CBO Releases Report on Budget Implications of NASA's Exploration Program

CBO Releases Report on Budget Implications of NASA's Exploration Program

The Congressional Budget Office released a report entitled “The Budgetary Implications of NASA’s Current Plans for Space Exploration.” The report updates a 2004 CBO analysis of 72 NASA programs that showed that NASA’s development programs could grow by 50% on average. Using that as a basis, the new report lays out four scenarios for fulfilling the 2004 mandate to return humans to the Moon and someday send them to Mars.

“Because of the likelihood that NASA will not meet its planned schedules if funded at its current level, CBO considered four alternative scenarios.” They are:

  • Keep Funding Fixed and Allow Schedules to Slip
  • Execute NASA’s Current Plans and Extend Operation of the Space Shuttle and Space Station
  • Achieve the Constellation Program’s Schedule and Allow the Science Schedules to Slip
  • Absorb Cost Growth to Achieve Constellation’s Schedule by Reducing Funding for Science and Aeronautics

The new report was required by the 2008 NASA authorization act.

User Comments



SpacePolicyOnline.com has the right (but not the obligation) to monitor the comments and to remove any materials it deems inappropriate.  We do not post comments that include links to other websites since we have no control over that content nor can we verify the security of such links.