spacetoday.net: Panel: budgets don't match exploration plans

Posted: Fri, Aug 14, 2009, 11:24 AM ET (1524 GMT)
Ares 1 launch illustration (NASA)

NASA's current exploration plans cannot be achieved on the current timeline without the infusion of an additional $50 billion over the next decade, and alternatives also require either additional spending or stretched timelines, a panel concluded Wednesday. The Review of US Human Space Flight Plans Committee, also known as the Augustine Committee after chairman Norm Augustine, discussed several approaches to NASA's exploration plans in its final public hearing in Washington. In order for NASA to achieve its current goal of landing humans on the Moon by 2020, the agency would need an additional $50 billion. Several alternatives the panel is looking at range from an ISS-focused option, a proposal that would push back the lunar return until later in the 2020s, and a "deep space" option that would defer lunar landings in favor lunar orbital, NEO, and Mars orbital missions. Those options, though, would in some cases still require several billion dollars a year in additional funding to implement. The panel is scheduled to deliver its final report to the White House at the end of the month.