Search for Alien Life Ignites Battle over Giant Telescope, Scientific American
“The foundation was and still is interested in partnering with Arecibo, Scientific American has learned. But according to Arecibo Director Robert Kerr, that partnership is currently being prevented due to a poison pill inserted by the observatory’s owner, the National Science Foundation (NSF). The situation is a startling example of a cash-strapped federal agency seeking to offload an expensive, world-class facility to the private sectorat the potential cost of compromising its ability to perform world-class scientific research. … The NSF approved Green Bank’s Breakthrough Listen partnership, allowing Milner to purchase 15 percent of the telescope’s observing time for SETI, although NSF officials say even with that cash infusion Green Bank’s continued operations remain in jeopardy.”
Smith Introduces Bipartisan Bill to Ensure NSF Research Advances ‘National Interest’, House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
“All government employees and their agency heads need to remember they are accountable to the American taxpayer who pays their salaries and funds their projects. It is not the government’s money; it’s the people’s money. The Scientific Research in the National Interest Act is a step toward more accountability.”

Biologist, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA Space Biologist and Payload integrator, Editor of NASAWatch.com and Astrobiology.com, Lapsed climber, Explorer, Synaesthete, Former Challenger Center board member...

9 replies on “NSF's Confusing Stance On Accepting Financial Support”

  1. Sadly this narrow utilitarian view of scientific research once again come back to haunt this nation. It is high time we review Robert Wilson’s argument when Fermi Lab was established.

    Senator Pastore: Is there anything connected in the hopes of this accelerator that in any way involves the security of the country?

    Dr. Wilson: No, sir; I do not believe so.

    Senator Pastore: Nothing at all?

    Dr. Wilson: Nothing at all.

    Senator Pastore: Is there anything here that projects us in a position of being competitive with the Russians, with regard to this race?

    Dr. Wilson: Only from a long-range point of view, of developing technology. Otherwise, it has to do with: Are we good painters, good sculptors, great poets? I mean all the things that we really venerate and honor in our country and are patriotic about. In that sense, this new knowledge has all to do with honor and country but it has nothing to do directly with defending our country except to help make it worth defending.

  2. It would be nice to have more funding. The NSF budget has been essentially static since 2004 while GDP has grown by 17%. But that said maybe NSF needs a Space Act, i.e. the authority to establish flexible partnerships. If Arecibo is closed, it’s not going to accomplish much peer reviewed research. Or it might make more sense to get more time for SETI at Green Bank, where background radio noise is more of a problem for conventional astronomy and divestiture without outside funding seems even more likely.

    With its powerful transmitter, Arecibo is unexcelled for outgoing calls, i.e. saying hello to those who might be out there.

    1. Actually, Green Bank is the more radio-quiet facility. GB is used over a wide range of frequencies, but interference is from
      satellites, many in geo loops but unfortunately some lower that transit. Arecibo RFI is from San Juan Intl. radar. Arecibo does mostly H I and redshifts > 0.0X can be hammered. They used to have a gizmo synced to the radar that stopped integration as the beam passed, but San Juan changed frequencies and Arecibo doesn’t have the modest funds to adjust to that. A big limit of Arecibo is that it can’t steer much from zenith, whereas GBT can point down to 5 degrees elevation.

      1. Interesting. But then why is NSF threatening complete divestiture for Green Bank? The annual cost seems like a drop in the bucket compared to building new optical telescopes. Why not get all the users to lobby Congress? What about Jay Rockefeller? If he wants the telescope to keep operating then he should push for more NSF funding. Or Rockefeller could let NASA eliminate the IVV facility (also in WV) and provide the funds to Green Bank instead. Just trying to cover all the bases.

        1. Frankly it sounds like a bit of Washington Monument Syndrome.

          2. “The Washington Monument syndrome, also known as the Mount Rushmore Syndrome, or the firemen first principle, is a term used to describe the phenomenon of government agencies in the United States cutting the most visible or appreciated service provided by the government when faced with budget cuts.”

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wi…

        2. NSF astronomy has its own peculiar logic re divestiture, optical and radio. To say that it’s controversial among astronomers is an understatement. *Closing* a facility entails the huge cost of reverting the site to its pristine state. Several Kitt Peak Natl Observatory telescopes outside Tucson are seeking or have developed partnerships after NSF divestiture and their ops cost can be low enough for several universities to take control. But the GBT is a different order of mag, a much more complicated divestiture.

          NRAO is doing this under considerable duress, but must, to pay for operating the US’ share of the international ALMA observatory in the high Andes and to operate the upgraded JVLA near Socorro. ALMA is a jack-of-all-trades interferometric array, but it can’t reach GBT sensitivity at the low angular resolution necessary to study the Milky Way and its satellites. Milky Way studies are about to make a gigantic step forward with the GAIA satellite data release of 3D stellar positions/orbits, so taking the GBT offline now would be unfortunate. And the JVLA is now hundreds of times faster with new broad-band receivers and correlators, able finally to map the ‘magnetic universe’ in detail. So, it’s a real conundrum for NSF.

  3. This sounds a lot like the facility shenanigans that go on in NASA once you get into discussions about partnering with the private sector, imagined fixed yearly costs, actual fixed yearly costs, and some government organizations that won’t take yes for an answer – usually due to having other obscure intentions they are not willing to advertise.

    I have seen this so often in NASA. “Ask why seven times” gives only a start into figuring out what is really happening in the gov’t org, who’s deciding things, and why.

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