NASA Administrator Charles Bolden

By John Holdren and Charles Bolden

Today, President Obama outlined a vision to CNN for the future of space exploration.  Echoing what he said in the 2015 State of the Union address, the President wrote, “We have set a clear goal vital to the next chapter of America’s story in space: sending humans to Mars by the 2030s and returning them safely to Earth, with the ultimate ambition to one day remain there for an extended time.”  Later this week, many of the Nation’s top innovators will come together in Pittsburgh at the White House Frontiers Conference, where they will further explore, among other things, how American investments in science and technology will help us settle “the final frontier” – space.   But today, we’re excited to announce two new NASA initiatives that build on the President’s vision and utilize public-private partnerships to enable humans to live and work in space in a sustainable way.

In April 2010, the President challenged the country – and NASA – to send American astronauts on a Journey to Mars in the 2030s.  By reaching out further into the solar system and expanding the frontiers of exploration, the President outlined a vision for pushing the bounds of human discovery, while also revitalizing the space industry and creating jobs here at home.

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President Barack Obama has nominated U.S. Air Force Gen. John Hyten as the new commander of U.S. Strategic Command (Stratcom). Hyten had headed Air Force Space Command since 2014. President Obama has nominated Lt. Gen. Jay Raymond, who serves as the Air Force’s deputy chief of staff for operations, to replace Hyten at that position in overseeing space operations. “I want to congratulate Gen. John Hyten on his nomination by […]

INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE OF SPACE LAW

Position Paper on Space Resource Mining
Adopted by consensus by the Board of Directors on 20 December 2015

I. The U.S. Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act

On 25 November 2015, the President of the United States signed into law the U.S. Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act (H.R. 2262).¹ It consists of four Titles: I. Spurring Private Aerospace Competitiveness and Entrepreneurship; II. Commercial Remote Sensing; III. Office of Space Commerce; and IV. Space Resource Exploration and Utilization.

Title IV, which is of interest here, addresses in a preliminary way space resource exploitation.

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President Barack Obama is on a state visit to India. The U.S. and Indian governments released a joint statement focusing on areas of cooperation, including enhanced cooperation in space. The following are excerpts from the statement. The Prime Minister and the President acknowledged and expressed satisfaction at the qualitative reinvigoration of strategic ties and the intensity of substantive interactions since the Prime Minister’s visit to Washington in September 2014.  They […]

President Barack Obama recognizes NASA and Astronaut Scott Kelly at the 2015 State of the Union Address.

Elon Musk

By Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

Elon Musk’s efforts to overturn a U.S. Air Force launch contract with United Launch Alliance (ULA) has had an immediate impact, with a U.S. Court of Federal Claims judge issuing a preliminary injunction barring rival ULA  from any further purchases of Russian-made RD-180 rocket engines for its Atlas V launch vehicle.

Judge Susan G. Braden issued the order late Wednesday barring ULA and the U.S. Air Force “from making any purchases from or payment of money to NPO Energomash or any entity, whether governmental, corporate or individual, that is subject to the control of Deputy Prime Minister Rogozin, unless and until the court receives the opinion of the United States Department of the Treasury, and the United States Department of Commerce and United States Department of State, that any such purchases or payments will not directly or indirectly contravene Executive Order 13,661. The scope of this preliminary injunction does not extend to any purchase orders that have been placed or moneys paid to NPO Energomash prior to the date of this Order.”

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A 3-D printed rocket part blazes to life during a hot-fire test. (Credit: NASA/MSFC/David Olive)

by David Weaver

On Tuesday, President Obama announced that Chicago will be the site of a public-private partnership Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute.. Led by NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, the agency will support the new Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute with tools including prize challenges, university research grants and expert advice and knowledge sharing.

The idea behind the new Chicago institute is that manufacturing is being transformed by digital design, which replaces the drawing table with the capacity to work and create in a virtual environment. It has the potential for producing a faster and cheaper next-generation aircraft engine, or drastically reducing the amount of scrap material associated with small manufacturing runs and speeding the design process among multiple suppliers.

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NASA Administrator Charles Bolden speaks to NASA personnel and others during a wreath laying ceremony as part of NASA’s Day of Remembrance, Friday, Jan. 31, 2014, at Arlington National Cemetery. The wreaths were laid in memory of those men and women who lost their lives in the quest for space exploration. Photo Credit: (NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Message from the Administrator: Day of Remembrance

Today we pause in our normal routines and reflect on the contributions of those who lost their lives trying to take our nation farther into space. On our annual Day of Remembrance, please join me in giving thanks for the legacy of the STS-107 Columbia crew; the STS-51L Challenger crew; the Apollo 1 crew; and Mike Adams, the first in-flight fatality of the space program as he piloted the X-15 No. 3 on a research flight.

These men and women were our friends, family and colleagues, and we will never forget their lives and passion to push us farther and achieve more.  They have our everlasting love, respect and gratitude.

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By Douglas Messier
Parabolic Arc Managing Editor

President Barack Obama handily won re-election against Republican challenger Mitt Romney on Tuesday, ensuring that American space policy will remain largely unchanged over the next four years.

Although there will be no major policy shifts, NASA will likely face budgetary pressures as the nation grapples with the need to reduce the deficit. The first challenge comes with sequestration, which would trigger a series of deep spending cuts in the federal budget this January unless Obama and Congress can work out a deal.

Meanwhile, the song remains largely the same in Congress in terms of members on key NASA committees. And developments in California appear to bode well for strengthening a state informed consent law backed by commercial space proponents.

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Astronauts, Business Owners, and Space Leaders Agree: Obama Vision for Space Exploration Ensures a Brighter Future
Barack Obama Press Release

Sunday night’s successful SpaceX launch marks another extraordinary new milestone in space. It also provides an opportunity to assess the significant advances we’ve seen in just four years on Florida’s Space Coast.

When President Obama came into office, he inherited a human spaceflight program in crisis. The previous Administration’s decision to retire the Space Shuttle by 2010 was exacerbated by the lack of a viable follow-on program. In 2009, an independent commission concluded that the program to replace the Shuttle suffered such significant underinvestment and was so behind schedule that the first crewed flight to the International Space Station (ISS) would not occur until more than a year after the ISS was planned to be deorbited into the ocean.

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