What's Happening in Space Policy August 22-September 2, 2016

Here is our list of space policy events for the next TWO weeks, August 22-September 2, 2016 and any insight we can offer about them.   The House and Senate will return for legislative business on September 6.

During the Weeks

It is just two weeks until Congress returns for legislative business, so this edition of What’s Happening covers only those two weeks with the expectation that activity will begin ramping up again and there will be new events to list soon.

Not that the rest of August doesn’t have a lot to offer. First is the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) conference coming up this week in Raleigh, NC.  It is certain to whet the appetite with concepts for the longer term future.  When they say innovative, they MEAN innovative.  “Nano Icy Moons Propellant Harvester,” “Fusion-Enabled Pluto Orbiter and Lander,” and “Stellar Echo Imaging of Exoplanets” are just three of the novel ideas that will be presented. The conference will be livestreamed.

This Wednesday, Rep. Chris Van Hollen will speak to the Maryland Space Business Roundtable.  As we explained earlier, he is considered the front runner to succeed Sen. Barbara Mikulski, who is retiring at the end of the year.   Should be interesting to learn his views on the space program.  Considering how much government, private sector. and academic space activity there is in Maryland — from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center to Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Lab to the Space Telescope Science Institute to Lockheed Martin corporate headquarters, to name just a few — one could well anticipate that he’ll be a strong supporter like Mikulski.  If elected, he won’t have her seniority, though, so his influence on the outcome of, say, appropriations, likely will take some time to develop.

Next week, two of the panels for the Earth Science and Applications from Space (ESAS) Decadal Survey will meet.  As we explained in our last issue, this is the second ESAS Decadal Survey from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine.  The first was issued in 2007 and they are done every 10 years (a decade, hence “decadal”), so this one is expected to be completed next year.  Meetings of the other panels and two steering committee meetings now are scheduled through January 2017 as shown on our month-by-month FULL CALENDAR OF FUTURE EVENTS view (click on the link at the bottom of the Events of Interest list on our home page).

Those are the only four events we know about for the next two weeks as of Sunday morning (August 21) and are shown below.  Check back throughout the weeks to see new events that we learn about later.

Tuesday-Thursday, August 23-25

• NIAC Symposium, Sheraton Raleigh Hotel, Raleigh, NC (livestreamed)

Wednesday, August 24

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

Tuesday-Wednesday, August 30-31

• NAS Earth Science Decadal Survey’s Solid Earth Panel, Keck Center, 500 5th Street, Washington, DC

Thursday-Friday, September 1-2

• NAS Earth Science Decadal Survey’s Hydrology Panel, Beckman Center, Irvine, CA