Obama's NASA budget

[wakela]

Article [ur=http://www.universetoday.com/2010/02/01/nasa-budget-details-constellation-cancelled-but-where-to-next/l]here[/url].

Basically, it looks like the plans to go to the Moon and Mars have been scraped for now.  Which breaks my heart.  But the funding has been increased for unmanned missions around the Solar System.  With the extra money and the savings from not having to develop human missions, we could be seeing some interesting things in the next few years....

Still, I had no small amount of emotional capital invested in my three-year-old daughter growing up to be on one of the Mars missions.  Not necessarily the first, mind you, a guy has to keep realistic. 

[Heradel]

Constellation being canceled sucks. Recent policy studies said that they wouldn't get there until the 2030s but the FY2011 budget does also increase NASA's budget by $6 billion and science spending is increased in the overall budget.

NASA’s Constellation program – based largely on existing technologies – was based on a vision of returning astronauts back to the Moon by 2020. However, the program was over budget, behind schedule, and lacking in innovation due to a failure to invest in critical new technologies. Using a broad range of criteria an independent review panel determined that even if fully funded, NASA’s program to repeat many of the achievements of the Apollo era, 50 years later, was the least attractive approach to space exploration as compared to potential alternatives. Furthermore, NASA’s attempts to pursue its moon goals, while inadequate to that task, had drawn funding away from other NASA programs, including robotic space exploration, science, and Earth observations. The President’s Budget cancels Constellation and replaces it with a bold new approach that invests in the building blocks of a more capable approach to space exploration that includes:

—Research and development to support future heavy-lift rocket systems that will increase the capability of future exploration architectures with significantly lower operations costs than current systems – potentially taking us farther and faster into space.
—A vigorous new technology development and test program that aims to increase the capabilities and reduce the cost of future exploration activities. NASA, working with industry, will build, fly, and test in orbit key technologies such as automated, autonomous rendezvous and docking, closed-loop life support systems, in-orbit propellant transfer, and advanced in-space propulsion so that our future human and robotic exploration missions are both highly capable and affordable.
—A steady stream of precursor robotic exploration missions to scout locations and demonstrate technologies to increase the safety and capability of future human missions and provide scientific dividends.

Edit to add: Also buried in the budget document:

 Landing on the Moon with a robot that can be tele-operated from Earth and can transmit near-live video.
 Demonstrating a factory to process lunar or asteroid materials for use for various purposes.

So apparently NASA will be looking for Coooaaal iiinnn Spaaaacce!

[Boggled Coriander]

You know, I'm a big space exploration nut, but I'm okay with this.  Constellation looked cool, but it didn't look to me like the start of something sustainable.  To be honest somehow I never really believed it would happen anyway.

More money for unmanned space probes?  Private industry encouraged to build manned space vehicles?  I'm sorry, but I don't see much to be unhappy about here.  I could be wrong though.

[CryptoMe]

I'm waiting to see what will happen to actual spending on lunar exploration and the NASA Lunar Science Institutes. Of course, I ultimately support manned missions, because there is (as yet) no parallel for the human brain-eye-hand combination. But robotic precursor missions are not a bad start. And so long as the data keeps rolling in and the funding to use it for planning and research purposes, I'll be happy.

[lowky]

I do sort of have issues with the plan for NASA.  It's great to encourage private industry to do manned flights.  The problem is if NASA continues unmanned flights you get no real innovation happening.  Oh look pretty pictures of Mars, or where ever, but it's manned space flight that gives technological advances.  It's just logged data this way, no new inventions for food, waste recycling, etc, which is what we need if we hope to colonize space at some point.  And look at all the inventions and improvements to inventions that happened because of earlier space flights.  Improved Food Storage, better air filters and cooling methods, etc. etc.

I guess my point is without NASA sponsored manned space flights, I am afraid that we will stagnate, and never get there.  If you can't be an astronaut why study astronomy, astrophysics, etc.  We in the US seem to be falling further and further behind in the sciences, and to me this seems like another step away from science. 

[Heradel]

Holy crap never mind, cut the budget, cut the budget, they've been taken over by Cybermen.

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/Yadj3asTyc0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;fs=1&amp;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" class="bbc_link bbc_flash_disabled new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/Yadj3asTyc0&amp;hl=en_US&amp;fs=1&amp;</a>

[Heradel]

And DARPA's doing them too. Oh when will we ever learn, er, before the robotic overlords bit comes to pass.

[stePH]

Send this into space:



 

[Heradel]

Bad Astronomy's (positive) reaction.

[wakela]

The Economist reminds us of the money being used to stimulate private investment in space.  I don't necessarily think that that will get us back to the moon before the Chinese, but I think it's interesting.
http://www.economist.com/node/15543675/comments

[CryptoMe]

I was at the NASA Headquarter's briefing at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Houston yesterday. There, Jim Green (Director of the Planetary Science Division of the Space Mission Directorate) and Dr. Laurie Leshin (Deputy Associate Administrator of the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate) gave scientists their take on the Obama budget. Here's my summary of what they had to say.

The Moon is not off the table. It is included in the new "multiple destinations" initiative, which seeks to develop technology readiness for sending humans into the solar system in general. That said, the Moon is the closest solid body target, and as such, remains foremost on the priorities list. While the budget itself does not specify a particular target, NASA does hope to name a specific target in the future. This target will not preclude the use of developed technologies for alternate manned missions to a different target. Meanwhile, numerous robotic precursor missions to multiple targets will continue.     

[Yargling]

You know, I'm a big space exploration nut, but I'm okay with this.  Constellation looked cool, but it didn't look to me like the start of something sustainable.  To be honest somehow I never really believed it would happen anyway.

More money for unmanned space probes?  Private industry encouraged to build manned space vehicles?  I'm sorry, but I don't see much to be unhappy about here.  I could be wrong though.

I have to agree - Bush's 'Mission to Mars' 'plan' wasn't very well thought out, and he didn't really follow through. Its disappointing to see it go, but I would prefer a realistic plan to expand mankind's presence beyond our cradle instead of Bush trying to copy Kenny.

[Heradel]

I went to the Asimov debate last night at the Hayden Planetarium on this topic, where the consensus, insomuch as you can have one when Robert Zubrin (Mars, or the dog gets it) and Paul Spudis (Colonize and Commercialize Moon now) are in the same room was that NASA needed a destination and a less than ten year timeframe.

Which may be what we're going to get on April 15th when the President goes down to Florida.

I wish there was video or audio, but there doesn't seem to be. Luckily there are a few writeups.

[Heradel]

The fact sheets on the President's speech tomorrow have been released.