A Performance Assessment of NASA's Astrophysics Program (2007) / Chapter Skim
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4 Slowdown of Progress--Analysis and Appraisal
4 Slowdown of Progress--Analysis and Appraisal
Pages 28-38
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From page 28... ...
In addition, a number of intangible concerns about the stability of the agency and its interactions with the community have established the perception that NASA is not responding to the guidance provided in the NRC reports. The dramatic slowing, at the middle of the current decade, of progress toward realizing the scientific opportunities laid out in the Q2C report and starting the missions recommended in the AANM survey report has been due to no one single factor.
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From page 29... ...
INTERNAL AND ExTERNAL PRESSURE ON NASA'S ASTROPHYSICS BUDGET An important and quantifiable part of the story of how progress toward AANM and Q2C goals has slowed involves budgetary expectations versus budgetary reality for astrophysics. Estimates of the dollar value of the mismatch between the assumptions of the AANM survey and the budget reality for the period from 2001 through 2010 are summarized below:1,2 • At least $2 billion: Higher than expected costs for the recommended projects, dominated by cost escalation for JWST; • At least $0.6 billion: Cost of delay in the HST fourth servicing mission due to the Columbia accident, from the planned 2003 servicing to the projected mid-2008 servicing; • Approximately $0.5 billion: Carryover projects from previous decades, largely SIM and SOFIA, which were not accounted for in the AANM survey; • Approximately $0.5 billion: Approximate cost of NASA's share of the Joint Dark Energy Mission, which was not included in the AANM survey but was recommended by the Q2C report; and • $0.383 billion: Projected decreases (as given in the president's FY 2006 budget request)
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From page 30... ...
is the growth in the cost of the projects that the division is implementing. The higherthan-anticipated costs to the division for missions currently in development will total roughly $2 billion more over the course of the decade than the AANM decadal survey anticipated based on the cost data the survey committee was given by NASA.
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From page 31... ...
Since the agency's shift to full-cost accounting, astrophysics missions must budget individually for staff support, launch services, mission operations, and NASA infrastructure overhead. While this accounting change may be neutral from an overall agency perspective (the agency transferred funds to the Science Mission Directorate to cover the cost of the new responsibilities)
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From page 32... ...
The end product of such efforts should be technology development in mission-critical areas so as to achieve a technology readiness level of 6 before a project is fully defined, planned, and costed. The committee credits NASA for implementing management procedures for risk and technology development for larger missions such as SIM and JWST.
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From page 33... ...
Clearly the real impact of the current situation at NASA has been magnified by the high expectations of the astrophysics community for the decade 2000-2010. Confronted with more realistic mission costs, the Astrophysics Division appears to have chosen to concentrate its resources on the highest-priority items listed in the AANM survey report and to maintain other missions in development at their current level.
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From page 34... ...
The Explorer program in the early 1990s launched the Extreme Ultraviolet Explorer (EUVE) and the X-Ray Timing Explorer (XTE)
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From page 35... ...
are estimates based on the current understanding of mission status and expected mission starts. The committee believes that the current era of discovery in astronomy and astrophysics owes much to the combination of flagship missions and Explorer missions that are now operational.
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From page 36... ...
, the pressures to devote some significant fraction of the NASA science budget to other priorities is likely to further erode the dollars available for the priorities in astrophysics identified by the AANM, Q2C, and future decadal surveys.
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From page 37... ...
The current advisory structure at NASA, which consists of the NASA Advisory Council and its committees and subcommittees, is very vertical. That is, advice at all levels, from tactical and ad hoc expert advice to high-level policy and strategic advice, flows through the NASA Advisory Council to the NASA
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From page 38... ...
A more effective structure would be more horizontal, separating the different advice functions and providing more direct connections between the experts and the relevant managers. The NASA Advisory Council would continue to advise the administrator on policy and strategic matters, with NRC science committees and studies providing advice to the associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate and the NASA Advisory Council.
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