A Senate committee on Thursday unanimously agreed to a blueprint for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration that cancels the agency’s return-to-the-moon program, starts investments in commercial companies that could build rockets to take astronauts to low Earth orbit and speeds development of a heavy-lift rocket for more distant missions.
The compromise authorization bill approved by the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation bridges disparate proposals and outlines the tasks and budgets for NASA over the next three years. The bill has gained the support of both the White House, which was pushing for more aggressive changes under plans proposed by President Obama, and senators on the committee who had resisted those plans.
“The consensus we achieved today was a miracle, but I believe in miracles,” Senator Bill Nelson, the Florida Democrat who is chairman of the committee’s space subcommittee, said after the vote. The bill now moves to the full Senate.
The committee acceded on the cancellation of the Ares I rocket, which is part of the return-to-the-moon program known as Constellation, but called on NASA to start development of a larger heavy-lift rocket in 2011, likely to be based on shuttle components, that could be ready for launching by the end of 2016. The administration had proposed waiting until as late as 2015 to start work on a heavy-lift rocket, which would be needed for human missions to asteroids and Mars.
The bill also calls for development of a spacecraft capable of traveling beyond low Earth orbit — almost certainly a continuation of the Orion crew capsule that is part of Constellation. The administration had originally wanted to cancel Orion and later proposed a stripped-down version as a lifeboat for the International Space Station.
To pay for Orion and the heavy-lift rocket, the Senate authorization slices much of the money the administration proposed for developing new space technologies and cuts the amount to be spent on the commercial crew program over the next three years, to $1.3 billion from $3.3 billion in the president’s budget request. The budget request had sought $6 billion in total for commercial crew over the next five years.
Senator Nelson said the intent was that the administration would eventually get $6 billion, just spread over a longer period.
The bill, known as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Authorization Act of 2010, would also extend the life of the International Space Station to 2020 and increase financing for earth science and aeronautics as requested by Mr. Obama.
NASA’s total budget would follow Mr. Obama’s request: $19 billion in 2011, $19.45 billion in 2012 and $19.96 billion in 2013.
Some NASA critics had hoped the administration would continue to push for a more radical overhaul of the space agency, but the Senate committee bill “really would accomplish the major shift that the president laid out in his plan,” said Lori B. Garver, NASA’s deputy administrator, in particular tapping commercial companies for the transportation of crew and cargo to the space station.
“This is way beyond what we had hoped for, the ability to come into agreement with Congress this soon,” Ms. Garver said.
In addition, the Senate bill calls for adding one more space shuttle flight next year and leaves the door open for yet another flight by instructing NASA to refurbish an old external fuel tank that had not been planned for flight. A NASA official said this week that the tank could be refurbished by next October 2011, or about a year faster than earlier estimates.
Because the Senate’s authorization bill covers only the next three years, it does not spell out how NASA could avoid a budget problem in later years as the development of the commercial crew vehicles and the heavy-lift rocket proceeds.
The House of Representatives has yet to pass its version of the NASA authorization bill.
NASA has been in limbo as the Obama administration has maneuvered to cancel Constellation while Congress mandated that work continue on the program until it agreed otherwise. In Congress, there has been a cacophony of divergent opinions. Some members wanted to continue Constellation. Others have pushed for extending operations of the space shuttles, now scheduled to be retired next year. A few liked the president’s plan.
Source: The New York Times
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