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Projects: Space AdvocacyStatement to the House of Representatives Science and Technology CommitteeMarch 13, 2008 -- Today, The Planetary Society submitted an invited statement to the House of Representatives Science and Technology Committee, Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics, regarding NASA's proposed 2009 budget. On behalf of Society members, this statement was entered into the official record. The U.S. Congress is now reviewing in detail the Administration's proposed budget for fiscal year 2009. Today's hearing of the Science and Aeronautics Subcommittee was part of the congressional authorization process, which will set the direction for NASA and oversee the results. The actual dollars in the budget will be allocated by the Appropriations Committee, which has its own series of hearings planned. Congress frequently invites The Planetary Society to represent the public interest in space exploration, and we have testified many times before the congressional budget committees, and we have submitted many statements for the record. Taking action before Congress is one of the most effective means we have to influence space policy and represent our members' views to the world. We will continue these efforts. —Louis D. Friedman
STATEMENT TO THE U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES The Planetary Society appreciates the attention and care paid to space exploration and the NASA budget by the House Science and Technology Committee. The influence of this Committee has enabled the many great achievements of the United States in space. We are pleased to submit this statement relevant to your consideration of NASA's Science Programs: Fiscal Year 2009 Budget Request and Issues. The Planetary Society is the largest space interest group in the world, representing more than 100,000 members and on-line activists from all walks of life. Space exploration, both human and robotic, creates enormous public interest and inspires both the generation that is privileged to work on it and the next generation that hopes we will create for them a positive vision of the future. Our advocacy for space exploration is based on that public interest. Positive Developments NASA also proposes new funding to start an Outer Planets “Flagship” Mission, either to Europa in the Jupiter system or to Titan in the Saturn system. Their selection will be announced later this year. A Europa orbiter, recommended in the National Research Council (NRC) Decadal study, was advocated by The Planetary Society and endorsed by the Congress for the past two years. Previously NASA had rejected additional funds to start the mission. This year, however, they have said they will commit to the new start. The outer planets new start is overdue, and we ask Congress to support it. Concerns Continue for Science Unfortunately, the devastating cuts to science made two years ago are still felt in the new budget. This year the pain is transferred to Mars. The positive changes in NASA’s new budget came at the expense of a $200 million cut (35%) in Mars exploration. This tactic of moving the cuts around from year to year to please one community while hurting another was more or less admitted in recent Congressional testimony when the Associate Administrator for Space Science said that they transferred money from the only program which got an “A” in the NRC Decadal Study evaluation (Mars) to bolster programs that got a “D” or “F”. Moon, Mars and Beyond is now Only the Moon The Vision for Space Exploration was offered as a broad program of robotic and human exploration. It asserts the goal of landing astronauts on Mars, but in its first year of budget submission, the NASA Exploration Office was stripped of all Mars funding. The Mars Sample Return, then being initiated as a scientific robotic precursor to human space flight, had its funding cancelled. Since then, culminating in this year’s huge 35% cut, the program has been scaled back every year – despite the enormous public excitement about what is being found at Mars, lessons that teach us about past, present and future habitability. That cut-back is described in the attached figure showing the Administration’s proposed Mars budget since the Vision for Space Exploration was announced, as well as its five-year projection. Mars Matters! Scientific questions about Mars now can focus on understanding conditions crucial to understanding life on other worlds and, even more importantly, conditions crucial to understanding life on planet Earth. Mars’ thin CO2 atmosphere, gigantic dust storms, and starkly revealed history of climate change provide a laboratory for studying atmospheric processes that are now changing Earth’s climate. As noted at the beginning of this statement, we are not a scientific special interest complaining that our area is being cut in favor of other scientific areas. Indeed, the Mars program problem does not affect only science program in NASA – it is a NASA-wide problem. The goal of human exploration is Mars; public interest in the search for extraterrestrial life centers on Mars; the question of humankind’s future on other worlds will begin to be answered on Mars. Mars is firmly tied to understanding the processes of habitability and global climate change. This is why the Mars program was fully restructured in 2000 into a strategic set of interrelated missions leading to robotic and then human sample return. That approach, binding exploration and science together, is now weakened. After the elimination of Mars from the Exploration program, Mars is now being diminished in the Science program. The planned 2011 Telecommunications and Science orbiter was first slipped to 2013. This year it is being moved to 2016 (with some uncertainty that it will even be included in the next five-year plan). The program of launching at every Mars opportunity, begun with Pathfinder in 1997, has been abandoned, and it appears likely that there will be no lander for more than a decade following the scheduled 2009 Mars Science Laboratory. In principle, we support the new direction for Mars sample return proposed by NASA. But it is being offered with almost no technology development funds in the next five years. The Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group (MEPAG) recently reviewed this and concluded, “Without the assumption that the funding for Mars exploration will dramatically increase from the proposed level of $300-400M per year (FY11-13) to levels of $600-900M per year in the future, then MSR cannot happen” (emphasis added). What we see is a microcosm of what has happened to the Vision for Space Exploration – offer a grand plan with promises for future years, then scale it back to remove its essence. For the Agency to be in the position of eliminating the goal of human exploration to fund its year-by-year needs is not just ironic, it is doomed to curtail public support for the program. We believe the reason that the Vision for Space Exploration and its first step with Constellation have failed to excite the public is because of diminishing the Mars goal and focusing on re-creating Apollo. The Vision is Strong; Its Support is Weak For this reason, The Planetary Society joined with Stanford University’s Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics to hold a two-day workshop of experts to “Examine the Vision.” The Workshop conclusions were:
Some in the space community were looking for something more radical to come out of the workshop – a new destination or even elimination of the Vision. But the problem is not the Vision – it is with the blinders put around it. The Workshop’s first conclusion emphasizes that Mars is the driver, and in our view, the lack of public enthusiasm is directly related to not tying both the Vision’s human AND robotic elements to the Mars goal. The third and fourth conclusions emphasize that the Vision has not yet found its political niche. Perhaps the next Administration will find it and will understand that the cost and risk of human space flight are only justified when they serve national and international geopolitical interests. We believe that the need to bring nations together in space and on Earth is interest enough. International cooperation, especially at the Moon where so many other nations are following American footsteps (and Russian robotic tracks), could lower costs and heighten interest. It could move us to Mars faster. Which brings us to the fifth conclusion: The Vision has been underfunded, and that has caused dislocations that will only get greater. Budget should follow public support. Support requires that Mars be set as the goal for astronauts, and that the cost and risk be shared internationally. The proposed Mars Sample Return is also underfunded and also may fail to be realized. MEPAG and the NRC have rated Mars Sample Return a top priority, but it needs broader NASA support, and like the Vision, it needs international cooperation. We ask you to restore science and exploration funding for Mars to this end. Congress should assert the public interest in Mars science and exploration. That way America will really have a Vision for Space Exploration, one that will serve our country and excite the world with adventure, discovery and inspiration.
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