New NASA Budget Woes

Abcd1234 writes "The last few months have seen NASA the focal point of high drama, the most obvious example being the controversy surrounding the next Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission. Well, the drama continues with NASA reporting to a Senate subcommitee that it currently faces a $2 billion budget shortfall which could result in the downsizing, delaying, or outright cancellation of a number of NASA missions, including the Space Interferometry Mission and Terrestrial Planet Finder, which may be delayed, and the James Webb Space Telescope, often cited as the successor to the HST, which faces potential cancellation. Among the reasons for the shortfall: cost overruns in a number of missions, including the shuttle return-to-flight program, resumption of the Hubble servicing mission, and mandated congressional expenditures (a.k.a 'pork')."

Comments

No big deal, really

[Anonymous Coward]

Just offshore NASA to India.

An Example of a Short Sited Administration

[amcdiarmid]

NASA is in a budget crunch. They are going to NOT service the Hubble because its' successor (James Webb) will be up in 4-5 years. But wait, mysteriously, NASA is in a budget crunch and will kill James Webb due to budget priorities.

Or We will send enough troops to beat the Flintstone army, but not enough to keep Bedrock safe and orderly untill we can install a new government in Bedrock.

Duh!

Re:An Example of a Short Sited Administration

[Chairboy]

Incorrect. The JWST hasn't even started major construction, and the estimated (and optimistic) launch date is late 2011.

Hubble is a bird in the hand, and the JWST is two birds flying around in the future, and part of an organization that routinely starts and cancels projects.

Don't count your telescopes before they've hatched.

Re:An Example of a Short Sited Administration

[johansalk]

It's all done the same way; in much the way that Bush is deliberately running a huge budget deficit to bring down the "welfare state" thanks to fiscal crises he has created, the same was done with NASA. O'Keefe had nothing to do with space; he's a guy from business who joined the Bush administration on its very first day and was sent to NASA to carry out a partisan politics agenda, and he did it to the letter. The manned mission to Mars is simply a huge cost that will keep NASA distracted and in crises such as this one that will force it to cull science programs, in much the same way they plan to cull social security programs, and Bush has already culled 150 social security and welfare programs in his last budget, on the excuse that they can't afford them. Additionally, Hubble is primarily from the liberal state of MD, whereas the missions the Bush administration imposed on NASA are those that will primarily benefit the military-industrial complex and conservative states such as FL and TX.

Strategies for space

[rbanffy]

I think we should right now focus on having cheaper access to orbit, a permanent presence on the moon and a fleet of modular vehicles, manned and unmanned, that could be assembled in space for varied purposes.

Science was a only by-product of Apollo.

We need something like Apollo to lay foundations to have more science done later at lower budgets. Until science is no longer hideously expensive, it won't be done.

It gets down to patience, objectives and the will to get from here to there.

Why NASA?

[HermanAB]

Honest question: Why does the US have NASA? The US Army, Arforce and Navy all have their own space programs, so what is the point of NASA?

Survivor Mars, The "M" Prize

[Anonymous Coward]

Get NASA on a for profit basis. Create the M-prize. First team to reach Mars and bring back soil samples wins a billion dollars. You film the various teams and require them to film the mission. You get a hit TV series out of the deal and cheap science.

Next season is survivor Afganistan. First team to go in and capture Osam gets a billion dollars. A real bargin and ratings gold. Could save broadcast TV and solve the budgt crisis at the same time! The government is so screwed up outsourcing to entertainment could solve all our problems.

The Trick Is...

[EXTomar]

People always suggest "they should privatize space!" but these same people fail to realize a fundemental problem: space is not profitable.

There is very little out there to capitalize on (you know...the root of capitalism?). I don't think people realize how hard it is to travel out there (in terms of size, durability, and other huge problems). What does a company do with space exploration? If the rings of Saturn were made of gold nuggets we would be there. If there where diamons the size of boulders on Mars we'd be there. Unfortunately by all measurements these places are remarkable but not useful for any buisness on Earth.

I don't think you'll have MD, Boeing, Airbus or anyone else lining up to fund their own excursions into deep space because there is simply no money to make out there. Remember that Columbus had a plan to make money before going on his little trip. Expecting companies to explore space just because is unrealistic.

Re:The Trick Is...

[bitingduck]

Space has already been privatized and commercialized to a large extent, but only for Earth orbiting systems. The largest commercial application in space so far is telecom, but the imaging market is picking up lately.

Nearly all satellites built in the US are built by private companies (sometimes with gov't funding, sometimes private, depending on the application). Launch vehicles are designed and built by private companies (typically designed under contract with the gov't, with construction paid for by whoever is getting the lift)

Deep space and earth orbiting science applications will likely remain gov't funded for the forseeable future, unless the private foundations that fund things like ground based science and telescopes decide to start funding space based research.

A modest suggestion...

[sssmashy]

NASA should hire some of those legendary Russian engineers who kept the Russian space program alive on a shoestring budget, using inelegant but practical solutions like kerosene rocket fuel. They should also hire the entire winning X-prize team. Mothball the shuttle program, focus less on manned space missions, increase R&D co-operation with private companies. Figuring a way to get payload into orbit cheaply should be the main mission.

Re:A modest suggestion...

[GumphMaster]

> using inelegant but practical solutions like kerosene rocket fuel.

Yeah, really inelegant in Apollo too! The first stage engines burned liquid oxygen and RP-1 (kerosene).

The Soviets tended to use hypergolic fuels, in which two components were mixed and would spontaneously combust. This reduced the need for complex ignition systems and makes for lighter engines. The Apollo lunar module also made use of hypergolic propellants.

Yeah, it's always tough to find the money

[Anonymous Coward]

When you need to give:

$700,000 for the Admiral Theater in Bremerton, Washington, despite a $4.2 million privately-funded facelift

$500,000 for the Olympic Tree Program for the 2002 Winter Olympics.

$1,250,000 for Aleutian Pribilof church repairs.

$750,000 for the Ketchikan Wood Technology Center.

$400,000 for a parking lot and pedestrian safety access in Talkeetna (population 300).

$2,500,000 for marijuana eradication.
-----

Priorities, priorities. You know?

Re:Yeah, it's always tough to find the money

[Nova77]

And above all about $400,000,000,000 each year for the army..

Somekind of thingy I don't have a word for

[Quirk]

The International Space Station, failures, warts and all, represented a transnation project akin to projects like Stonehenge. Throughout histroy war has acted as a dissemenation tool for culture. An example being Alexander's Hellenization of the cradle of western civilization and the near east. Often conquerers press ganged the conquered into building new wonders to punctuate and perpetuate their victories. The ISS representes an undertaking by many nations to take the first semipermanent step to get us off mother earth. The ISS also could be the only, presently, viable, safe haven for gene banks, living and frozen, to repopulate the earth in case of a worldwide disaster scenario. The USA is in a postion to lead the way to put the ISS back in play as a means and symbol to represent a peaceful transnational implementation of world class science, while sharing the cost burden. I would rather governments, transparent and accountable (at least in theory... Churchill: "democracy is the worst form of government except for all the others") than private corporations be the builders and keepers of the ISS.

I read Toynbee and weird O. Spengler some years ago, along with many other historians but I can't recall a term that represents the construction of monuments to cement nation building.

just my .01 cent.

Re:Somekind of thingy I don't have a word for

[demachina]

" to take the first semipermanent step to get us off mother earth"

Uh you are really overselling the worth of the ISS. MIR was the first step to that goal not ISS and it was done for a fraction of the cost. MIR wasn't in great shape when it was abandoned but it was abandoned due to political pressure from the ISS not because it was done. Chances are slim the ISS will last any longer than the MIR did. The key ISS problem is there is very little happening on it that justifies the staggering price tag. One redeeming aspect of ISS is it kept all the good people in the Russian space program who build MIR employed since they build the heart of the ISS and in many respects its a MIR2 but done on a NASA scale budget which meant vast quantites of our tax dollars were squandered on it, lining the pockets of contractors.

The key problem with space stations are they are intensely dependent on cargo from earth to continue to function and at current launch costs those costs are steep. As others have noted you would be better served at this point to get launch costs down and then a large permenent presence in space would be more feasible. With current technology and approach keeping people in space is simply not sustainable. You have to throw away buckets of money every year that could better go elsewhere, and there isn't actually that much for people to do spinning around in a tin can in zero G in LEO, to justify the cost. A moon base is only slightly better. Zero G manufacturing was supposed to be a boon but you really dont hear any convincing case that it is. There is growing protein crystals and some material science work but its really debatable if that couldn't be done for a fraction of the cost of the $100 billion ISS price tag using robot spacecraft. At this point all NASA can use to justify the ISS is zero G biology, something that is of value for long duration space travel but simple CAN'T justify the $100 billion ISS price tag.

A permenent colony on Mars is probably the only manned endeavor that might be justifiable and sustainable because Mars "might" have enough resources, especially water to sustain a colony that is not completely dependent on Earth. I'm talking about sending people there who stay there and not some pointless Apollo style stunt where they plant a flag, pick up rocks and come home.

Mining asteroids might be another endeavor with some value especially as we exhaust the Earth's mineral resources but its not clear if men or robots would be better for this.

All in all this is just a sad story because it just highlights NASA's incompetence. They are spending staggering sums of money wringing there hands over every detail of the Space Shuttle and to no real long term purpose. All this money is ONLY to try and finish the ISS, with one exception a Hubble repair mission. The ISS is a staggering failure and no one has the guts to admit it and stop pouring every larger sums of money in to it, while it and the Shuttle bleed every other program with a point to death. If they do manage to finish the ISS then the shuttle is abandoned and all the money they are squandering on it now trying to reinvent it at a point it already obsolete, is down the tubes.

Simple problem here, NASA bureaucracy and its pork fed contractors Lockheed/Boeing are burning vast sums of money on the shuttle, ISS and their bottom lines to no productive end, and they are just continuing to do what they've done the last 20 years, bleed every other potential aerospace venture white to feed a corrupt empire.

Re:Somekind of thingy I don't have a word for

[Quirk]

"Uh you are really overselling the worth of the ISS"

Yes I am, while not wanting to appear flippant, I noted Stonehenge as an example of making a people in the image of an icon or wonder. I'm suggesting we build, and even overbuild, not because it's economically feasible but because it will meld the efforts of several nations in a symbol that transcends political differences. The spinoffs from developing and implementing new and bleeding edge technology are manifold and not always apparent. What I'm suggesting verges on a technological totemism and, as such, may seem bathotic, but I think we are subject to a very primitive brain barely overridden by the executive center of the cortex, and likely to respond very positively to making the ISS a la the Tower of Bable. When has space exploration been an economically driven enterprise? There is probably no similar project in all of history that didn't pork feed contractors.

One of the biggest blunders to come from the baby boomer generation was the demonization of nuclear power and it was extended to the Orion project. It may be that a transnational enterprise would manage to escape the hysteria surrounding nuclear powered spacecraft giving support to Project Prometheus. (It's not uninteresting as an aside that James Lovelock, formulator of the famed, Gaia hypothesis now advocates development of nuclear power because were out of time to search out alternatives in the face of depletion and pollution of oil.)

Get with the (space) program, fellas.

[xigxag]

Look, NASA would solve a lot of its budgetary woes if it would just hire somebody professional to come up with names for its various projects. Space Interferometry Mission? WTF is "interferometry"? Sounds like a cancer treatment. "Planet Finder" --- boooring, besides, isn't "Finder" already trademarked by Apple? And who in the tarnation is James Webb? Some hack from the sixties nobody's ever heard of.

Off the cuff, I can think of much snappier names -- "Intragalactic Terrorist Locator" for the planet spotting thingy, "George H.W. Bush Memorial Telescope" should make it politically impossible to cancel the Hubble replacer, and for that Space Interfrazometer Moozit, let's license the sucker to Electronic Arts/Maxis and call it "SIMS in Outer Space."

Re:Hubble Pictures

[kiltedtaco]

This is the only reason NASA would contemplate keeping hubble alive: to appease citizens who want to see pretty pictures.

You can point at the pictures all you want, but the HST is still broken and outdated. Some great research has come out of it yes, but that doesn't mean that it's worth the cost of fixing. Some great research has come out of ground based telescopes too, but they're not as glamorous and don't put out as many pretty pictures for the public to ooh and ahh at. The ground based telescopes is where great research is coming from now, ask an astronomer. They put far less import on saving hubble than the general populace, and they're the ones who actually use it. Hubble is just a public-relations device anymore.

It amazes me...

[Anonymous Coward]

That Mr. Bushie can get $80B to support is evil, immoral, and illegal wars, but NASA can't get $2B to fund crucial missions. We've given up on science that's not used to kill people. What have we become? Maybe someone is afraid of what knowledge NASA might unlock.. some other tidbit to go against creationism ?

Re:Aren't we at war?

[Camel Pilot]

What is the budget for iraq this year something like 100 Billion? For what? The majority of Iraqi's and arabs in general hate us even more than before and we have significantly increase our target potential for the future. Bush the Wiser and Senior points this out in his book that:

We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. The coalition would instantly have collapsed, the Arabs deserting it in anger and other allies pulling out as well. Under the circumstances, there was no viable "exit strategy" we could see, violating another of our principles. Furthermore, we had been self-consciously trying to set a pattern for handling aggression in the post-Cold War world. Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the United Nations' mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression that we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land. It would have been a dramatically different -- and perhaps barren -- outcome.

Doonsbury used this quote in one of his cartoons with a punchline that it was too bad GWB was apparently a child left behind and was unable to read his Dads book.

Form a post above I learned that Quayle had actually proposed spending half our military budget on space development. Eventhough I probably disagree with Quayle on every other issue he would have received my vote.

Re:lets get our shit on earth fixed first

[Zobeid]

Gaaah! It really cheeses me off whenever I hear this tired old argument. "There are problems here on Earth! We must solve all the world's problems before going into space!"

That's the same as saying we should never do anything in space. The world has had problems for thousands of years, I don't see paradise-on-earth being established anytime soon.

So if you really believe this, let's get serious. Let's stop making movies, since they cost a ton of money and don't contribute to solving the world's problems. Let's outlaw the gambling industry. Let's shut down tourism, too. Let's make people give up their pets -- Americans spend way more on their pets every year than NASA gets.

And of course, the US military budget is about 10X NASA's budget, maybe we should trim *that* back until after we've solved illiteracy, poverty, world hunger, AIDS & cancer, etc.

Never explain by conspiracy...

[SysKoll]

... what can be attributed to good old bureaucratic incompetence.

Your explanation is actually very optimistic. It describes an administration with a set (albeit evil) purpose, and, with sheer determination, remarkable acumen and awesome foresight, this demonic plan is achieved.

I think that this is actually giving credit to this bureaucratic mess known as NASA. They haven't been that organized since the Appolo days.

NASA is in survival mode. Its actions are not rational, they are guided by the panic of administrators that see their personal empires crumble.

NASA has admirable engineers and great scientists, but they don't get to make the decisions. Bureaucrats do. Evil geniuses need not apply. Now, on the other hand, if you know someone who can snowjob Congress, they are hiring...