Wed, Jun 10, 2009
Neither Can Afford To Go It Alone
Budget constraints are pushing NASA
to consider a joint Mars exploration venture with Europe, and by
2016, the US may join forces with the European Space Agency for
future Mars trips. The move would signal a significant shift in
NASA policy.
Last month, NASA's space sciences chief Ed Weiler said he
believed a joint venture was the best solution to achieving shared
science goals "if we can lose a little bit of our ego and
nationalism."
Funding is the primary issue for both agencies. NASA had to
severally cut its technology spending and reduce its future Mars
vision to pay for the $2.3 billion next-generation, nuclear-powered
rover. That after delaying the launch of its Mars Science
Laboratory to 2011. As for the Europeans, they lack the Euros to
send up ExoMars, a new rover scheduled to launch in 2016. NASA is
trying to determine how to help Europe land on Mars, while sending
up its own less capable orbiter in the same launch window.
In an AP report appearing in The Los Angeles Times, Doug
McCuistion, leader of NASA's Mars exploration program, said "That's
a difficult partnership because we had an existing mission and they
had an existing mission and to merge two existing missions is
challenging. Frankly, we have backed off quite a bit on our mission
requirements. They've backed off somewhat." One of the things
to be determined is who would pay for the launch vehicle that would
carry both payloads.
NASA has successfully partnered with
other space agencies in the past, and has plans for more in the
future, but they're more in the arena of deep-space missions.
NASA worked with the European and Italian space agencies to launch
the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn and its moon Titan. And
earlier this year, NASA and the ESA they would be partners on a
2020 mission to Europa.
But when it came to Mars, NASA has maintained a go-it-alone
posture, but has also allowed other countries to add instruments to
NASA spacecraft for their own data-gathering. A proposal to
collaborate on a mission to Mars reflects a budget reality. The
costs for a Mars mission, particularly one in which a primary goal
is returning Martian rocks and soil to Earth for study, has gotten
too high, the agencies say. The estimated price tag for the mission
is $5 billion.
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