and some Republicans also object to the funding for the border wall. Before the two-week recess that is just ending there were indications that congressional Republicans were agreeing not to fight the border wall battle now so they can finish the FY2017 appropriations process, but the Trump White House reportedly is pushing hard for its inclusion.
It’s high stakes politics once again with an uncertain outcome. Rumors are that they might pass another short term (one week) CR to provide more time to reach agreement. It is usually true that such decisions are made only when there is an ominous deadline looming, so it’s not clear why adding another week would make much of a difference.
Bear in mind that this is all about FY2017, the current fiscal year. They haven’t begun work on funding for FY2018, which starts on October 1. Trump sent a “budget blueprint” or “skinny budget” outlining the contours of his FY2018 spending plan last month. That’s the request that indicates a status quo budget for NASA ($19.100 billion in FY2018 compared to $19.285 billion for FY2016), with some cuts to Earth science and the elimination of NASA’s Office of Education among the more contentious issues. Some of NOAA’s satellite programs are in for cuts, but the blueprint doesn’t specify where. The detailed FY2018 budget request is expected to be sent to Congress on May 15.
Also on Capitol Hill this week, the Senate Commerce Committee’s space subcommittee and the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee will each hold hearings on Wednesday at exactly the same time (10:00 am ET). The Senate hearing is on the regulatory environment for commercial space and features the leaders of four prominent commercial space companies (Bigelow Aerospace, Blue Origin, Virgin Galactic, and Made in Space). The House hearing is on advances in the search for life with representatives from NASA (Thomas Zurbuchen, head of the Science Mission Directorate), the SETI Institute (Seth Shostak) and academia (Adam Burgasser from UC San Diego and James Kasting from Pennsylvania State University).
The House hearing takes place as the astrobiology community gathers in Mesa, AZ all week for the 2017 Astrobiology Science Conference (AbSciCon). Some sessions and two public lectures (Tuesday and Thursday nights) will be webcast. A “town hall” meeting today (Sunday) will discuss the results of the Science Definition Team report on a Europa lander. The Trump Administration’s FY2018 budget blueprint specifically does not include funding for a Europa lander (only for the Jupiter orbiter/Europa flyby “Europa Clipper” mission), but discussions about a lander are continuing since it has strong support by Rep. John Culberson (R-TX) who chairs the House Appropriations subcommittee that funds NASA. It is Congress, not the President, that decides how government money is spent. Culberson is convinced life (microbial, not intelligent) exists in Europa’s subsurface ocean and is adamant that a NASA probe find it in the next decade. Today’s town hall meeting will be available by WebEx/telecon. Remember that although Arizona is in the Mountain Time zone, it does not observe Daylight Saving Time, so the offset from your time zone is like Pacific Daylight Time (e.g., add three hours, not two, to get Eastern Daylight Time).
The first meeting of the newly chartered NASA Astrophysics Advisory Committee is Monday and Tuesday. NASA has restructured its advisory apparatus that is subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA). This group used to be a subcommittee of the Science Committee of the NASA Advisory Council (NAC), so any findings or recommendations had to go from the subcommittee up to the full committee up to NAC up to the NASA Administrator and then down to the Associate Administrator for Science and then, at last, down to the Astrophysics Division Director. A long route where advice could be changed or eliminated. Now the group — and others that also used to be subcommittees — can report directly to division directors. Astrophysics Division Director Paul Hertz will brief the committee tomorrow morning (9:45-11:45 am ET) and later in the meeting program officials will provide updates on the James Webb Space Telescope and the Wide Field Infrared Space Telescope (WFIRST), among other topics. The meeting is at NASA HQ in Washington, DC and is available remotely via WebEx and telecon.
Those and other events we know about as of Sunday morning are shown below. Check back throughout the week for others we learn about later and add to our Events of Interest list.
Sunday, April 23
- Europa Lander Town Hall meeting at AbSciCon, Mesa, AZ, 12:30-6:00 pm local time (3:30-9:00 pm Eastern Daylight Time) WebEx/telecon
Monday, April 24
- President Trump calls NASA Astronaut Peggy Whitson Aboard ISS, 10:00 am ET (Watch on NASA TV and other NASA media outlets)
Monday-Tuesday, April 24-25
- NASA Astrophysics Advisory Committee, NASA HQ, Washington, DC (WebEx/telecon)
- NOAA Science Advisory Board, DoubleTree by Hilton, Silver Spring, MD
Monday-Friday, April 24-28
- 2017 Astrobiology Science Conference (AbSciCon), Mesa Convention Center and Phoenix Marriott Mesa, Mesa, AZ (some sessions webcast)
- Small Satellites for Earth Observation (International Academy of Astronautics), Berlin, Germany
Tuesday, April 25
- Where Will We Find Alien Life? (public lecture at AbSciCon), Mesa, AZ, 7:00-8:30 pm local time (10:00-11:30 pm Eastern), webcast
Tuesday-Thursday, April 25-27
- Space 2.0, Crowne Plaza San Jose-Silicon Valley, Milpitas, CA
- AIAA Defense Forum (SECRET/US ONLY), JHU Applied Physics Lab, Laurel, MD
Wednesday, April 26
- Senate Commerce Sbcmte Hrg on Commercial Space Regulations, 253 Russell Senate Office Building, 10:00 am ET (webcast)
- House SS&T Hrg on Advances in the Search for Life, 2318 Rayburn House Office Building, 10:00 am ET (webcast)
Thursday, April 27
- How Astrobiology and Planetary Science Inform Planetary Stewardship (public lecture at AbSciCon), Mesa, AZ, 6:30-8:30 pm local time (9:30-11:30 pm Eastern), webcast
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