Bridenstine's Vision For A Re-focused NASA
NASA Nominee Jim Bridenstine Has Bold Vision for Space, Unclear Intentions for Science, American Institute of Physics
“Concerning NASA, [Bridenstine’s] bill states that the agency has lacked a “clear purpose or mission,” owing to a “lack of consistency in leadership along with budget uncertainty in out-years.” It declares,
“NASA should undergo reorganization, altering its mission with a clearer focus, ridding itself of extraneous responsibilities handled elsewhere within the Federal Government or private industry, and standardizing activities across the whole of NASA.”
In the bill, Bridenstine proposes that NASA amend its institutional objectives, which would include eliminating current objectives for the “expansion of human knowledge of the Earth and of phenomena in the atmosphere and space” and the conduct of studies on “the utilization of aeronautical and space activities for peaceful and scientific purposes.” It would also set three new objectives that would form the core of a new “pioneering doctrine”:
“(1) The expansion of the human sphere of influence throughout the Solar System.
(2) To be among those who first arrive at a destination in space and to open it for subsequent use and development by others.
(3) To create and prepare infrastructure precursors in support of the future use and development of space by others.”
Legal Basis For NASA Earth Science and Space Commercialization Activities, earlier Post
Even more unqualified for the job than I’d previously thought.
Are you referring to Bridenstine or Trump?
It sounds as though he intends to terminate the very NASA activities that provide practical benefits for America.
Yes. I’m concerned about this “get there first” approach. They visit a 100 asteroids, for example, and claim they got there first, but what’s the point if the ones they visit were all largely the same?
There is actually a good reason to visit a hundred asteroids, and it’s because they aren’t largely the same. There was a good presentation on this, at a planetary CubeSat workshop last May
https://icubesat.files.word…
The fact is that we’ve only seen a few as more than a point of light, a spectrum and a light curve. Of those we have seen, they all look different. The idea was about sending dozens or hundreds of very small spacecraft to different asteroids. Even if each one only returned a few close-up images of each asteroid, it would really revolutionize small body science.
Of course, that’s probably very different from what Mr. Bridenstine was thinking of…
I agree; the problem is that Bridenstine has not distinguished between “science” and “exploration” or suggested that missions that are logically robotic (i.e. asteroid research) can have value comparable to those which involve human spaceflight.
For those of us for whom discuss makes following links impossible: would you mind posting a few keywords I can use to Bing that link?
It’s easier to describe. icubesat.org shouldn’t be a problem (it’s short enough type in by hand.) Then scroll down to “iCubeSat 2017 presentations online.” Follow the links (two, including a “here” embedded in a paragraph of text…), then the presentation I mentioned is B.1.5
And thanks to you as well.
icubesat.
files.
wordpress.
com/2017/05/2017-
b-1-5-20170531092000-
wayfarer.
pdf
Thank you.
Why send people? Robotic probes are enough.
Well, _I_ didn’t say anything about send astronauts. I was talking about the value of sending something, even the most limited something, to a huge number of small bodies in the solar system.
Cubesats aren’t people.
I do not like these new “Republicans” who want to cover their eyes, ears, and mouths when it comes to Earth Science. For a party who seems to worship President Ronald Reagan, this is quite disheartening because it was President Ronald Reagan who signed the bill into law which added earth observation into the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Authorization Act.
Reference:
https://disq.us/url?url=htt…
From above:
(1) The expansion of human knowledge of the Earth and of phenomena in the atmosphere and space;
Note: The clause, “of the Earth and” was added by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Authorization Act, 1985,
Pub. L. No. 98-361, § I 10(b), 98 Stat. 422, 426 (Jul. 16, 1984).
They don’t cover their mouths.
Why have NOAA then?
NASA doesn’t do monitoring, NOAA does.
NOAA depends on NASA to develop new space based measurement technologies for science and ops and to manage the construction and launch their Satellites.
End NASA Earth Science and you have to duplicate this skill for NOAA and USGS and etc. space act 1958 indented to reduce agency duplication by creating NASA.
It works. NOAA GOES-16 Instrument like the ABI which is certain real for hurricane forecasting was conceived pioneered and proven by NASA science.
NOAA also includes a uniformed-service division that does aerial and ship-based surveys. It also houses the coastal surveying unit, and similar bodies that were accumulated during the two hundred years prior to it becoming NOAA.
People seem to believe (a belief encouraged by lobbyists and their political pets) that NASA’s “Earth science” is just climate change research, and likewise believe that NOAA is just a climate and weather agency.
The overlap between the agencies is virtually non-existent.
Why does the Army have helicopters? What NASA and NOAA do are quite complementary. To ban NASA from developing new earth observation techniques (while doing the same for other planets) would be like saying the Army doesn’t need helicopters because the Air Force has plenty of aircraft to support them.
Off-topic, but I’d go further, the artificial rotor/fixed-wing division between Army and USAF that was created when the USAAF was spun off from the Army has actually harmed the Army. Fixed-wing ground attack and support aircraft like the A-10, AC-130, etc, are functionally equivalent to the Army’s attack helicopters; fixed-wing transport aircraft are an obvious requirement for the Army.
(The USMC learned not to be dependent on other services, the Army needs the same freedom.)
((Aside: I’d also spin the USAF missile command back to the Army as well. It fits the artillery model better than the aircraft model, and in the USAF is a deeply neglected service.))
Missiles fit the army artillery model in term of operations and goals. I agree with that. But in terms of development and maintenance, a missile is much more like an aircraft than a tank or rifle. I’m not sure which service they best fit into, but they don’t fit with any of them all that well.
The Army already has tactical and theatre level missiles under its command. That’s what “artillery” mostly is these days.
Please give us a list of those practical benefits, provided within the past 20 years.
Here are just a handful. I don’t think we should limit it to the last twenty years because NASA was first brought to life as NACA in 1915, and since the Moon Race much of the agency’s resources has been dedicated to human spaceflight programs that were funded to achieve various geopolitical goals.
The first major NACA project, an improved radial engine cowling, cut drag in half and increased the speed of existing aircraft by twenty miles per hour. The fuel it saved in the first year of use paid for the entire budget of the agency. NACA developed the entire spectrum of airfoils, fairings, inlets, and other aerodynamic structures that made modern aircraft possible.
A NASA partnership with Boeing in developing fabrication methods for composite aircraft helped make possible the 777 with its all-composite primary structure.
A NASA partnership with SpaceX provided funding for the Falcon 9, and the additional capability for reusability, which for the first time in over a decade allowed the US to win back a significant share of the commercial satellite launch market.
The Hubble Space Telescope has revolutionized our knowledge of the universe. The Kepler telescope made possible the discovery of thousands of extrasolar planets. NASA planetary probes have given us a sense of the beauty and complexity of our Solar System.
The NASA partnership with the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration has revolutionized our ability to collect environmental data on the Earth, the oceans, and modeling our weather and climate.
Eric Fossum, working on a camera for Cassini, found an ingenious solution to the high dark noise of CMOS light sensors and invented the camera used today in every smartphone in the world, with its incredibly small size, high resolution and speed, and low power consumption.
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/ne…
A NASA partnership with a local university allowed a small group, including myself, to apply fluid dynamic theory to publish a paper on the mechanism of cell death in Alzheimer’s disease.
http://journals.plos.org/pl…
The frustrating thing today is that NASA has excellent R&D facilities, researchers and engineers, but is given no resources to pursue the many practical developments they could provide. Aeronautics and spaceflight are completely separated, research and development funding is severely limited and largely directed to programs supposedly promoting small business rather than actually utilizing the agency’s capabilities.
You are forgetting one of President Kennedy’s goals, weather monitoring from space. That fact that is why we have days of warning for a storm like Imra is a good example.
BTW in Rep. Bridenstine’s rant on climate change he was focusing on how the budget for near term weather forecasting was being pushed aside to spend more on long range research on global warming. He argued that the government should be spending much more money on how to forecast events like tornadoes, which are a major hazard in his state, than what might happen to coastal areas in a hundred years. But as usual folks like twisting peoples words and taking them out of context to push their agendas.
BTW a recent Act on weather forecasting he push through the House.
https://lucas.house.gov/pre…
“Today the U.S. House unanimously approved H.R. 353, the Lucas-Bridenstine Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act. This legislation prioritizes protecting lives and property.”
Another example from Bizzaro Land, where the names of Acts of Congress are exactly opposite the actual content.
I’m not sure I’d go that far. Saying that short-term weather forecasting and warnings are more important than studying the long-term problems may be short-sighted. I don’t agree with that view. But I wouldn’t call it bizarre or completely contradictory to “protecting lives and property.”
Why are you treating them as being incompatible?
Most of the climate data we have for the last 50 years started out as data collected to forecast the weather. And better short term forecast required better knowledge of how weather systems work, which then helps the researchers build more accurate long term models for what the climate will be in a 100 years.
I didn’t mean to imply that short-term and long-term studies were incompatible. As you point out, there are considerable overlays and synergies. But different priorities, interests and funding decisions can favor one over the other. My point was that, although I favor a long-term view, I wouldn’t call a concern for short-term predictions irrational.
We need both short and long term environmental modeling. Right now I am in the path of a hurricane, so short term modeling is important. But rising ocean temperatures will make such storms more intense and raise sea level as well, so long term modeling is also essential. They are not conflicting goals, nor are atmospheric science and aeronautics. In fact Qamar Shams, a NASA scientist at Langely, the original home of the NACA, has developed an infrasonic detector, developed to monitor wake vortices from aircraft, that can detect tornadoes hundreds of miles away by their infrasonic vibrations.
It sounds very useful. Is NASA working with NOAA to install them? Or will be up to someone to use a Space Act agreement to do so?
The next step is development and field testing. Unfortunately the way NASA works now, NASA has little or no funding for technology development, even for R&D with a very modest budget and significant potential, unless it is specifically needed for a NASA mission.
Negotiating an agreement for one government agency to fund another agency, under the Space Act, is possible. A group at KSC is doing this with an agreement between NASA and NIOSH to apply NASA cryogenic technology to emergency air packs for escape from underground mines. But the administrative process is slow and costly; the government is not organized to allow one agency to fund another.
The best strategy for the nation to efficiently use its tax dollars would be to provide line managers of R&D organizations (not just NASA) with modest funding that can be allocated at the laboratory or organizational level to work cooperatively with industry and universities to quickly bring useful technological developments to the point at which industry can commercialize them.
“…the administrative process is slow and costly; the government is not organized to allow one agency to fund another…”
It’s also structured to make managers hate the idea. In the cases I’ve seen, the funds are authorized by one agency and transferred to the other. Then the other agency spends the money as they see best, without any significant accounting or reporting. Managers like knowing (and having documentation) of how the money is spent, and not simply taking it on faith that it’s spent as intended.
“path of a hurricane”
As I write this at 835 EDT from Naples Florida the winds are picking up dramatically. We are expecting the eye overhead late this morning.
It’s a CAT3 now. Huge difference.
Aren’t you on the east coast somewhere? Not like it won’t be the same for you. It will.
I drove around this morning, also picked up some friends – Russian emigres who are terrified. But the ocean is still flat, due to offshore winds. That is going to change.
Stay safe!
Yes, I suspect the Everglades also did their job and took some energy out of it.
The bill specifically forbids NOAA from making predictions that extend more than two years into the future.
The American Institute of Physics disagrees with you. Or do you think they and the National Academies of Science are climate deniers.
https://www.aip.org/fyi/201…
“Following nearly four years of debate, discussion drafts, and hearings, the House passed the bipartisan “Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation” in a unanimous voice vote on Monday. The legislation would be the first major update to weather research and forecasting policy at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in at least a decade.”
“Many of the sections of the bill were inspired by recommendations from reports authored by experts in the U.S. weather enterprise, including a National Academy of Sciences report published in 2012 entitled Weather Services for the Nation: Becoming Second to None and a National Academy of Public Administration report published in 2013 entitled Forecast for the Future: Assuring the Capacity of the National Weather Service.”
And in case you missed the memo, Democrats voted 100% for it…
‘Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-OR), ranking member of the Environment Subcommittee of the House Science Committee, also spoke in favor of the bill on the House floor on Monday, lauding it for tying NOAA’s research “more effectively to the forecasting needs of the National Weather Service.” House Science Committee Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) praised the bill and reminded her colleagues that “weather affects all of us everyday.”’
Its nice to know what the climate may be like in 100 years, but for most folks knowing what the weather will be like tomorrow is far more important – Just ask the folks impacted by Hurricane Harvey or Imra.
So why not put Bridenstein in charge of NOAA? The reorganization, and refocus, of NOAA is long overdue (see Cliff Mass’s blog for insight into that).
And let NASA do what it does, by law, and better than any other government organization, which is climate research?
Maybe because Earth Observation is only a small part of NASA’s mission, a legacy of its IGY roots? For most NASA is about exploring space, and it will be good to have a New Spacer run it.
One could as easily say that human spaceflight is a legacy of the Moon Race. For human spaceflight to be sustainable, the cost of putting a human in space must be reduced to a level that a substantial number of potential passengers are willing and able to pay.
Except no other agency is doing human spaceflight. But NOAA, EPA, Dept. of Ag. Dept. of Energy, Dept. of Interior. EPA, NSF and even the Office of Naval Research are all doing climate research…
Why would this be objectionable? Several have pointed out here that the overlap is negligible. And each of these agencies have a clear-and unique- POV that drives the research they sponsor. Isn’t this a good thing? Better than a single government agency?
Perhaps. But when one sees so many agencies involved in climate research one has to wonder if it would benefit from some coordination. Maybe a Climate “Czar” to use a term common during the Obama Administration? After all if it is a crisis wouldn’t it benefit from coordinating work on it?
It’s such a weird bubble that guys like you live in. Had you really never heard the term “Czar” used for ad hoc political overseers before 2008? Seriously? Because the term first came into common use under Woodrow frickin’ Wilson. I’ve heard it used my entire life.
[Probably the first one I heard of was Reagan appointing a “Drug Czar” in 1982. I think that was when I first started paying attention to US politics. But it was in common use going back to WWI.]
President Obama may not have invented the position, but he sure used it more than any other President.
http://abcnews.go.com/Polit…
‘WASHINGTON — The latest skirmish between conservatives and the Obama administration — the proliferation of “czars” named by the president to handle pressing issues — is prompting efforts in Congress to put limits on the White House.”
“In the Senate, Democrats, such as Robert Byrd of West Virginia, are questioning the constitutionality of the advisers the White House says it needs to coordinate policy and advise the president on issues from health care to the Middle East. Republicans, such as Susan Collins of Maine, are trying to curb funding for them.”
He also appointed the first climate czar during his Administration which I was referring to…
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WOR…
updated 11:49 p.m. EST, Mon December 15, 2008
Obama names first ‘climate czar’ for U.S.
Are you saying that Carol Browner fraudulently created evidence of climate change? Or that it is wrong to coordinate climate and energy policy, when energy production is creating an unprecedented increase in atmospheric CO2? If plants were going to consume it, it would be stable, not increasing.
No other agency is developing spacecraft and instruments for collecting the hard data needed to develop a predictive model of environmental change. In fact, the Brindenstine bill explicitly forbids NOAA from developing the science for any forecasting that extends more than two years into the future.
My concern is not which agency does the work. My concern is that the Trump Administration is trying to keep any agency from doing it. My concern is that the current administration is making an audacious attempt to supress science that might discover (not create) facts essential to human survival. Why is it doing this? Could it be to protect the short term profits of the fossil fuel industry? That’s not rocket science.
Ta-da!
Mr. Woodard, which NASA Directorates, Programs, Projects, or “activities” that provided the items in your list does President Trump plan to terminate? You initial posting is a very broad statement.
Trump is not exactly transparent with regard to NASA, but he clearly plans to terminate research on anthropogenic global warming, one of the most important scientific issues facing the world today and at the present time, alone with charting the near Earth asteroids, one of two elements of the NASA mission most critical to our immediate survival as a civilization.
The purpose is to address the Space Grand Challenges and then Explore. Until NASA addresses #1 Economic Access to Space and #2 Long Duration Crew Health, it will limit Exploration within the existing budget.
One impractical activity is the continuation of the completely expendable architecture, in direct contrast to the VSE.
“For future, sustainable exploration programs, NASA requires cost-effective vehicles that may be reused, have systems that could be applied to more than one destination, and are highly reliable and need only small ground crews. NASA plans to invest in a number of new approaches to exploration, such as robotic networks, modular systems, pre-positioned propellants, advanced power and propulsion, and in-space assembly, that could enable these kinds of vehicles.”
Yes. Good to hear another voice on this issue as I am sure that many here are tired of my own expositions: chiefly that one of the legacies of Apollo is the notion that expendable equipment is part of the cost of space.
The VSE was the policy announcement that lead to the SLS and Orion, with their expendable (and, regrettably, unaffordable) architecture. one can argue that the element of reusability was contained in the original policy announcement, but the VSE and the Constellation program were both conceived and implemented by the administration of George W. Bush, and one cannot argue that it was not what he wanted. Presciently, John McCain said at the very beginning, and in no uncertain terms, that there was no way to pay for Constellation.
No, more likely extend and focus them on forecasting.
FYI
https://qz.com/1070719/nasa…
“Bridenstine evidently knows the importance of weather research. “People often say, ‘Why are you so involved in space issues?’” he reportedly said (paywall) at a commercial space transportation conference this year. “My constituents get killed in tornadoes. I care about space.”
And
https://lucas.house.gov/pre…
This legislation is the product of a bipartisan effort. It directs
the Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to focus resources and effort to:
· Rebalance NOAA funding to place a higher priority on weather-related research and activities;
· Emphasize developing accurate forecasts and timely warnings of high impact weather events;
· Create programs to extend warning lead times and improve forecasts for tornadoes and hurricanes;
· Develop a plan to utilize advanced technology to regain U.S. superiority in weather modeling and forecasts;
· Increase focus and continue development of seasonal forecasts and how to maximize information from these forecasts; and
· Enhance coordination among various federal government weather stakeholders.
None of this is exactly shutting down NOAA and all would have benefits for climate researchers. It just doesn’t place them at the top of the priority list anymore. I expect he will be good for Earth Sciences at NASA, although they will complain no matter what, such is their mindset at the moment.
The bill specifically forbids any NOAA research on prediction beyond a two year limit (the minimum needed by the Ag industry). This strikes me as significant. Could it have anything to do with the influence of the Koch Brothers and the rest of the fossil fuel industry, who want to deny the fact that atmospheric CO2 is rapidly increasing? I actually remember when it was 315 ppm, now it’s 407. There is no geological record of such a rapid increase.
This is probably the most optimistic thing i have read regarding NASA since the VSE speech, actually. Without hyperbole.