• 7 months ago
On Tuesday, the House Science, Space & Technology Committee held a hearing about the Budget Proposal for NASA for Fiscal Year 2025.

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Transcript
00:00:00 Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare recesses of the committee at any time.
00:00:04 Welcome to today's hearing entitled "An Overview of the Budget Proposal for the National Aeronautics
00:00:09 and Space Administration for Fiscal Year 2025." I recognize myself for five minutes for an opening
00:00:17 statement. Today, we hear testimony from Administrator Nelson about the President's
00:00:22 budget proposal for NASA for fiscal year 2025. This committee plays an important role in NASA's
00:00:28 mission by providing policy direction and authorizing activities for the agency.
00:00:32 While we make progress with language included in the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act,
00:00:38 it's been more than seven years since the last comprehensive NASA reauthorization bill was signed
00:00:42 into law. I'm certain that everyone in this room, including the Administrator, can agree that seven
00:00:47 years is far too long. As many of our experts have highlighted in committee hearings this year,
00:00:53 a lot has changed for NASA since 2017. We must approach an authorization bill with these changes
00:00:59 in mind and address a few major topics. The first topic is Artemis. I speak for members on both sides
00:01:06 of the aisle when I express the strongest support for America's return to the lunar surface.
00:01:11 But support also means asking tough questions about the planned architecture and execution
00:01:16 of the program. The second topic is NASA's role in low Earth orbit when the International Space
00:01:22 Station is retired. We heard several perspectives on this topic in February and I look forward to
00:01:28 continuing this dialogue as we move forward. A third topic is NASA's management of science
00:01:34 missions within the agency's portfolio. We support NASA daring to do big things, particularly in
00:01:41 science, but how can Congress ensure these projects, particularly flagship missions,
00:01:46 remain on schedule and within budget? As we deliberate on these topics while we consider
00:01:51 this important reauthorization legislation, we must also keep in mind recent budgetary issues.
00:01:56 NASA doesn't lack plans for future exploration efforts, whether it's returning astronauts to
00:02:03 the moon, exploring our solar system, or developing new aviation technology. However,
00:02:08 these ambitions come at a cost. In May of 2023, President Biden signed the Fiscal Responsibility
00:02:14 Act capping federal discretionary spending for FY24 and FY25. One of our challenges will be to
00:02:21 draft an authorization bill that complies with that law while providing sufficient support for
00:02:26 NASA to execute these awe-inspiring missions. Failing to do so will force NASA to take on more
00:02:34 work than they have the funding to accomplish, which will not only set NASA up for failure by
00:02:39 asking them to do too much with too little. By providing proper oversight and clear direction
00:02:45 and authorizing language, this committee can create the framework for adequate funding for
00:02:51 the agency's activities. A common theme among the hearings this committee held this Congress
00:02:55 is the importance of ensuring U.S. competitiveness in research and technology development globally,
00:03:01 and today is no different. While the U.S. remains the global leader in space exploration,
00:03:06 we face increasing challenges internationally. Just last week, China reiterated its commitment
00:03:12 to landing two astronauts on the lunar surface by 2030. Later this week, China intends to launch a
00:03:20 mission that will retrieve samples from the far side of the moon. If they are successful, China
00:03:25 will be the first country to do so. We cannot allow China to become the front-runner in space
00:03:31 exploration. There are too many consequences for our competitiveness, our national security,
00:03:36 and our continued ability to explore space. With clear direction from Congress, NASA will ensure
00:03:42 that the U.S. remains a global leader in space and continues to inspire millions of people around the
00:03:47 world. I want to welcome Administrator Nelson back to the committee, where he served for many years.
00:03:52 I look forward to working with you as we move forward with our NASA authorization bill.
00:03:58 And I now recognize the ranking member, the gentlewoman from California, for an opening
00:04:03 statement. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I join Chairman Lucas in welcoming Administrator
00:04:09 Nelson back to the committee to discuss the President's budget proposal for NASA.
00:04:15 We appreciate your leadership at NASA and that you are here again today.
00:04:19 Amidst what can be times of geopolitical, economic, and environmental strife, NASA continues to be a
00:04:27 bright spot, a North Star that sparks a sense of wonder and curiosity about our planet,
00:04:32 our solar system, and the universe. NASA's mission to advance space and earth science,
00:04:38 human exploration, aeronautics, space technology, and STEM education continues to bring us together,
00:04:45 and that's something we need. Here in Congress, there's broad bipartisan support for NASA's
00:04:50 mission. Beyond the United States, NASA continues to lead us in activities that serve the peaceful
00:04:56 exploration and utilization of outer space. The value of these intangible benefits cannot be
00:05:03 underestimated, nor can we forget the direct value that NASA R&D has had on societal challenges such
00:05:11 as climate change, space weather, and even on tracking and characterizing potentially hazardous
00:05:17 near-Earth asteroids. Today's discussion provides an important opportunity to examine NASA's progress
00:05:23 towards meeting our policy goals for the United States Civil Space Program, to identify opportunities
00:05:29 for improvement, and to understand what NASA needs in budgetary, workforce, and infrastructure
00:05:35 resources to accomplish its inspiring mission. The President's fiscal year request for NASA is
00:05:42 $25.384 billion, about a 3% increase from the enacted fiscal year 2023 appropriation.
00:05:50 I believe this request allows us to keep the Artemis II demonstration on track, advancing
00:05:57 Moon-to-Mars activities, and investing in sustainable aviation, among other activities.
00:06:04 However, last year's debt ceiling agreement does impose caps on discretionary spending,
00:06:09 and that presents challenges for all our federal research and development agencies.
00:06:14 NASA is no exception. Under the 2025 request for NASA, high-priority science recommended in recent
00:06:21 National Academy decadal surveys cannot be initiated. The timeline for Mars sample return
00:06:27 is to be determined. Previously selected science missions are being pushed to the right or even
00:06:33 canceled, while other productive science observatories, such as the Chandra X-ray
00:06:37 Observatory, are proposed to be phased out. For human exploration and spaceflight, NASA's plans
00:06:43 call for transitioning from use of the International Space Station to commercial low-Earth platforms at
00:06:50 the end of the decade. At the same time, NASA also plans to begin an annual cadence of
00:06:57 Artemis missions to the Moon in short of Beau Wave's building. There's no sugarcoating the
00:07:03 current budget proposal. I recognize that tough decisions need to be made. It's essential that
00:07:09 this committee understand what drove some decisions in the proposal over others as we evaluate
00:07:15 tradeoffs, and it's also imperative that NASA has clear plans for action on the other side of the
00:07:21 present budget horizon. Lots is at stake. I'm especially concerned, as the Chairman has mentioned,
00:07:27 about reductions in workforce, including those in my home state in California, resulting from
00:07:33 prolonged mission timelines. Losing skilled talent is a further setback that cannot be erased.
00:07:39 We need to look holistically at the implications of the 2025 proposal on the health of NASA now
00:07:45 and in the future. How will we position NASA to meet the future, or will we stay on the tail
00:07:51 as other nations that don't share our values advance, as the Chairman has expressed? As a
00:07:56 ranking member, I will continue to ensure we position NASA for success and that the United
00:08:02 States continues to lead in the exploration of outer space. I want to thank you, Administrator,
00:08:09 for your extraordinary leadership of NASA, and we welcome you back and thank you for your service.
00:08:14 I yield back, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Ranking Member. Let me introduce our witness for today's hearing,
00:08:18 Mr. Bill Nelson, who serves as the 14th Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
00:08:24 Administrator Nelson's career includes over four decades in public service. He represented Florida
00:08:30 in both chambers during his 30 years in Congress, and I would most importantly note, including six
00:08:36 years of chairing the House Science Committee's Space Science and Applications Subcommittee.
00:08:43 That's a real resume item, Mr. Director. Thank you for joining us today. I now recognize
00:08:47 Administrator Nelson for five minutes to present his testimony. Mr. Chairman, with your permission
00:08:53 to submit my written statement in the record, and if I may, just give you a couple of thoughts,
00:09:01 and then let's get to your questions. Without opposition, absolutely.
00:09:09 NASA is a storied organization, and this agency does amazing things.
00:09:17 A lot of the things that we do is right on the edge, and next Monday,
00:09:24 night about 1030, we're going to launch another vehicle. It's human-rated. This is the first time
00:09:35 that America has ever had three human-rated spacecraft. The one that will go to the moon,
00:09:44 which is Orion, on top of the big rocket, the SLS. The Dragon, which flies on the Falcon 9,
00:09:54 and is part of the commercial crew and cargo services to and from the International Space
00:10:03 Station, and now the third one, the Boeing Starliner. This is the first test flight.
00:10:10 We have two test pilots, Butch Wilmore and Sonny Williams, that are flying this test flight.
00:10:22 And if successful, then we will have three, the first time this has ever happened.
00:10:33 It's all a part of us continuing to, in the human space program,
00:10:39 explore the heavens. We're learning so much on the International Space Station.
00:10:47 It's an international station. Fifteen nations participate,
00:10:54 and there is science that is just coming of age. Some of the pharmaceutical research
00:11:02 is just going to knock our socks off. We are also going back to the moon after a half century.
00:11:13 We're going back not just to go to the moon. We're going back for the reason of learning enough
00:11:20 so we can send humans to Mars in the decade of the 2040s.
00:11:24 NASA's science program, you read about it all the time. I mean, the James Webb Space Telescope,
00:11:33 look what it is discovering out in the universe. And I could go on and on. The aviation program,
00:11:40 we're going to fly that needle-nose jet this year, proving a different design that we can fly
00:11:48 passengers, supersonic, across populated areas and not have the big bang-bang of the sonic boom,
00:11:58 but it would be more of a ruffled, a muffled roar. And so it goes on and on. And I will stop
00:12:09 right there well before the five minutes, Mr. Chairman, and be delighted to try to answer your
00:12:15 questions. Thank you, Director Nelson, for your testimony. And the chair recognizes himself for
00:12:21 five minutes. Administrator Nelson, it was recently reported that NASA is considering
00:12:27 changing the mission profile for Artemis III, the mission scheduled for September of 2026,
00:12:34 which is currently intended to land humans on the lunar surface. The potential change in profile
00:12:39 will result in a mission where astronauts do not land on the lunar surface,
00:12:43 but rather remain in low Earth orbit. Is NASA actively considering an alternative mission
00:12:49 profile for Artemis III? What's going on, Mr. Administrator? Mr. Chairman, this is part of our
00:12:56 commercial program, and SpaceX is signed up to land in September of '26. Next year, September of '25,
00:13:14 we are going to launch a crew of four, three Americans and a Canadian,
00:13:20 and they will test out the spacecraft, and it will circle the moon and come home.
00:13:26 A year after that, SpaceX is signed up to provide a lander where we would go into a new kind of
00:13:38 orbit, a polar orbit, an irregular or elliptical orbit, and the crew will transfer into the lander.
00:13:53 Now, that is what is provided in the contract. The article that you're referring to
00:14:03 is speculation. Well, what happens if they're not ready?
00:14:08 Well, naturally, people think about these things, but the plan is to land,
00:14:18 and it would be two astronauts of the crew of four that would get into the lander and go down and
00:14:26 land. I might say, think about the Apollo program and the Artemis program. Artemis III, the first
00:14:41 lander that SpaceX is contracted for, is the equivalent of Apollo 9, Apollo 10, and Apollo 11.
00:14:55 So, it's a very accelerated program. Very much so, Mr. Administrator. The 2023
00:15:05 decadal strategy for planetary science suggested a total cost of $5.3 billion for the Mars sample
00:15:13 return. Significant increases to that estimated cost have triggered several project reviews,
00:15:18 including NASA's ongoing efforts to reassess the program. As NASA reconsiders the approach for the
00:15:24 Mars sample return, is NASA still targeting a total project cost of $3.5 billion?
00:15:31 3.5 is unrealistic, but I pulled the cord on it, Mr. Chairman, about two weeks ago because
00:15:42 the independent review boards had said the cost was going up to $11 billion.
00:15:53 It was very possible that we were not even going to get the sample back until 2040,
00:16:00 and that's just simply unacceptable. So, what I did was I said, "I want to go out
00:16:09 to all NASA centers," which includes the Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
00:16:16 "I want to go out to industry," which we now have done with a request for information,
00:16:23 "to come up with new ideas." By the way, I checked in yesterday with the head of the Jet
00:16:35 Propulsion Laboratory on how their ideas are, and they are quite excited about coming up with new
00:16:44 ideas that can bring that cost down and also get that sample back earlier.
00:16:50 Well, certainly we wait with enthusiasm to hear those. One last question, Mr. Administrator.
00:16:56 In October, the President submitted a domestic supplemental request to Congress requesting
00:17:00 funding for a U.S. deorbit vehicle to safely decommission the ISS, as well as funding to help
00:17:07 rebuild the NASA facilities in Guam and at the Armstrong Flight Research Center. Congress has
00:17:13 not passed a supplemental appropriation package yet to date. Is the funding for the Guam hurricane
00:17:18 package included in NASA's FY25 budget request? No, sir. It is, just like the Department of
00:17:27 Defense. That request for the Guam dishes is a request in an emergency supplemental,
00:17:36 because that was as a result of a typhoon. Our request is $400 million, of which we have been
00:17:45 cutting and pasting and chewing gum and bailing wire as an interim solution. Our request pales
00:17:56 by comparison to DOD. DOD is something like $2 billion request. Ours, $400 million.
00:18:04 But also in that request is the request for the funding for the deorbit vehicle.
00:18:11 Why is it an emergency, and it should not be in the regular request for appropriations?
00:18:21 Because we do not know what Vladimir Putin is going to do.
00:18:29 We built the International Space Station with the Russians. We operated with the Russians.
00:18:35 We have had no hiccup whatsoever with the Russian cosmonauts, nor Moscow
00:18:42 mission control and Houston mission control, of which we have both Russians and Americans in both.
00:18:52 We do an integrated crew on the Soyuz. There's an American astronaut on the Dragon.
00:19:00 There is a Russian cosmonaut. But we don't know what the President of Russia is going to do,
00:19:09 and we could be in an emergency situation that we have to get this structure that is as big
00:19:16 as a football stadium down and down safely in 2031. And that's why I'm making the request and
00:19:26 I'm pleading to you all in the Appropriations Committee to put that in the emergency supplemental
00:19:32 bill that will be coming up later. How much money are we talking about,
00:19:36 Mr. Administrator, for the deorbit vehicle? For fiscal year '24, $180 million.
00:19:44 For the total cost over six years, it's going to be a billion and a half.
00:19:50 Okay. My time has expired, and I'll turn to the ranking member for her questions for five minutes.
00:19:55 Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Administrator. You have to make some tough
00:20:01 decisions given the budget, and I don't envy you for that. It was interesting to hear about the
00:20:09 Mars sample return decision, and I understand it better now that you've given us your testimony.
00:20:15 But are we really starting over with a clean slate on this, or what's the need for additional
00:20:24 technical analysis? I mean, where are we on this? We are not starting over. As a matter of fact,
00:20:34 I'm just saying we can't do it at $11 million. I'm not disagreeing with that.
00:20:39 And a sample not even a return until 2040. So let me give you an example of what the director of
00:20:48 the Jet Propulsion Laboratory said. They're looking at, instead of this huge Mars lander
00:20:56 that would then have an ascent vehicle, which was the original concept and was one thing of many
00:21:05 that was running the cost way up, use existing legacy proven techniques and hardware, such as
00:21:15 the Sky Crane that landed two landers, rovers, the size of a truck. We've got Perseverance up there
00:21:26 now running around, digging. These samples are about the size of a cigar sealed in titanium tubes.
00:21:35 We want to get most of those back. So come up with new concepts, bring new ideas in this particular
00:21:45 case. It was using a particular legacy. But we want all those ideas to come forth.
00:21:52 And then sometime this fall, when they're in on their deadline, we will evaluate them.
00:21:59 And at that point, make a decision going forward. And hopefully, it's going to be
00:22:05 much more in what is in line with what the independent review board said. And we've had
00:22:13 about three of those. And that was that the cost should not exceed somewhere in the $6 billion range.
00:22:23 Let me go to another topic. In the NASA Authorization Act of 2022,
00:22:31 an act as part of Chips and Science, we extended the enhanced use leasing authority for 10 years.
00:22:40 For those not familiar with it, that allows NASA to lease underutilized, non-excess property
00:22:47 owned by the federal government and under NASA's jurisdiction to private sector entities,
00:22:52 state and local governments, academic institutions, other federal agencies.
00:22:56 I know in terms of aims, this has been very successful. We've got UC Berkeley about to open.
00:23:02 We've had Carnegie Mellon there. We've had various other entities, USGS that has come in.
00:23:09 There's a synergy that has been created. How has this worked around the United States,
00:23:15 not just at Ames? And Google.
00:23:18 And Google, yeah. It's another major...
00:23:20 Yeah, they're maintaining the field. Yes, ma'am.
00:23:23 Well, it wasn't too long ago that I was sitting down up here on Capitol Hill begging to get
00:23:33 enhanced use authority instead of doing this piecemeal one year at a time to get it
00:23:40 for a number of years in the future in order to do just exactly what you have just outlined at Ames.
00:23:48 And so another one would be, for example, at Stennis. We've got this huge area
00:24:00 because when you test rocket engines, you want to have a buffer so that people are not
00:24:08 disturbed by the sound of the rocket test. So what we've done is we brought in other agencies
00:24:16 of the federal government there, and it becomes a mixed-use space facility. Same thing at the
00:24:25 Kennedy Space Center. The Congressman Posey can tell you, I mean, that place has come alive.
00:24:34 Those old rocket pads that had weeds growing on them have come back to life.
00:24:41 There's a lot of commercial activity there that has allowed, because of, with regard to
00:24:51 NASA's Kennedy Space Center, the mixed use with the enhanced lease use.
00:24:57 Let me just, if I may, Mr. Chairman, make one more comment. The Jet Propulsion Lab in California
00:25:05 recently had to lay off more than 500 skilled, talented employees as part of the pullback on
00:25:12 MSR. And I'm not disputing your decision, I understand it, but it's really tragic to lose
00:25:18 that kind of talent. Do we have a plan to recapture that kind of talent that we've lost, I mean,
00:25:24 decades of experience? That's a tragic situation. Do we have a way to recapture that?
00:25:33 Well, let me try to set the table for you as to why this occurred. Had we had our 24 request
00:25:45 and 25 request, that wouldn't have happened. However,
00:25:51 the Congress, in its wisdom, and I can tell you that if I had been in your seats, I would have
00:26:00 voted for the bill because the alternative was the federal government to go into default,
00:26:09 and the government, full faith and credit of the federal government to be impugned.
00:26:15 And the sacrifices, the trade-offs, or the compromise, if you will, in order to get the
00:26:24 votes to pass that in both houses was to cut the spending in both 24 and 25. NASA was cut
00:26:35 two and a half billion dollars in almost in each of the years 24 and 25.
00:26:44 Science, NASA science, just in 24 was cut a billion dollars. So if I've got a smaller
00:26:56 potato sack that only holds five pounds of potatoes and I've got 10 pounds that I want to get,
00:27:05 it's hard for me to get those 10 pounds in that five-pound sack.
00:27:10 I've gone over, and I appreciate your comments. I think it's really we should look in the mirror,
00:27:15 and I appreciate that. Thank you very much, Mr. Administrator. I yield back.
00:27:20 The gentlelady yields back. The chair recognizes the gentle Florida. Mr. Posey for five minutes.
00:27:25 Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Administrator Nelson. Good to see you back again.
00:27:29 Regarding the deferred maintenance we have on the aging structures, how do we make sure that
00:27:36 we prioritize the infrastructure needs going down the road? And I know it's the same problem
00:27:42 slightly you just talked about. Yes, sir. You can't build infrastructure without some money.
00:27:50 And so where do we cut in the budget? I just gave you one example that we're trying to still
00:27:59 succeed with the Mars sample return at a cost of about one-half of what it was going projected to
00:28:08 be. Infrastructure is one of the biggest problems we have. It is aging infrastructure. It's right
00:28:17 there in your district, but it's in every center and NASA facility in the country.
00:28:24 And what I'm hoping is when you all get through with the cycle of '24 and '25 that come '26,
00:28:34 with all of the fiscal other things that you have to consider that there might be some more
00:28:45 appropriations for NASA to address its facilities needs. Thank you. Can you speak to the importance
00:28:52 of NASA's commercial partners in supporting our space station? Say that again, Congressman.
00:28:58 Can you speak to the importance of NASA's commercial partners supporting our space station?
00:29:03 Oh, absolutely, and they are. Look at all the science with commercial partners that we have
00:29:12 going on, not only the science like pharmaceuticals, but the planetary science that we have going on.
00:29:23 Commercial partners, as we go back to the moon, we don't go back just as the U.S. government. We're
00:29:31 going back with commercial partners, and the example is both SpaceX and Blue Origin are
00:29:38 developing landers. And once we have both, then we'll make a choice between the two.
00:29:45 So commercial parts of NASA happen to go back to the 2010 NASA bill,
00:29:57 of which Kay Bailey Hutchinson of Texas and I had something to do with.
00:30:01 Could you explain how China uses space as a foreign policy tool?
00:30:08 How China does or how all of us do?
00:30:12 How China does.
00:30:12 Well, let me say that when we fly a foreign astronaut, that certainly is a part of a
00:30:23 foreign policy tool. When we do a foreign experiment, when the University of Edinburgh
00:30:33 is a major principal investigator on the James Webb Space Telescope, that's all foreign policy
00:30:40 as well. Likewise, China does, tries, but is not nearly as successful as we are because they're
00:30:51 much more secretive in their space program. Yeah. How do we counter their announcement that
00:30:59 they're going to invite international astronauts to fly in their space station? We've already done
00:31:03 that in many cases, obviously. Been there, done that, but...
00:31:05 Well, we're not going to counter it. We'll see if they do it and to what extent. It's just like
00:31:12 they say that they want to put international contributions into an experimental place on
00:31:22 the South Pole of the moon. Of course, my concern is that they don't get there first and then say,
00:31:30 "This is our area. You stay out," because the South Pole of the moon is an important part,
00:31:36 we think, because we think that there is water there, and if there's water,
00:31:42 then there's rocket fuel. That's one reason we're going to the South Pole of the moon.
00:31:50 Yeah. They're not going there to study the origins of man or collect rocks.
00:31:55 They're going there to colonize, and everything that they do has a military component to it. You
00:32:00 know that. I know that. Great, great concern. I see I'm about to run out of time. Mr. Chairman,
00:32:05 I yield back. Thank you. Gentlemen, time has expired. The chair now recognizes the gentleman
00:32:09 from Oregon, Ms. Bonamici, for five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member.
00:32:13 Thank you for being here, Administrator Nelson. Nice to see you. Welcome back to the committee.
00:32:18 I thank you also for focusing your testimony on the many ways that NASA benefits America,
00:32:24 and one of those examples in your testimony is NASA's climate and earth science research, which
00:32:30 we know is so essential to the health of the planet, really strengthening resilience in our
00:32:35 communities and ecosystems. Those NASA satellites are so critical with giving researchers the data
00:32:42 they need to monitor and forecast extreme weather events, climate events. We know the data also
00:32:49 provides wonderful educational opportunities to inspire the next generation of scientists and
00:32:55 engage them, engage the public. Also, thank you for the new Earth Information Center at your
00:33:01 headquarters here in Washington, D.C., helping with that critical piece of science, improving
00:33:06 science communication. You stated in your testimony that much of what we know about our changing
00:33:12 planet is rooted in NASA's more than 40 years of earth observations, and the suite of satellite
00:33:18 resources supports that earth science mission and the scientific community by providing an access of
00:33:25 variety of measurement data, air quality, emissions, ocean chemistry, surface biology,
00:33:30 just to name a few. And I'm especially excited about the contributions of the recently launched
00:33:35 PACE satellite, Plankton Aerosol Cloud Ocean Ecosystem, PACE satellite, to improve understanding
00:33:42 of ocean health. So NASA's budget for fiscal year 2025 proposes to restructure the earth science
00:33:50 observatory program by breaking missions into smaller elements. So I wonder, how did NASA arrive
00:33:55 at this new strategy, and what effects could this change have on NASA's long-term earth measurements
00:34:01 and climate research? Our strategy is to understand very specifically exactly what is happening to our
00:34:10 earth and its climate. We have about two dozen spacecraft up there now that are bringing us
00:34:21 various pieces of technical information, and we are pulling this together in a composite 3D
00:34:32 understanding precisely what is happening. You mentioned one that was more recently,
00:34:39 the PACE. PACE is able to look at plankton, and we're able to trace it in the ocean like we've
00:34:52 never been. The A in there is aerosols, which clearly has an effect upon our climate.
00:35:01 We had another one, EMET. This is a spacecraft. It was supposed to just look at dust storms and
00:35:12 how that was affecting the climate. Lo and behold, we got a big byproduct from it. It could identify
00:35:21 methane emissions, very specific emissions, so that we could go and try to stop those,
00:35:30 or in the case that it might be an industry, the industry might even not know that it had methane
00:35:36 emissions. We can tell. Mr. Administrator, I want to get another question. I certainly don't
00:35:40 question the value of the program. I just want to watch how the change in the budget
00:35:44 in this new strategy will affect it. So you also talk about the work that NASA is doing to
00:35:49 decarbonize the aviation industry and aeronautics research programs like the Sustainable Flight
00:35:54 National Partnership supports projects to increase aircraft fuel efficiency, for example,
00:35:59 and invest in electrified propulsion research could significantly reduce
00:36:03 aircraft greenhouse gas emissions. So considering numerous delays and cost overruns,
00:36:09 what steps is NASA taking to see these projects through to completion,
00:36:12 and how can Congress support that work that NASA is doing on sustainable aviation?
00:36:17 Well, we have a serious project that we invested upwards of $600-700 million in a joint project with
00:36:26 Boeing on producing a mid-range single-aisle transport aircraft that will reduce fuel
00:36:38 consumption by 30 percent. That project is underway, and that will be substantial. You take,
00:36:46 like the Boeing 737, is the most heavily trafficked commercial airliner. If you can
00:36:53 save 30 percent of fuel by a different design of the wing, a high wing that's long and thin,
00:36:59 and therefore being high can support higher – bigger fan jets, you can get 30 percent
00:37:09 combination between the engine and the wing. That's a substantial effort.
00:37:15 We started on electric aircraft, but that's been overtaken by industry. So you're going to see
00:37:24 a lot of industry coming out with electric-powered aircraft. All of this is to do exactly what the
00:37:35 goal is that you stated very eloquently, and that is – the word is sustainable. I call it save energy
00:37:45 and fly. My time has expired. I yell back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
00:37:48 The gentlelady's time has expired. The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Texas,
00:37:51 Mr. Weber, for five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Administrator.
00:37:54 Good to see you again. I'm constantly amazed by how much you know about even aircraft and stuff
00:37:59 like that. Where do you store all that stuff? Up here, huh?
00:38:02 Well, Congressman, it used to be kind of like a bathtub. You fill the bathtub up,
00:38:09 you drain it out, and there's a residue on the side. You fill it up again, drain it out,
00:38:16 there's a little more residue. So over the number of years, I kind of get an accumulation in here.
00:38:21 I have the sinking feeling you've discussed this before. So let me go to my questions.
00:38:26 Many of the employees at Johnson Space Center live in my district. They're Dr. Babbins,
00:38:32 the actual facilities in Dr. Babbins' district. We're still trying to route Clear Creek around
00:38:36 this so it gets to be in my district. So we've discussed the de-orbiting of the ISS at the end
00:38:41 of the decade, but not so much what that does to the people that are employed backing that up.
00:38:48 So what does NASA plan to do with that workforce that actually currently supports
00:38:52 ISS mission after 2030? Is there a plan? Well, we want to keep them, but a lot of
00:38:58 that depends on what you appropriate. As a matter of fact, the fact that this two years,
00:39:06 '24 and '25, that NASA has been cut between the two years $4.7 billion from our initial request,
00:39:18 that's going to have an effect on some of the contracts at all NASA centers.
00:39:25 And I'm hoping that when you get to '26, that the Congress may see the wisdom of some of these
00:39:34 programs. But let me just assure you, you got a lot of folks at Johnson. You got a lot of really
00:39:40 good folks on good programs. You'll never have to face the situation that I had to face as a senator
00:39:50 for the Kennedy Space Center when we shut down the space shuttle.
00:39:54 They had 15,000 employees and they went immediately down to 7,000 employees.
00:40:01 That's not happening anywhere in NASA now. It's much more manageable, but a lot of it depends
00:40:09 on the wisdom of the Congress in the future. Well, I remember the shuttle program going away,
00:40:13 and I know that that was heavy on people's hearts. And I'm assuming that they're probably
00:40:17 thinking right about now, are we facing a similar demise coming forward? Are you all communicating
00:40:22 this to the employee group? Absolutely. And what we are also doing, since you posited the
00:40:30 question about the de-orbiting of the International Space Station, we want to do that only
00:40:39 when we have commercial space stations in low Earth orbit in order to do the research and the
00:40:47 training and so forth that we need to do in low Earth orbit for our astronauts as they go further
00:40:55 out into the cosmos. We think that by 2031 that the business case will have easily been made for
00:41:05 low Earth orbit commercial space stations. And we have put seed money, significant seed money,
00:41:15 into three commercial operations that are now developing commercial stations.
00:41:22 Well, we appreciate NASA taking the lead on that, so thank you for that. China's, I'm not sure how
00:41:29 to say it, Jinggong Space Station is in orbit, and the CCP would love to whittle down on American
00:41:35 dominance in space wherever they can. Now, your previous comments about commercial are very,
00:41:39 very encouraging. With the coming de-orbit of the ISS, what is NASA's plan to maintain
00:41:45 American competitiveness with China when it comes to presence in low Earth orbit? You said
00:41:50 a little bit about it, but extrapolate, expand on that some. We want to be – we don't want China
00:41:56 to be in the lead. You remember the – you remember Captain Kirk, the final frontier.
00:42:00 Extrapolate, expand on what you mean by that. And by the way, that – not letting them be in
00:42:07 the lead means beyond low Earth orbit also. I agree.
00:42:11 It means also Moon, Mars, and beyond. I agree.
00:42:15 So, for example, we never want to give up this incredible scientific research in LEO.
00:42:25 We are on the cusp of major breakthroughs coming up on pharmaceuticals for disease.
00:42:36 Let me give you an example of two. Number one, Keytruda, and a very effective drug
00:42:44 on certain types of cancer. But the cancer patient has to take it intravenously, frequently,
00:42:54 long periods of time. They have, with that drug, found out how, through protein crystal growth,
00:43:05 on the space station, to make that drug into a shot instead of intravenous so that the patient
00:43:16 can go in, get a quick shot at the doctor. That's one example. Stem cell research being used on a
00:43:25 whole plethora of diseases. What happens when you grow stem cells in zero G, you can grow a lot more
00:43:35 of them. On Earth, when you grow them, they all clump to the bottom and a lot of them die.
00:43:41 In space, they're suspended and they don't die as much. You then freeze them and bring them back,
00:43:50 and that is just in its infancy in research. But there's a lot of promise there.
00:43:56 Well, thank you for that. I'm over my time, but it's fascinating. We appreciate all the help.
00:44:00 Gentleman's time has expired. Chair recognizes the gentlelady from North Carolina. It is Ross
00:44:05 for five minutes. Thank you, Chairman Lucas and Ranking Member Lofgren, for holding this hearing.
00:44:10 And to Administrator Nelson, thank you for the fabulous job you are doing at NASA.
00:44:15 My state of North Carolina has contributed to NASA for decades. It's the home state of James Webb.
00:44:24 And then, of course, Christine Darden, one of NASA's hidden figures who broke barriers in the
00:44:30 stem industry and in gender and racial equality, is from North Carolina. We have three members of
00:44:36 the Science Committee from North Carolina, including my colleague, Congresswoman Foushee.
00:44:42 But Christine was the first African-American woman to be promoted into senior executive service
00:44:48 at NASA's Langley Research Center. And just last week, I got to join Governor Cooper,
00:44:55 a local educator and a third-grade class from the Explorist School in my district to honor
00:45:02 astronaut Christina Koch. And she's a three-time grad of NC State University and, as you know,
00:45:09 the only woman selected to join the Artemis II mission. She was also a participant in an
00:45:16 all-women spacewalk, which we're still celebrating. I want you to know that I will continue to fight
00:45:23 for robust funding for NASA so that we can keep doing the incredible things that you have been
00:45:30 leading and everything that makes groundbreaking research possible. So to that end, I want to
00:45:37 follow up on some of the workforce issues that we've heard about today. So we hear a lot from
00:45:45 the burgeoning commercial space sector, and we know that that benefits the nation, exploration,
00:45:52 our economy, and that's good. But it also means that there's increased competition for trained
00:45:59 aerospace professionals. And I wanted to know from you, to what extent does that increased
00:46:06 competition for science and technical professionals affect NASA and your ability to fill and retain
00:46:13 experienced top-notch people? Congresswoman, you have put your foot, your finger on
00:46:22 the allure of private industry to bring NASA folks into private industry because they can pay them so
00:46:35 much more, is a real concern. However, there seems to be a mysterious pixie dust at NASA
00:46:49 that people enjoy working there. And that's the proofs in the pudding about what some of
00:47:00 these wizards do. Now, certainly, our any success that we might have is due to the commercial sector
00:47:10 as well, because the body that you think of as NASA, which is about 60,000 employees,
00:47:18 is basically about 17,000 civil servants and 45,000 contractors. They all wear the NASA badge,
00:47:31 but they're all part of the NASA family. And it's that combination that we've been able to be
00:47:40 successful. And again, I tell you, everything we do is right on the edge. And when we launch
00:47:47 next Monday night, it's white knuckle time. But that's the business we're in. And these folks
00:47:55 really are rather incredible. I absolutely agree with you. NASA's STEM engagement programs are
00:48:04 also important to building that pipeline and to STEM students and learners of all ages.
00:48:09 And it's important to track the impact and efficiency of our STEM investments. And I'm glad
00:48:16 to see your progress in developing and maximizing the use of STEM Gateway. That's the database that
00:48:24 lets us know what's going on. Could you speak more about the STEM Gateway and NASA's evaluation work
00:48:31 in the Office of STEM Engagement? Yes, ma'am. You've been generous with us in the appropriations
00:48:38 to keep this STEM effort going, reaching out with grants to universities, colleges,
00:48:47 community colleges all over America. We particularly, for example, make an effort to
00:48:57 get into rural colleges and universities so that we're not missing the talent that might be
00:49:05 hidden out there like Christina Cook. Exactly. And so there is a very serious effort there.
00:49:13 We have a huge intern program at NASA that we pay them. We end up hiring 30 percent of our interns.
00:49:24 I wish you could see some of these interns and talk to them. Their eyes are as big as this
00:49:33 with excitement telling what they're working on. STEM is very much a part. And, Mr. Chairman,
00:49:40 let me just say as a part of STEM, what we learned from Apollo when we went to the moon and did all
00:49:47 of that, it so excited two generations of students that they became engineers and scientists and
00:49:59 technicians. And we're going to see the same thing come out of the Artemis program as we go back to
00:50:08 the moon and then to Mars. Thank you. And I yield back. Ladies, time has expired. The chair now
00:50:13 turns to the gentleman, Mr. Babin, for five minutes. Sir, thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr.
00:50:18 Administrator. Good to see you. And I really liked your analogy about the bathtub a while ago.
00:50:26 After a few decades, you know, I guess all of us have a little residue in there. I just need a
00:50:31 little bit more in mine. But thank you so very much. Amen. For what you're doing and your
00:50:39 inspiration. And I say that very, very sincerely, talking about STEM and the excitement and the
00:50:47 inspiration that NASA instills in our youth to go forward to create these wizards. So it's very
00:50:56 exciting. Thank you. I'd like to start by keeping priority programs, talking about this on track and
00:51:05 submitting a FY 25 budget request that largely complies with the Fiscal Responsibility Act that
00:51:13 the president signed in May. And as we work on the FY 25 request, we also have to finalize the FY 24
00:51:20 budget. I'd like to work with you to ensure that NASA remains on track despite the challenging
00:51:27 budget environment that we find ourselves in now. As you work with appropriators to finalize the
00:51:33 24 spending plan, I'd like to call your attention to a few priorities of mine to maintain existing
00:51:40 funding levels within the Space Operations budget. Congress provided you with a great deal of
00:51:45 latitude and we hope that you are able to use this in a way to use this funding appropriated
00:51:52 for Space Operations. And I want to make sure that we're all on the same page. While the final 24
00:51:59 appropriations for NASA Space Operations is 46.7 million below FY 23 levels, the 24 requests
00:52:08 included 180 million for the deorbital vehicle, the USDV for ISS. The original schedule for
00:52:17 awarding a contract for USDV has slipped several times. Under even the current plan to award a
00:52:23 contract this summer, NASA could be challenged to allocate funding for USDV within FY 24 based on
00:52:31 current schedules. And I believe that within this given timeline, NASA could maintain current ISS
00:52:38 operations at 23 rates. It's critical now more than ever to maintain the full functionality of
00:52:46 the International Space Station that Mr. Weber had mentioned in his questioning and support our
00:52:51 current crew and cargo missions because of the amazing things that are going there. I was a
00:52:57 health care professional myself and your story about cancer and creating drugs and things up
00:53:05 in zero G are very, very fascinating. I was pleased to see you mentioned on Capitol Hill
00:53:11 two weeks ago the necessity of keeping the ISS fully operational until we have a follow on CLD.
00:53:19 It's critical that we maintain our presence in LEO for the very reason that he brought up a while
00:53:26 ago, the Qing Gong Chinese craft is up there as we speak. And so Mr. Administrator, I know that
00:53:38 you don't have this information at your fingertips right now, but will you provide us with the
00:53:42 following information as soon as possible so that we can understand the full range of options that
00:53:48 NASA has in implementing the 24 appropriation so that ISS program can continue to return
00:53:55 the great science and advance exploration that's been coming back. Number one, the amount of
00:54:01 funding obligated for the USDV in 24. Number two, an updated schedule for the award of the contract
00:54:10 for USDV. Number three, a list of full time equivalents and work year equivalent personnel
00:54:17 for the ISS program for each fiscal quarter for the last five years. And number four,
00:54:25 workforce costs and contractor rates associated with the ISS program, including contractors over
00:54:32 the last five years. And last, number five, workforce costs and contractor rates planned
00:54:39 for the ISS program over the next five years. Mr. Administrator, I stand ready to work with you.
00:54:45 You're a joy to work with. I've always appreciated you and the great work you've done
00:54:51 in your capacity as our administrator. But we need to ensure that NASA has the necessary workforce
00:54:58 and funding to enable the continued success, amazing success, 22 years of the International
00:55:06 Space Station. Can I count on you to work with me on this? Of course. And I can tell you that
00:55:13 the first question that you ask in the 24 budget, there is $180 million for the starting of a US
00:55:25 deorbit vehicle, which I am begging the Congress in the next emergency appropriations bill,
00:55:35 the one that will address Guam and the typhoon for the Department of Defense as well as NASA.
00:55:43 That you include within that in the argument that I made earlier in the hearing,
00:55:48 that that is an emergency because we don't know what President Putin's going to be doing.
00:55:55 Right. And therefore, we cannot count
00:55:58 that we will have the cooperation all the way through the next six years in order to be able
00:56:06 to deorbit the station safely into – most of it will burn up, but the big chunks that are left,
00:56:16 to put them safely in the graveyard in the Southern Pacific Ocean. And we desperately
00:56:27 request that that $180 million and the rest of the six-year total funding of a billion and a half
00:56:36 for the US deorbit vehicle be put in the emergency supplemental appropriations.
00:56:45 I understand very, very clearly. Thank you, Mr. Minister.
00:56:48 Your time has expired. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Illinois,
00:56:51 Mr. Sorensen, for five minutes.
00:56:53 Good morning. I join the chairman and the ranking member in welcoming Administrator Nelson
00:56:58 back to the committee. Thank you for your leadership of NASA during this important time
00:57:04 and for our nation's space program. As a self-described science nerd, being a meteorologist
00:57:12 and now a member of Congress, I often tell my neighbors back in Illinois how important
00:57:17 science is. I explain to them how investing in science helps grow our economy, create good-paying,
00:57:24 sustainable jobs, and addresses problems our neighbors face every day. And that is why I
00:57:31 champion investing in NASA, one of our nation's leading science agencies, and why the work that
00:57:38 you and folks at NASA do is so important. Just this month, millions of Americans were looking up
00:57:47 through their glasses at an eclipse. It's my hope that the next generation is interested in science
00:57:54 because of what happened. But also, as we look up, we're learning more and more about how solar
00:58:00 storms on the sun bring us not only beautiful displays of the aurora borealis, but recent
00:58:06 events that disrupt technology and infrastructure. Why is NASA proposing to cut so much of the
00:58:13 heliophysics division funding if we have such a need and understanding? Well, we're not, Congressman.
00:58:21 And by the way, as Congressman Babin is still here, I want to thank the two of you for how you get
00:58:28 along. You as ranking and he as chairman in the subcommittee. We wouldn't have had we not
00:58:39 had to cut a billion dollars from science. And that as a result of the compromises that were
00:58:47 made in order to for the country not to go into default on its debt. And I understand that. And
00:58:54 I said I would have voted that way. But it's a hard reality for us. And you have to make
00:59:02 some choices of where you're spending. Now, the truth is, we've got a lot of good stuff going on
00:59:09 in heliophysics. And so we're going to continue. The president proposes, the Congress disposes.
00:59:19 Right. Right. And so, Administrator, if we in Congress are forced to continually cut budgets
00:59:26 year after year, does that mean that there's going to be a growing gap in funding
00:59:32 because the public sector and the private sector move farther away? And so I guess what I'm saying
00:59:37 is, how do we meet the objectives, for instance, of the ISSD orbit and the Artemis missions if we
00:59:44 have a forecast for a growing gap in funding? Well, that's what I have been pleading for that
00:59:51 come '26, when you get out from under the constraints of '24 and '25, that you will
01:00:00 hopefully be a little more generous in making sure that there's not that gap that you described.
01:00:10 What do you think we need to do to make sure – I'm going to go back to the young STEM student for a
01:00:17 moment. When we look forward to what we are going to learn, how do we continue to build the workforce
01:00:24 that we're going to need to meet our objectives? Well, the enthusiasm is certainly there.
01:00:30 We're trying to steer them in a way by having them – and we have a lot of interns.
01:00:40 We send out a lot of grants. We try to distribute that across the board
01:00:48 so that you're finding talent wherever it is and get them enthused.
01:00:55 Another thing we do, we have a secret weapon, and it's called an astronaut in a blue flight suit.
01:01:03 Right.
01:01:04 And we frequently have our astronauts go into classrooms, and I'm telling you,
01:01:11 there's nothing like getting attention and suddenly excitement into the STEM field
01:01:16 when they start talking about space flight.
01:01:20 I always look forward to bringing NASA astronauts in my district, and I hope we can do that again
01:01:24 here soon. My time has expired. I'll yield back, but thank you so much, Administrator.
01:01:29 Thank you.
01:01:30 Thank you. And I'd like to recognize the gentleman from California, Mr. Garcia.
01:01:34 Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Administrator, good to see you again. It feels like it was just last
01:01:38 week, because it was. I've been losing sleep over this Mars sample recovery thing for a couple
01:01:48 months now, and JPL, especially – to use your bathtub metaphor, the brain drain there right now
01:01:55 is real. We are losing critical national security talent and workforce there. I know the plan,
01:02:04 I don't disagree with it. I get the metaphor of, hey, you had a five-pound bag and you got
01:02:08 10 pounds of potatoes that you're trying to fit into that bag, and you had to make trades.
01:02:14 But I would submit that this is no small potato. What I'm afraid of is that when we go to open
01:02:20 that bag up in FY26 after we get healthy back on track and you get responses from the SARA5 that
01:02:26 you're going to be seeing just potentially potato chip crumbs at the bottom.
01:02:33 That used to be JPL. So what I'm worried about is the next four months, five months.
01:02:42 Is there something we can do collectively to keep them whole, to not impart another significant
01:02:51 impact to JPL's workforce? Because I'm hearing it from adjacent domains, missions, agencies, that
01:03:02 those layoffs are affecting not just NASA science, but also DOD, NRO, true national security
01:03:13 implications across the board. We don't need to get into specifics there, but can we work together
01:03:19 to look at potential options to bridge the next four or five months somehow to prevent that bathtub
01:03:26 from being drained to the point where it's irreparable damage? Congressman, I've been
01:03:34 losing sleep over this too. The good news is what I reported earlier, you, I think, were out of the
01:03:43 room. I had a conversation. I was here. I got you. I heard you. I had that conversation yesterday
01:03:50 with the head of JPL. Dr. Leshin feels that they're going to be able to come up
01:03:59 with a retrieval of the Mars sample, enough sample return, and get that cost down by using
01:04:10 new and creative ideas and old legacy ideas that are much less costly.
01:04:20 And so I approach this optimistically and certainly to get a sample back before 2040.
01:04:32 Sure. That's just too long. That's way too long. So is it, I guess, walk me through the next,
01:04:38 from an acquisition timeline and your acquisition strategy on this RFI. You're going to get
01:04:42 responses here in May, June, some ENs, I'm sure, some questions that are going to go back to JPL
01:04:50 and other industry partners. Is there an opportunity to fund before, say, October 1st and start
01:05:01 funding this new approach at some level that is not just necessarily the 330 million that we ended
01:05:08 up landing on? It's somewhere in the fall that we can take the ideas that are generated and then put
01:05:16 that into a contract. Okay. So it may be enough confidence for a vendor, and I'm not trying to
01:05:23 put a finger on the scale on source selection here. I want to be very clear. This is an open
01:05:28 competition. I'm assuming no one has the inside track, and this is not pre-wired for anyone. But
01:05:33 when you get the good ideas back from all of the competitors, you may be able to instill
01:05:41 enough confidence in one of whoever the down-select folks are, one or two, however many
01:05:48 players are, to go ahead and do long lead investments on their own at risk, knowing that
01:05:53 there's a lifeline coming in an FY25 line item that would allow them to go execute this program
01:05:58 with confidence. That's my hope, Congressman. Okay. That's very encouraging. That's, I think,
01:06:04 a very important thing for us all to be aligned on. Congressman, I had to do battle to keep this
01:06:10 thing from being pushed. No, I know you did. You did God's work, and we didn't help you.
01:06:14 I think it's the executive branch as much as the legislative branch, but I think the key
01:06:22 now is to figure out how to make one plus one equal three and to get to a lower price point,
01:06:27 get the samples back before 2040. But more importantly, keep that center of the universe
01:06:35 asset in Pasadena whole, and if not whole, at least sufficiently staffed so they're not
01:06:44 getting below critical mass. So I appreciate everything you've done, Mr. Administrator. Thank
01:06:47 you for continuing to do that, and looking forward to that partnership over the next few months.
01:06:52 Thank you, sir. Appreciate you. You'll bet. Thank you very much. And now I'd like to recognize the
01:06:57 gentlelady from North Carolina, Ms. Foushee. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you,
01:07:02 Administrator Neslin, for being with us here today. The safety of NASA's astronauts is always
01:07:08 top of mind for me and for everyone involved in overseeing our nation's space program.
01:07:15 I know how deeply and personally you care about safety, and I know how vigilant
01:07:21 you are ensuring that NASA maintains a robust safety culture informed by the lessons of
01:07:27 Challenger and Columbia, with which we are all so tragically familiar. But the world of human
01:07:36 spaceflight has changed dramatically for NASA over the past decade. Through the Commercial Crew
01:07:42 Program, the agency now regularly sends its astronauts to the International Space Station
01:07:48 on rockets that are designed, built, and operationally managed by private contractors.
01:07:54 The agency is increasingly looking to use this commercial services model for other human
01:08:01 spaceflight programs as well. As a result, NASA must be capable of conducting rigorous oversight
01:08:08 over the safety cultures of its contractors to prevent the development of blind spots in its
01:08:15 own ability to ensure mission safety. I believe it is critical for the agency to have well-crafted
01:08:22 and targeted oversight procedures that can ensure its contractors are every bit as committed to a
01:08:29 culture of safety as NASA is itself. So my first question is, what tools and procedures does NASA
01:08:38 possess to evaluate contractor safety culture? That is at the top of the list of everything that
01:08:46 we do. We evaluate them. We are all over the design. We are all over the building of whatever
01:08:57 the spacecraft or instruments are. And at the end of the day, NASA, if it is a human spaceflight,
01:09:09 NASA has the veto. Thank you for that. If NASA makes recommendations to a contractor about how
01:09:17 they can improve their safety culture, do you expect the agency to follow up with the contractor
01:09:24 to make sure that the recommendations have been adopted? We do that and we do it all the time.
01:09:30 And finally, do you believe NASA's ability to conduct safety culture oversight of commercial
01:09:37 service providers is impacted by the agency's reliance on those providers for indispensable
01:09:44 mission support? If that means are we letting anything slip, we better not. That's what it
01:09:53 means. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. And may I point out to you, Congresswoman, that one of the
01:10:00 tragic results of inattention was the space shuttle Challenger and the pilot of Challenger was Mike
01:10:12 Smith from North Carolina. Thank you. I yield back, Mr. Chairman. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. And
01:10:20 I'd like to recognize the gentlewoman from Oklahoma, Ms. Bice. Thank you. Five minutes.
01:10:26 Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Administrator. It was great to see you in Oklahoma under a bit of sad
01:10:31 circumstances with the passing of General Thomas Stafford. We celebrated his life a couple of
01:10:36 weeks ago and I was honored to be a part of that. And thank you for recognizing and honoring such
01:10:40 an incredible Oklahoman. Let me start by asking you, I am still fairly new to Congress. This is
01:10:49 my second term. And what I have noticed is that there seems to be a lot of work being done in the
01:10:55 space arena, but we tend to, in some cases, be siloing a lot of that work. How can NASA, the FAA
01:11:02 and the DOD strategically pull resources and expertise to conduct essential research in an
01:11:10 area of fiscal, in an era of fiscal constraints that ensures we'll have continued innovation
01:11:16 crucial for maintaining global leadership in civilian aviation? Well, aviation research
01:11:27 is the first A in NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
01:11:36 So where did the wingtips come from that improve the efficiency of the wing?
01:11:45 Where does the design of the wing? It's often these things that make aviation safer, more efficient.
01:11:57 And earlier in the meeting, I described, for example, the joint project that we have with Boeing
01:12:05 to try to have that single aisle mid-range transport save 30 percent of fuel.
01:12:13 All of this is a major part of what we do. It's not just space. It's not just aeronautics. It's
01:12:23 also climate as well, because we have the instruments that measure the climate.
01:12:31 We're coming into a new era of air mobility, particularly in urban areas.
01:12:38 So the old idea of the Jetsons suddenly flying around, that's right upon us.
01:12:47 And we are researching that. And what we found is that a lot of industry, commercial enterprises,
01:12:58 are having major breakthroughs in that. And so I'm – we're all over aviation,
01:13:06 and that is clearly a very proud part of NASA. You sort of briefly touched on this,
01:13:14 but I think it's worth maybe diving a little deeper into it. As you look at sort of what the
01:13:21 next phase of space looks like, what keeps you up at night? At the end of the day,
01:13:29 defying the forces of gravity with millions of pounds of thrust,
01:13:36 putting human beings up there in a very unforgiving
01:13:40 atmosphere, and bringing them back alive through the fiery heat of reentry.
01:13:51 For the astronauts coming back from the moon, they'll hit 5,000 degrees Fahrenheit. So
01:13:58 that hopefully doesn't keep me up completely all night, but I know that everything that we do
01:14:12 like that, we're right on the edge. But that's the part of discovery. That's the part of adventure.
01:14:20 That's the part of being in a frontier mode, going out there and doing unusual things.
01:14:28 President Kennedy said it best at Rice University in the stadium in September of '62. He said,
01:14:38 "We go to the moon and do other things not because it's easy, but because it's hard."
01:14:46 And what we do is hard, but it's worth doing. Thank you. And I'll just maybe wrap up by
01:14:56 mentioning there's a lot of work being done, I think, by NASA to encourage young people to
01:15:02 consider getting into the sort of aviation space. And I think we need to make sure that we continue
01:15:08 that and focus on it because I have been to some of the facilities. And when you see these young
01:15:15 people walking through, looking at astronaut suits and previous videos, they get such excitement.
01:15:22 And I think we need to continue to foster that because they are the future of NASA. So with that,
01:15:27 Mr. Chairman, I yield. Thank you very much. And I'd like to recognize the gentleman from Illinois,
01:15:34 Mr. Kasten. Thank you, Mr. Acting Chair. And thank you, Mr. Administrator, for being here.
01:15:39 I want to chat a little bit about the TEMPO mission that you've got underway. And
01:15:44 if I understand this right, and correct me if I've got this wrong,
01:15:47 geosynchronous monitoring North America and sort of hourly neighborhood level granularity. Am I
01:15:54 about right on that, of the monitoring capability it's going to have?
01:15:57 Just one second. This is the mission that's monitoring local pollutants in the atmosphere.
01:16:07 Well, it is one of the ones that is doing that. And what we are trying to understand all these
01:16:16 different things that affect our climate, such as dust, such as aerosols,
01:16:27 such as the changing of the elevation of oceans and fresh water. All of these missions are designed
01:16:38 on some particular aspect of then putting it all together in a 3D composite.
01:16:46 Yep. And I'm totally supportive of the mission. I guess my first question is just, is that going to
01:16:55 be the highest temporal and spatial resolution we're going to have on this level of monitoring,
01:17:01 at least from a space-based system? Well, it is the next iteration.
01:17:06 Okay. But we'll get even more sophisticated as we go on.
01:17:11 And will the data that comes out of that be publicly available, or is there any concern
01:17:17 about, I mean, I could think of national security reasons why you might not, we might want to be a
01:17:21 little cautious about a particular plume. I could also imagine reasons why the private sector might
01:17:25 be reluctant. So what's going to be the process for that data being made available to the public?
01:17:30 It's available. Okay. In real time as it's released?
01:17:34 Well, there'll be a lag of some seconds as it comes back to Earth.
01:17:42 Okay. That's cool. Is there the potential to do that globally? And I'm thinking about things like
01:17:53 several years ago, there was this concern about hydrofluorocarbon leaks from China that were
01:17:59 violating international treaties. And I would imagine from a national security perspective,
01:18:05 if we had the ability to pinpoint where that leak was coming from at a specific point, it might be
01:18:09 in our national interest, the Chinese might have been reluctant. Is there the potential to make
01:18:14 this global, or does that create some diplomatic problems?
01:18:17 Global.
01:18:18 Global. Okay.
01:18:19 Just like what I mentioned earlier, we have one up there called EMET. It was going to look at
01:18:26 dust coming off of the Sahara. Lo and behold, unexpectedly, it can pinpoint very specifically
01:18:38 methane leaks.
01:18:39 Oh, wow.
01:18:41 And that's global.
01:18:42 So you are going to be monitoring methane from this as well?
01:18:44 Absolutely.
01:18:46 Okay.
01:18:46 It's already happening.
01:18:47 Well, you're reading my mind, and I'm intrigued, and let us know how we can continue to help this.
01:18:54 A part of what I'm thinking about on this is that we are going down the path to have global
01:19:03 methane monitoring, global methane tracking as a climate-forcing compound in the atmosphere.
01:19:08 We know that methane leak rates exceed what is documented, right? If you look at the balance
01:19:16 on natural gas extraction and what's sold, we know there's a gap that's bigger. And it's really hard
01:19:21 to pinpoint exactly who's responsible. To the extent that this has the ability to get granular
01:19:29 and temporal, I would assume that this starts to be something where we can look and say, "Okay,
01:19:33 this specific entity at this time of day was operating in that location, and so we have some
01:19:37 accountability." Will that data then be – I guess, what's the plan to coordinate with other
01:19:43 agencies on the use of this data?
01:19:45 It is available, and it also is very specific. This is what was such a pleasant surprise
01:19:56 about the spacecraft EMET. We can pinpoint methane emissions now so specifically that,
01:20:11 for example, if there's a real polluter, we've got the evidence. But what we find out is that
01:20:19 some industries don't even know that they are emitting methane. And so this is valuable information
01:20:27 for that industry to be able to stop it. And methane, of course, is one of the major
01:20:35 greenhouse gases. And carbon dioxide.
01:20:39 No, it's precisely why I asked the question. We were up in Alaska last year and looking at
01:20:44 permafrost melt and how you figure out where the global balance goes and how you track all that.
01:20:48 Well, it's fascinating. Happy to have you here. Proud to have you here. And look forward to
01:20:53 working with you to make sure that we can continue to expand these programs. Yield back.
01:20:56 All right, sir. Thank you very much. Now I'd like to recognize a gentleman from Georgia,
01:21:03 Dr. McCormick.
01:21:04 Thank you, Mr. Chair. And it's good to see you, Mr. Administrator, Senator, Captain, Astronaut.
01:21:15 There are seldom times where I get to see somebody who has as many titles as I do and
01:21:19 more. And actually, somebody who I'm a little envious of is somebody who's actually done
01:21:24 something I want to do that I haven't been able to do. As a matter of fact, if you have any advice
01:21:28 for a guy who would love to follow your tracks into space someday as a doc and pilot, just let
01:21:34 me know. I'll be happy to meet with you for lunch. We need medical doctors to go to Mars.
01:21:39 I'm sure a lot of my constituents would like to send me there.
01:21:43 I appreciate you being here today in all seriousness. NASA and space exploration
01:21:51 are vital for our national security, economic growth, scientific advancement,
01:21:57 international prestige, and our inspiration as Americans. Just recently, Venturi Astrolab,
01:22:04 Incorporated, a startup founded by a veteran spaceflight robotics engineer, has unveiled
01:22:09 a groundbreaking prototype of a lunar rover, the Flexible Logistics and Exploration Vehicle,
01:22:15 Flex. If NASA integrates Flex into the Artemis program, it will mark the return of passenger
01:22:21 capable rover to the lunar surface since Apollo 17 in 1972. It's this kind of discovery that
01:22:31 inspires the future generations of scientists, engineers, and explorers. It's pretty exciting
01:22:36 to me too. With this being said, NASA has been plagued by the same issues for years,
01:22:42 constant deadline extensions, flawed cost estimating processes, and poor financial
01:22:47 management. Administrator Nelson, in your testimony, you highlighted the great success
01:22:53 of the International Space Station and the milestone of 23 years with continuous human
01:22:57 presence in low orbit Earth. As NASA approaches its 2030 deadline to decommission the International
01:23:05 Space Station and aims to transition to a commercially owned and operated platforms
01:23:10 in the low Earth orbit, do you believe that NASA has an obligation to ensure continued
01:23:15 human presence in the low Earth orbit? Yes. Great. And you know, it's funny, I'm going
01:23:23 to get a little bit off track. We just recently talked about some of the pollutants and how
01:23:27 Earth might be warming. And I agree, there might be climate change. I think the one thing
01:23:34 that worries me is that we get away from science. In a Senate article that was published back in
01:23:39 2007, it talked about the heating of other planets in our solar system. This is back in 2007. It's
01:23:44 continued. Would you say there's more concrete, carbon dioxide, and vehicle emissions in Neptune,
01:23:51 Jupiter, and Mars during this period of time, just like there is in this Earth? I don't know.
01:23:59 I would say probably not, because I don't know of anybody who's building concrete or
01:24:03 or who has vehicle emissions in those planets that are also heating. I would say that's pretty
01:24:08 much factual unless we know, unless you know some life that you haven't told us about so far.
01:24:12 Well, what I do know is that we are seeing the heating up of the Earth and our instruments have
01:24:20 indicated that. And we've seen... Wouldn't discount that at all, sir. And I'm just saying
01:24:24 that it's happened to other planets in the solar system, too. They don't have the same challenges
01:24:28 we do. Now, I want to be scientific. You and I are scientists by nature. We love facts. We love to
01:24:35 talk about things that matter, things that we can change. But I also don't want to waste time and
01:24:40 money on things we cannot change. Back in the 70s, we're talking about global cooling during some of
01:24:44 the highest carbon dioxide emissions of all time. And we've seen decreases in certain pollutants
01:24:51 while the Earth is heating. So I just want to have a scientific conversation with you and I
01:24:57 about what's really causing the heating and can we affect it or do we need to put our money
01:25:01 elsewhere to help us adjust for those while the Earth continues its natural cycle. Because I am
01:25:07 a scientist. I do understand how much carbon dioxide and how much the United States produces
01:25:13 as a global percentage of that carbon dioxide. Would you agree that it could be due to something
01:25:18 other than methane and carbon dioxide that's causing the Earth to heat? Well, there are
01:25:24 multiple. There you go. Yes, sir. And that's what I agree with you 100 percent as a scientist,
01:25:29 multiple factors, some which we can and some which we cannot affect. I just want to see our money go
01:25:34 to the right place. I know I'm almost out of time. I'm going to ask you one more question.
01:25:39 Commercial and international patterns are key to the success of the Artemis campaign. The
01:25:44 Commercial Lunar Payloads Service, the CLPS program housed within the Science Mission Directorate,
01:25:50 has resulted in the first ever landing on the moon by a commercial entity and the first U.S.
01:25:54 landing in over 50 years. Are there opportunities beyond the Commercial Lunar Payload Service where
01:25:59 the Artemis Campaign and Science Mission Directorate have mutual interests in the
01:26:03 development of commercial capabilities? When we are going back to the moon as a result of,
01:26:11 I take it back to the 2010 NASA authorization bill, we said we're going to do it
01:26:19 in a different way. We're going back with commercial partners.
01:26:23 The CLPS program that you just mentioned, interestingly, is like we are sending scouts
01:26:30 into the wilderness ahead of time on the South Pole to scout out for us before we get our
01:26:37 astronauts there on the surface so that we've got a better idea. One of the things that we're
01:26:44 clearly looking for is water. We've got a couple of instruments that are going this year on CLPS
01:26:53 missions, one called Intuitive Machines, that is actually going to be digging on the South Pole
01:27:01 to see if there's water content. We know there's water there because we've seen the ice in the
01:27:07 crevices of the constantly shattered rocks. But this is all a part of making the space program
01:27:16 something larger than just as we went to the moon before. And we're going to the moon, by the way,
01:27:24 not just to go to the moon. We're going to the moon to learn how then we can go all the way to
01:27:30 Mars and beyond. Thank you, sir. I'm without time,
01:27:35 so I yield. Thank you. Now I'd like to recognize a gentlewoman from
01:27:42 Virginia, Ms. McClellan. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Director,
01:27:48 Senator Nelson. I actually am going to start with a question from my 13-year-old son,
01:27:54 who wants to be an astronomer, who is a big fan of the great observatories he looks at,
01:28:00 uses images from Hubble, Spitzer, and even the now-deorbited Compton telescopes. But he wants
01:28:12 me to ask you specifically about Chandra, the X-ray telescope that under the current budget
01:28:21 proposal looks like could be ending. And he's very concerned, as I know a number of astronomers are,
01:28:29 that this could leave a blind spot in the collection of X-ray information in the future.
01:28:37 So can you assure my 13-year-old son, Jackson, that NASA is still committed to
01:28:44 X-ray images in space and the data that you collect in that way?
01:28:49 Earlier, I had talked about how the compromises that you all had to make,
01:28:55 which are certainly understandable, caused '24 and '25 to have less money.
01:29:02 In science, just in '24, it's a billion-dollar cut. And so you have to make some choices.
01:29:13 Chandra has been phenomenally successful, but we have new missions that are coming on.
01:29:22 We're going to keep it going as much as we can.
01:29:26 You just can't sustain it at the previous funding levels. And so we are having a senior review
01:29:38 during this year to get community impact on alternative operational scenarios for Chandra
01:29:49 and the Hubble Space Telescope as well to move to a more cost-effective way.
01:29:57 I can't spend for NASA money that we don't have.
01:30:02 I understand that. I understand that. And I think that question that I just asked is an example of
01:30:11 how important it is that NASA makes science fun and exciting for kids. Because, again,
01:30:17 the images that he has seen from these telescopes have gotten him more interested and fascinated in
01:30:24 STEM subjects in school than anything else that his father and I could have done.
01:30:30 May I point out that Chandra is 25 years old, and it's having operational issues with regard to
01:30:38 thermal problems. So we're going to keep it going as much as we can, but we have to lessen the
01:30:46 funding. And I understand that. But could you speak to some of NASA's programs that are focused
01:30:53 on our younger students, particularly during the summer, and time they spend out of school so that
01:30:59 we can get more students as passionate about space and science as my son is?
01:31:05 Well, for example, the discoveries that we're having with the James Webb Space Telescope is
01:31:11 just phenomenal. Every day, almost, it seems like there's a new discovery if he's particularly
01:31:19 interested in far reaches of this universe. It's not too long. We're already discovering other
01:31:29 planets with that. The ones that we've found thus far are gaseous. But we've got another mission
01:31:36 coming that your son, as he grows up and stays interested in this, is going to be interesting.
01:31:44 It's called the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, followed by Habitable Worlds Space Telescope in
01:31:51 the 2040s. We're going to be able to find other stony planets that are just the right distance
01:32:01 from a medium-sized star that has carbon and water on them. And lo and behold, that's beginning to be
01:32:15 another planet like planet Earth. I mean, there's so many possibilities out there.
01:32:21 Thank you. And going to more college students, can you talk about how NASA's budget will continue
01:32:27 to support partnerships with HBCUs and increase outreach efforts to students who are currently
01:32:34 underrepresented in the STEM fields? We specifically reach out to HBCUs and other
01:32:41 minority institutions. In the grants that we give out, we make sure that we do that. And an example
01:32:50 I gave early in the hearing is that, for example, we give grants to rural universities and colleges
01:32:58 that otherwise might not -- a student there might not have the opportunity of receiving
01:33:07 a grant like that. So we're trying as hard as we can to distribute it across the country.
01:33:15 Thank you. I yield back.
01:33:18 Thank you very much. And now I'd like to recognize the gentleman from Alabama, Mr. Strong.
01:33:23 Thank you, Chairman Babin, Ranking Member Lofgren, Administrator Nelson. Thank you and
01:33:28 your staff for being here today to discuss NASA's FY25 budget request. I have the privilege of
01:33:34 representing Alabama's 5th Congressional District, home to NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center.
01:33:39 I'd like to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to all the hardworking
01:33:43 civil servants and contractors at Marshall. I would like to also note that I have full faith
01:33:48 and confidence in Marshall's newest director, Joseph Pelfrey. Mr. Administrator, following a
01:33:54 successful uncrewed SLS test flight in late 2022, your agency planned to launch a crewed lunar
01:34:02 flyby mission, Artemis II, in November of '24. Earlier this year, your administration revealed
01:34:08 that because of various hardware issues, the Artemis II mission is now delayed until September
01:34:13 of 2025, nearly one year behind schedule. Mr. Administrator, what specifically led to this
01:34:19 nearly one-year delay, and what impact will this have on future Artemis missions?
01:34:24 Safety. We do not fly until it's ready, and we never will, as long as I'm around.
01:34:34 I've seen seven of my friends suddenly be killed in the Challenger disaster that was
01:34:45 10 days after the flight that I was on. We're sending a whole new spacecraft and a whole new
01:34:54 rocket to the moon. We're going to make sure that that heat shield is functioning as it should be,
01:35:04 because they are coming in hot and fast. They're coming in at Mach 32, and it's 5,000 degrees.
01:35:13 This new spacecraft, Orion, is a very complicated
01:35:20 machine, and we're just simply not going to fly it until it's ready.
01:35:26 Thank you. Thank you. Delays always lead to need for more money, and in a fiscally
01:35:32 constrained environment, that concerns me. As the leader of NASA, what actions have you
01:35:37 taken to ensure that Artemis III mission and future Artemis missions stay on schedule?
01:35:42 Well, again, we're not going to fly them until they're ready, but in this case,
01:35:48 Artemis III is the first landing on the moon. We have contracted with SpaceX for September
01:35:58 of '26. That's the contractual date. But if they're not ready, obviously, we're not going to fly.
01:36:06 Okay. Marshall is home to the best propulsion experts in the nation.
01:36:11 Marshall has also proven successful in manufacturing projects, such as the rapid
01:36:17 analysis and manufacturing propulsion technology. How is NASA leveraging additive manufacturing to
01:36:23 best optimize technology for future moon to Mars missions and deep space exploration?
01:36:29 Marshall has a brilliant future in nuclear thermal propulsion and nuclear electric propulsion.
01:36:38 And I think it's going to take that to get us to Mars, because right now, it'd take us
01:36:45 seven or eight months with conventional chemical propulsion. Once you got there,
01:36:52 you'd have to stay on the surface a year or two until the planets realigned so that you could
01:36:58 get back in seven or eight months. I totally agree. I think that's the only way we can get there.
01:37:03 I think we got to go faster. Absolutely. Marshall has partnered
01:37:06 with Auburn University's National Center for Additive Manufacturing Excellence to improve the
01:37:12 performance of liquid rocket engines. Liquid rocket engines serve as the core stage for NASA's
01:37:18 space launch system, also managed at Marshall. How can advancements in additive manufacturing
01:37:24 and liquid rocket engine performance be leveraged by NASA to mitigate Artemis mission delays?
01:37:31 We're doing that all the time. All of those new discoveries, we improve as we go. That's
01:37:40 the whole point of the development of the space program.
01:37:44 The President's budget request proposed funding the space operations account below the level
01:37:50 required for full operational maintenance of the International Space Station and the
01:37:54 crew and cargo program, as well as future commercial low-Earth orbit destinations.
01:38:00 What strategies is NASA exploring to ensure operational flexibility within the outlined
01:38:06 budget while maintaining its commitment to transitioning from the International Space
01:38:12 Station to commercial low-Earth orbit platforms by 2030 and integrating commercial services
01:38:18 without interruption? Are you asking specifically about the end
01:38:24 of the International Space Station? Yes, sir.
01:38:26 Okay. That's 2031. We want to keep it going for the next six years. Why? Because look at all the
01:38:37 science that's on it, but we want to replace it with commercial stations so that all the science,
01:38:45 the training, all the things that we do in low-Earth orbit can be done on a commercial station,
01:38:53 which at the same time has a business model that they can make money on a commercial
01:38:59 station, bringing business off the face of the Earth up to LEO.
01:39:06 Now, we have put some serious incentive money into three commercial companies
01:39:15 to build a commercial space station, and that is the intent. By 2031, when we would deorbit
01:39:26 the space station, that there would be the commercial stations ready to go.
01:39:33 Thank you, Mr. Administrator. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
01:39:35 Yes, sir. The gentleman's time has expired. We're down to just a few minutes to go vote.
01:39:40 If it's okay with you, Mr. Administrator, we will reconvene as soon as we get through the last vote.
01:39:46 How many votes do you have, Mr. Chairman? Seven.
01:39:50 Oh, my. Yeah.
01:39:51 But they're two-minute votes. Okay.
01:39:55 Two-minute votes. Is that okay? Yes, sir.
01:39:58 Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you very much.
01:40:00 If you make two-minute votes, you've done a miracle more than I've ever seen.
01:40:05 Well, we're going to try. And now I've got to run down there in two minutes, too. Okay. Thank you.
01:40:10 Thanks.
01:40:11 Team committee, thank you for indulging us while we had to cast nine votes, Mr. Administrator.
01:40:18 So, thank you. It was good to see you on the floor, too. I hope that brought back good old memories.
01:40:24 Okay. Well, we're going to resume our five minutes of questioning by our members.
01:40:33 And let's see. Mr. Tonko, a gentleman from New York, you're first for five minutes of questioning.
01:40:40 Well, thank you so much. Yes, sir.
01:40:42 I thank the chair and the ranking member for this important hearing today.
01:40:45 And thank you to Administrator Nelson for the work you do to ensure the success of the world's
01:40:51 preeminent civil space agency and your awesome leadership that you provide.
01:40:55 Up in my district, New York's capital region, I'm deeply proud of the critical research
01:41:01 and tech development being done at world-class academic institutions,
01:41:05 such as Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. I'm particularly thinking about the R&D there that
01:41:10 relies on funding from the Biological and Physical Science Division within NASA's
01:41:15 Science Mission Directorate. The BPS Division funding provides novel opportunities to better
01:41:22 understand the impact of the space environment on both life and physical sciences. Discoveries
01:41:28 made on the International Space Station with BPS funding have advanced our understanding of quantum
01:41:34 mechanics and helped facilitate the advancement of semiconductor-based electronics. The BPS has
01:41:41 also enabled advances in immunotherapy, regenerative medicine, osteoporosis treatments,
01:41:48 and neurodegenerative diseases. Despite how important this research is, the BPS budget
01:41:54 within the Science Mission Directorate remains severely underfunded and was acknowledged as
01:41:58 such in the recent Decadal Survey. In February, or excuse me, in fiscal year '23, NBPS budget was
01:42:06 84 percent less than it was in 2004. And as a result, the number of investigators in the state
01:42:12 of New York has decreased by some 67 percent, causing significant reductions in education and
01:42:19 training and negatively impacting the local economy. Specifically, at Rensselaer Polytechnic
01:42:24 Institute, the BPS Division currently funds approximately four PIs and over 25 graduate
01:42:31 and undergraduate students. However, just a few years ago, that number was closer to seven PIs.
01:42:37 Without significant reinvestment, labs funded by BPS will no longer be sustainable as the number
01:42:42 of grants awarded is reduced and be forced to change research directions, threatening the
01:42:48 success of NASA's exploration goals. So, Administrator Nelson, how is NASA attempting
01:42:54 to be responsive to the ambitions of reinvestment from the biological and physical sciences community
01:43:00 Decadal Survey in this constrained budget environment?
01:43:04 Congressman, when John Glenn first flew, we weren't sure what was going to happen to the
01:43:13 physical body. There was even concern that would the eyeballs stay in the sockets. We had flown a
01:43:21 chimpanzee prior, but you just think when you don't know what's going to be the physical, biological
01:43:30 reaction and how far we now have advanced where we are realistically getting ready to go back to the
01:43:41 moon in order to prepare to go to Mars. And so, the function of the amount of grants that would go
01:43:54 to a university such as the very eminent one that you just mentioned in your district
01:44:00 is a function of the amount of the budget that you give us.
01:44:07 Just in sciences in this fiscal year '24, because of the constraints that are upon you in '24 and
01:44:19 '25 as a result of the compromise reach to be able to avoid the default of the full faith and credit
01:44:29 of the United States government. For example, just in science, it's a billion-dollar cut in '24.
01:44:38 A similar cut in '25. Once you get to '26 and don't have the constriction that you have on the
01:44:48 budget, I wish that you would because the area that you have specified are areas that we have
01:44:57 to know what's going to happen in order to send humans all the way to Mars. The moon is four days
01:45:06 away. Mars is seven to eight months away, unless we develop the new technologies such as propulsion
01:45:19 of nuclear, thermal, nuclear, electric propulsion that could get us there faster. If we go
01:45:27 conventionally six, seven, eight months, then we're going to have to stay on the surface a very long
01:45:34 time until the planets realign to get back in seven or eight months. So these are all the part
01:45:41 of the challenges, but they're also exciting problems to solve. And we will keep those grants
01:45:50 going to universities because that is a main source of the research that we do at NASA.
01:45:58 Thank you, sir. Mr. Chair, I have another question that I was going to ask about. I'm out of time
01:46:04 so I will forward that to the committee, but it's my hope that through this budget process,
01:46:08 Congress will recognize the crucial importance of this research to help BPS and NASA fully
01:46:14 realize its mission. And with that, I yield back. Thank you very much. I'd like to now recognize
01:46:21 the gentleman from Ohio, Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Appreciate it. It's good to see you
01:46:27 again, Administrator. It's good to see you in Northeast Ohio just a couple of weeks ago for
01:46:32 the eclipse. And I really appreciate you coming out to Cleveland and spending the afternoon with
01:46:35 us. It really means a lot and to have you there is very special. While you were out there, we had
01:46:39 some great conversations, including about the importance of NASA Glenn Research Center, which
01:46:44 is located right in my district into NASA's mission. Administrator Nelson, NASA's Space
01:46:49 Technology Mission Directorate funds a lot of significant priorities for NASA, many of which
01:46:54 the Glenn Research Center is involved in. However, funding for STMD has been relatively stagnant over
01:47:00 the last five years. The fiscal year 25 budget request proposes ramping up funding for STMD,
01:47:06 in large part to support the development of fission surface power technology to create a
01:47:10 nuclear power system that could operate on the moon. Administrator Nelson, can you please talk
01:47:15 about the importance of fission surface power and why we need to invest in it now and not just
01:47:20 further down the line? And could you please address the importance of Glenn's role within
01:47:24 the project? Yes, Congressman, and it was great seeing you in Cleveland. And before I forget,
01:47:32 for Congressman Tonko, our commander going to the moon, Reid Weissman,
01:47:39 on Artemis II, he is a graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic. So, Congressman,
01:47:52 we got to have more power on the moon. We go to Mars, we got to have more power,
01:47:58 particularly as you get further away from the sun and you can't rely on all solar power. And so,
01:48:05 fission surface power is going to be a necessary element. And we're going to start this with
01:48:17 the moon. So this is part of the reason we go back to the moon in order to go to Mars.
01:48:25 The 25 requests is 113 million. Now, do you want me to get into nuclear electric and nuclear thermal
01:48:36 as well, or do you want to keep it to fission surface power? I'd like to keep it to fission,
01:48:40 just because mainly that's what's up there we're working on. Okay. Well, I certainly
01:48:47 would respectfully request that you all grant our 25 requests of 113 million.
01:48:55 Yeah. Okay. We'll take a look at it. I understand. And I get it. As you would have already
01:49:00 acknowledged that it's been a tough year working with the budget. And the last thing that we want
01:49:04 to do is to cut down anyone, but we have to make sure that we're being responsibly and efficient
01:49:08 for the country. But yes, Administrator, I'm with you a thousand percent. And thank you for your
01:49:12 earlier answer. Additionally, as you know, NASA Glenn Research Center leads the communication
01:49:17 services project, which leverages commercial capabilities to provide next generation data
01:49:22 relay for NASA satellites and to ensure that there's no data gap as NASA's older communication
01:49:26 satellites continue to age. Can you speak to the importance of the work performed at Glenn?
01:49:31 And do we have your commitment possibly that you will provide the resources to the center
01:49:35 that needs to complete this project quickly? You can't fly in deep space unless you can
01:49:41 communicate. Our deep space communication system ran into a problem because we need to communicate
01:49:53 with all of those science instruments, including the James Webb Space Telescope, bringing back all
01:50:01 of that data from deep in space. And lo and behold, we had to have the capability of communicating
01:50:11 to Artemis 1 in the test flight of the rocket. And we didn't have all of the bandwidth that we wanted.
01:50:20 So we need to improve that. And this is especially essential as we are going further and further
01:50:28 out into space. Right now in low Earth orbit, we got enough communications. We can handle that. We
01:50:37 need to update it, modernize it, et cetera. But deep space is a different thing.
01:50:43 Well, if there's anything that we can do to work with you, especially at NASA Glenn,
01:50:47 getting them the resources or just getting the education or familiarizing us with how we can
01:50:51 make it more efficient or to get to the next step, I would really appreciate it. And what makes me
01:50:55 just really glad to hear is your acknowledgement of how important NASA Glenn is not only to our
01:51:01 region, but to the country and more so the world and the capabilities that we have there. And I
01:51:05 just once again want to thank you for your time. It's been truly a pleasure to work with all of you
01:51:09 and your staff. And so just thank you again. And anything we can do in the future to work together
01:51:14 to make sure we can continue to evolve and progress in the right way, you have a friend in me. So
01:51:18 thank you, Administrator. I yield back. Congressman, thank you. And Mr. Chairman,
01:51:22 if I may, another example of the deep space communications that we just reestablished with
01:51:30 Voyager 1, which is outside of our solar system, approaching interstellar space,
01:51:37 and it came back to life. And lo and behold, we got it. And where it's located so far away
01:51:47 at the speed of light, the transmission takes 22 hours. And we just reestablished that.
01:51:56 What, if you don't mind my asking, Mr. Administrator, what caused that to come back
01:52:00 into force? Again, these wizards, they do all kinds of things. And this is a spacecraft,
01:52:07 it's a very old spacecraft, Voyager 1. I think it was launched back in the 70s.
01:52:13 And so it is still perking. Wow. Okay. Thank you. That's great information to know.
01:52:22 The gentleman from Florida, Mr. Frost, five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And good
01:52:29 afternoon, Administrator Nelson. With the goals of returning Americans to the moon and aiming for
01:52:34 Mars, the Artemis program has private partners in all 50 states and over two dozen in Florida's
01:52:40 10th congressional district, which is my district. Artemis is a significant contributor to NASA's
01:52:45 $4.7 billion economic impact on central Florida alone, and has partnered with the University of
01:52:52 Central Florida, Go Knights, on several research projects to support lunar landing and living.
01:52:57 This is why my colleague, Congressman Posey, and I are leading a bipartisan letter to the CJS
01:53:02 Appropriations Subcommittee calling for additional Artemis funding to overcome delays and technical
01:53:07 complications. Mr. Administrator, with all the challenges of such a complex and cutting edge
01:53:12 program, what can NASA do to minimize further delays in the Artemis mission cadence?
01:53:16 Well, first of all, we can have congressmen like you that help us make an additional request.
01:53:25 Understand that we're not going to launch until it's ready. And that is because safety is our
01:53:36 first – when we put humans on an explosive bomb called a rocket, we're going to do everything
01:53:46 possible to make sure it's as safe as possible, realizing that everything is cutting the edge of
01:53:56 the envelope that we do. But especially when humans are in the loop, we're going to make it
01:54:04 that much more safe. So we're on schedule next year to have four astronauts circle the moon and
01:54:16 check out the Artemis spacecraft. We are under contract with SpaceX for September of '26
01:54:26 to have a lander of which we would go into lunar orbit, and they would transfer in and go down
01:54:34 to the surface for six days. Obviously, if that lander's not ready, we're not going to fly at that
01:54:43 time. But that is the schedule and that's what the contract calls for.
01:54:49 Thank you. And the most recent success in the partnership of NASA and private space industry
01:54:55 was a soft landing on the moon's south pole as part of the Commercial Lunar Payload
01:55:00 Services Program. How does the work of the Commercial Lunar Payload Services Program
01:55:05 complement the work of the Artemis Program?
01:55:08 They are scouts for us, just like sending scouts out into the wilderness.
01:55:13 So, for example, one of them that is going on intuitive machines at the end of the year
01:55:21 is going to start digging in the south pole to see if there is water underneath the surface.
01:55:29 If there's water and it's in enough abundance, then we have rocket fuel.
01:55:33 And overall, what can we as members of Congress do to support the nationwide economic and
01:55:41 scientific impact of NASA's work, especially when it comes to the Artemis Program? We know
01:55:45 that I think any day now China will be sending, will do the first mission to bring back things
01:55:52 from the far side of the moon. We know this is funding these programs in the best interest of
01:55:58 our national security and the work that we do. But what can we as members of Congress do?
01:56:02 There's the old saying, "The President proposes and the Congress disposes."
01:56:09 You're our partner. You make it possible for authorizing us to do this stuff
01:56:19 and then appropriating the means by which to do it.
01:56:24 And lastly, can you briefly describe some of the scientific highlights of the commercial missions
01:56:31 in terms of the Commercial Lunar Payload Services Program?
01:56:33 Oh, yes, sir. For example, this last one, it was an intuitive machine.
01:56:44 It caught its leg on a rock as it was coming down and it tipped over.
01:56:53 The fact that it tipped over, it didn't have its antenna pointing in the right direction to receive.
01:56:59 But it was still faint enough that we could get enough to know that it was alive.
01:57:07 There were six NASA experiments on board. Now, this is an incredible story of the chairman of
01:57:15 the full committee, Hal Rogers, in his district as a University of Morgan State.
01:57:21 They have big dishes that can support the commercial program. But in this case, the CLPS,
01:57:32 the CLPS wasn't able to communicate. They didn't have enough power
01:57:43 from their commercial communications. But Morgan State was uniquely positioned that it could also
01:57:53 communicate with our government deep space communications that had the power in order to
01:58:01 receive that weak signal. And therefore, most of the objectives of the mission were successful
01:58:10 with a connection there made through Morgan State.
01:58:13 That is an example of a daring do that suddenly the NASA scientists and the commercial community
01:58:24 and a university were able to figure out real time.
01:58:28 Well, thank you so much for your time, Mr. Administrator, and I yield back.
01:58:32 Thank you very much. And I'd like to recognize the gentleman from New York, Mr. Williams.
01:58:38 Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Administrator, great to see you again. And sure, being on Capitol Hill
01:58:45 and testifying in these committees is among your favorite things to do. So we have a hometown hero
01:58:52 that is in orbit right now on the International Space Station. Dr. Jeanette Epps is beloved
01:59:01 by her hometown of Syracuse and really has inspired a whole generation of young kids in school. And
01:59:10 she is the talk of the town and the toast of the town. She's only been up there now for almost two
01:59:15 months. Can you give us some insight in the importance of her work and in her mission
01:59:21 while she's up in space? Jeanette is an example of
01:59:31 the extraordinary ability of our astronauts, their capability. In her case, she had to wait a long
01:59:39 time to fly. And yet she is there on orbit for six months performing great science and maintenance of
01:59:53 the International Space Station. Sometimes our astronauts have a great disappointment.
02:00:01 The best example that I can think of is Deke Slayton. He was one of the original seven.
02:00:09 John Glenn, Alan Shepard, et cetera. Deke was one of them. And they discovered a heart murmur.
02:00:19 And Deke was not qualified to fly. And yet Deke then took the role as the chief of the
02:00:27 astronaut office through all of those years of Gemini and Apollo. For Dr. Epps, if I may,
02:00:35 can you talk about how her mission is helping us get back to the moon specifically?
02:00:42 Well, everything that we do on low Earth orbit is in preparation for us to have the understanding
02:00:49 and the preparation so that we can go further. And that's what we're starting to do,
02:00:56 to go back to the moon, not just for the sake of going to the moon, because we did that a half
02:01:02 century ago. But we're going back to the moon to learn in order to go to Mars, just like
02:01:11 we are doing things in low Earth orbit on the International Space Station to go further.
02:01:17 In addition, we're doing serious science on board the International Space Station.
02:01:25 Earlier in the committee hearing, I had testified about things going on on cancer research
02:01:32 with the drug Keytruda and with stem cell research. All of that's going on. And although
02:01:40 I don't know Jeanette's specific science project that she's working on today,
02:01:47 she will be working on a lot of that science. Well, we look forward to having her back,
02:01:53 but not too soon. She's got a lot of work to do while she's there. I'd like to spend the last
02:01:57 little bit of our time talking about the Draco project and the cooperation between NASA and DARPA
02:02:06 with nuclear energy and propulsion. Are we still on track for a 2026
02:02:11 test launch? How is the Draco project progressing? Draco is a primarily a DARPA project.
02:02:22 We are working with them on nuclear thermal. It's a joint NASA DARPA project. Yes,
02:02:32 it's my understanding that it is on schedule. It is testing out nuclear thermal propulsion.
02:02:43 That's not the only nuclear propulsion. There's also nuclear electric propulsion,
02:02:51 and I hope to get this cranked up and going. Why? Because we need to go faster to Mars.
02:03:00 Chemical propulsion will get us there in seven or eight months.
02:03:04 Nuclear thermal, nuclear electric can get us there faster. The reason that's important, if we can go
02:03:12 fast, we don't have to stay on the surface for, on the first time, second time, a year or two
02:03:22 until the planets realign, we'd have a chance of getting back so that we go for a short visit,
02:03:28 test out what we needed to with all the systems, the equipment, the spacecraft, the landers, etc.,
02:03:35 and get back. I think nuclear thermal and nuclear electric is the propulsion of the future.
02:03:44 Great. Well, if we get nuclear propulsion, sign me up. I'd be happy to go. Thanks very much. I
02:03:48 yield back, Mr. Chairman. I want to say also, Congressman, that the end of the story about
02:03:53 Dick Slayton is he ended up flying. He did an experimental medical procedure, and it worked
02:04:01 on the heart murmur, and he was able to fly years later, and that was a good thing. But just think
02:04:14 of all the time he had to wait. It was a very good thing. Sure was. Okay, the gentleman from
02:04:21 California, Mr. Mullen, five minutes. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Administrator
02:04:26 Nelson, for your testimony today. As you know, the International Space Station is authorized to
02:04:32 operate through at least 2030, after which time NASA plans to use commercially developed space
02:04:39 stations to support its low-Earth orbit research and development. We're nearly halfway through 2024,
02:04:45 leaving just five and a half years to ensure that commercial stations are ready and certified for
02:04:50 NASA's use. I'm particularly concerned about the risk of losing access to low-Earth orbit for
02:04:55 research. There are so many important discoveries and innovations that have been developed thanks
02:04:59 to NASA providing this platform to do it in space. So could you just share with the committee what
02:05:06 the risk might be of a gap in sustaining how low-Earth orbit R&D activities should commercial
02:05:13 space stations not be ready, and then how might a gap affect our preparedness for Artemis and
02:05:20 the development of low-Earth orbit ecosystem in general? Congressman, we don't intend there to
02:05:26 be a gap for the reasons that you just articulated. It is so important that we keep this continued
02:05:34 presence of being able to not only research on fantastic things like pharmaceutical discoveries
02:05:44 that benefit us here on the face of the Earth, but also in preparation for going further to the Moon
02:05:55 and to Mars. For example, we would be training our astronauts in zero-G in low-Earth orbit on a
02:06:05 space station before we would send them to the Moon or to Mars. And so those are just a couple
02:06:15 of examples of why it's important. And we do not intend for there to be a gap, and thus it's all
02:06:23 the more reason that as you all give us direction in the authorization bills and as you partner with
02:06:36 your appropriations committees in giving us the financial means in which to do this, that we
02:06:43 continue to have the development of this commercial space stations that will take the place of when we
02:06:52 want to de-orbit the space station because it's getting old and we want to de-orbit it in 2031.
02:07:02 Thank you for that. I appreciate your optimism. And thank you for your testimony,
02:07:08 sir. With that, I yield back. I now recognize Ms. Lee for five minutes.
02:07:13 Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Last year, I had the pleasure of meeting with Deputy Administrator
02:07:21 Pam Melroy and was really taken by her passion for expanding opportunities in space exploration
02:07:29 and STEM. When I chose to serve as a member of the Space Science and Technology Committee,
02:07:33 I envisioned opportunities to work with my colleagues to expand the realm of STEM education
02:07:39 and workforce beyond those who have traditionally had access to them. I hope the work we do and the
02:07:46 funding we are advocating for here today will make dreams of so many students from underserved areas,
02:07:53 I think of Trayvon Martin before he passed who wanted to be an astronaut. I think and hope that
02:08:00 the funding that we advocate for here will make some of those dreams become a reality around our
02:08:05 nation. While NASA has no physical infrastructure in my district, Pennsylvania's 12th, the businesses
02:08:11 in my district are crucial to the work that the administration does. For fiscal year '23,
02:08:15 my district won over $58 million in contracts across 19 businesses and universities,
02:08:21 including small and women-owned businesses. Proposed budget cuts to NASA, 22% or more below
02:08:28 the fiscal year '23 enacted level, is an attack on the brilliant minds and our innovative,
02:08:34 industrious business owners who fuel American leadership in space exploration and technological
02:08:40 development. NASA has extensive partnerships in western Pennsylvania, partnerships that it relies
02:08:46 on to carry out its various missions and mandates. This current Congress continued to find new
02:08:53 innovative ways to shortchange or take away from the American people, especially the amazing
02:08:59 scientists, students and workers in my district who are helping to fuel NASA to discoveries and
02:09:04 technological developments that will vastly improve the human conditions here on Earth.
02:09:09 I will continue to ensure my region thrives around this space economy. Administrator Nelson,
02:09:16 I congratulate NASA for the two Commercial Lunar Payload Services missions that have flown this
02:09:21 year. These missions have fostered national pride in our nation's space program and produced
02:09:26 considerable momentum for the future. I know there are more missions on the way this year and next,
02:09:31 including some missions that promise truly groundbreaking science and exploration
02:09:35 opportunities. Some of these missions will also demonstrate important infrastructure
02:09:39 for improved renewable energy generation, such as space-based solar power. Can you just please
02:09:46 discuss some of these missions as well as outline your commitment to the lunar discovery and
02:09:51 exploration programs in Eclipse? Right from western Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh, is a company
02:10:00 that's astrobotic. Another one. They are going to have a mission later this year
02:10:10 with a huge instrument on it called Viper. And it is scheduled upon landing
02:10:23 to drill down in the South Pole underneath, maybe go down that far, and to see if there is water
02:10:35 in abundance. We know that there is ice because we've seen that in the crevices of rocks that are
02:10:42 in constant shadow. So if there is water, then there's rocket fuel, hydrogen and oxygen.
02:10:52 The Eclipse missions that are going, as I described earlier, are like scouts.
02:10:59 They go out and they scout the wilderness before the humans get there. And that's exactly
02:11:08 what we're doing. We will have the South Pole of the Moon characterized by a lot of these
02:11:15 commercial landing missions, usually with NASA instruments. We will have it characterized
02:11:23 much more in depth. At the outset of your remarks, you mentioned something about
02:11:29 your admiration of Pam Melroy. I want you to know that is very mutual admiration. Pam Melroy is the
02:11:39 real deal. She's the third woman in the Air Force to be a test pilot, and she is the second woman
02:11:48 in NASA to be a space shuttle commander. And so your recognition of talent is certainly right on
02:11:56 the mark. Thank you. I appreciate that. And while I do have two other questions, I'm happy to have
02:12:01 let you go with that one. And I'm happy to yield back. Thank you.
02:12:08 Well, Mr. Administrator, thank you. Thank you for your valuable testimony and for the members
02:12:14 for their question. The record will remain open for 10 days for additional comments
02:12:19 and written questions from members. And this hearing is adjourned.

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