New Course for Space Exploration Promotes Private Firms - WSJ.com

New Course for Space Exploration Promotes Private Firms - WSJ.com: "The Obama administration appears set to chart a new course for U.S. space exploration by promoting the use of private companies to ferry astronauts into orbit, according to people familiar with the matter.
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A Soyuz spacecraft is set to launch Monday in Kazakhstan, with a Russian flight commander and U.S. and Japanese flight engineers.The controversial plan would mark a trailblazing departure for the nation's space program by allowing a group of closely held start-up companies, for the first time, to compete for a central role in an arena previously dominated by much larger, publicly traded contractors with long track records working for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
Journal Community Discuss: Is the U.S. space program on the right track?
The initiative is part of a broader realignment of goals for an agency suffering from low morale and chronic budget shortfalls that also has been whipsawed by changing priorities in successive administrations."

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By ANDY PASZTOR
The Obama administration appears set to chart a new course for U.S. space exploration by promoting the use of private companies to ferry astronauts into orbit, according to people familiar with the matter.

View Full Image
Agence France-Presse/Getty Images .
A Soyuz spacecraft is set to launch Monday in Kazakhstan, with a Russian flight commander and U.S. and Japanese flight engineers.The controversial plan would mark a trailblazing departure for the nation's space program by allowing a group of closely held start-up companies, for the first time, to compete for a central role in an arena previously dominated by much larger, publicly traded contractors with long track records working for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

Journal Community Discuss: Is the U.S. space program on the right track? .
The initiative is part of a broader realignment of goals for an agency suffering from low morale and chronic budget shortfalls that also has been whipsawed by changing priorities in successive administrations.

But even as it moves to outsource major components of the space program to private industry, these people said, the White House is planning to hedge its bets in various other ways. One likely option is to ramp up funding for certain in-house rocket programs that over the next few years could serve as a technical safety net, and eventually provide the families of more-powerful boosters required for longer-term exploration of the solar system.

The White House also intends to jettison policies that have been in place for more than a decade, by pushing for international cooperation and funding to develop spacecraft able to land and explore the surface of the moon, and ultimately perhaps Mars or one of its moons.

The administration's emerging endorsement for the spending blueprint comes at a crucial time, because senior White House aides are now laying out a plan for space exploration in the next fiscal year that is expected to meet stiff resistance in Congress. By splitting funding between NASA's traditional way of doing business and innovative private-sector initiatives, the administration is trying to forge a compromise that would bridge broader disagreements inside NASA and among segments of the aerospace industry.

The disputes revolve around the likely safety and reliability of relying on private space systems that have yet to be tested or, in some cases, even designed. Among the companies set to gain from the new policy are closely held Space Exploration Technologies Corp., founded by Internet entrepreneur Elon Musk. SpaceX, as it is known, already has a NASA contract for as much as $1.6 billion to transport cargo to the International Space Station. By the spring of 2010, the company is slated to conduct the first test flight of its larger Falcon 9 rocket intended to carry astronauts to the station.

If the White House launches a new era of commercial crew transportation, "the significance of that decision would be on par with government-supported development of railroads" that crossed the continent during the previous century, Mr. Musk said in an interview on Sunday.

But the emphasis on commercial-style services also presents opportunities for aerospace heavyweights such as Boeing Co. and Lockheed Martin Corp., both of which are anticipated to vie for contracts, according to industry and government officials.

Separately, Boeing in the next few weeks is expected to emerge as one of the winners in a small-scale NASA competition for research grants to work on advanced crew transportation concepts.

NASA's revised trajectory was discussed in broad terms during an Oval Office meeting last week between President Barack Obama and agency chief Charles Bolden.

Some details were reported on the Web site of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

While no firm decisions have been made and budget numbers remain in flux, there appears to be broad agreement inside the administration over using private rockets and capsules to access the orbiting space station. "There is clearly a recognition that if you want to do that, it should be done seriously and with enough funding" to succeed, according to one senior administration official involved in the deliberations.

The changes come four months after a presidentially appointed study group, chaired by former Lockheed Martin Chairman Norman Augustine, sharply criticized NASA's moon-oriented exploration program, dubbed Constellation, as short-sighted and underfunded. Instead, the committee advocated switching to commercially run rocket programs as a way to let NASA devote scare resources to more-ambitious exploration goals.

NASA officials have declined to discuss the deliberations, except for the renewed focus on international cooperation. In a speech earlier this month, Mr. Bolden indicated he has explicit instructions from the president to engage the Chinese, European governments and other countries.

"There are not a lot of things I can tell you with certainty" about the agency's direction, the NASA chief said. "But I can tell you, [Mr. Obama] said, do that."

On Friday, a White House press official said Mr. Obama hasn't made any final determination, but the spokesman reiterated the president's "commitment to human space exploration, and the goal of ensuring that the nation is on a sustainable path to achieving our aspirations in space."

The idea of outsourcing a big part of NASA's work has been circulating around Washington and in industry circles since the summer, but only recently has it garnered unequivocal support from the highest levels of the Obama Administration. It's likely to cost the agency as much as $3.5 billion extra to pursue the initiative, possibly including funding to help develop crew-escape systems for some of the rockets considered likely to vie for firm transportation business.

At this point, according to people familiar with the details, it's not clear whether the additional money will come from existing NASA programs or new Capitol Hill appropriations. NASA's total budget, including environmental, unmanned and other programs, is about $18.7 billion annually, though there is some talk that it may go up by $1 billion or more in the fiscal year starting October 2010.

So far, most of the relevant committees in Congress have been highly skeptical of commercial crew transportation. Members of the House Science subcommittee with oversight for NASA programs have been particularly outspoken in opposition.

Worried about crew safety ad losing thousands of contractor jobs across several states if large portions of the current human exploration program are shelved, Congress earlier this month adopted language explicitly barring NASA from abandoning or substantially revising Constellation without prior approval from lawmakers. Florida, Alabama, Texas and Utah are some of the states that would be hardest hit by major changes.

Proponents of new commercial-style programs, on the other hand, contend that such a switch would create thousands of new jobs at fledgling companies hoping to ride the latest trend. Jeff Greason, a member of the Augustine committee and president of XCOR Aerospace of Mojave, California, one of those startups, signaled on Friday that a compromise would be acceptable to his faction. In the few years it's bound to take commercial space projects to prove their value, he said in an interview Friday, it would be smart "for NASA taka advantage of the long years of experience" shared among established contractors by allowing them to compete for some of the anticipated work.

One group certain to compete is the United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed that now supplies nearly all of the Air Force's rockets.

One of the biggest outstanding questions is what happens to the current plans to develop and build the Ares I rocket, intended to start its NASA work by blasting astronauts into orbit. The Augustine study group basically recommended killing Ares I, partly due to its large price tag and longer than anticipated development. Congressional supporters have argued equally strongly that it should be continued. Indeed, Ares supporters are campaigning for accelerated development of the booster, plus as many as three extra test flights over the next few years.

Some NASA officials, who have been scrambling to find a way to make that happen, argue it's less risky than relying on commercial rivals such as SpaceX.

But according to people close to the situation, the White House hasn't yet decided which way to go. In any event, NASA's revised spending plan is expected to emphasize development of a so-called "heavy lift" family of follow-on rockets, able to blast 100 or more tons off the launch pad.

Write to Andy Pasztor at andy.pasztor@wsj.com

Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A7