WASHINGTON, Feb. 7 (States News Service) - Space policy onlookers gave a thumbs-up Monday to President Clinton's $14 billion NASA budget.
Space industry-watchers particularly liked the budget's $290 million for space transportation, a 48-percent increase from last year. They also applauded $2.4 billion for NASA' space science division, a 9-percent increase over 2000.
Overall, the budget is three percent higher than the $13.6 billion NASA got last year.
For space transportation, the extra funds are part of a five-year $4.5 billion Space Launch Initiative to encourage space launch companies to develop a substitute for the shuttle fleet.
"I think it's excellent," said Eric Stallmer, president of the Space Transportation Association of the space launch initiative. "NASA needs to focus on more alternatives to the shuttle."
NASA's shuttle fleet, designed in the 1960s, is expected to last until about 2010. Lockheed Martin's re-usable Venturestar is a candidate to replace it.
"We were very pleased that the administration has decided to increase NASA's overall budget," said Jeff Carr, spokesman for United Space Alliance, a company operated by Lockheed and Boeing. Carr said the investments in shuttle safety and the effort to find a shuttle replacement were both positive.
A congressional aide said he expected Congress to find no major hang-ups in the NASA budget. "I think everyone is going to be fairly positive about it. We'll have to see the details to see how they're going to spend."
Space policymakers in Congress were unavailable for comment Monday.
Mark Oderman, managing director of CSP Associates Inc., an aerospace industry consulting firm in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said the budget was "much ado about nothing."
Aside from the transportation boost, Oderman said on the whole "there's nothing new in [the budget]." "Frankly I'm a little surprised in the context of an election year that it is what it is."
Joe Alexander, director of the Space Studies Board, said the numbers look "pretty good" for space science.
But Alexander cautioned that federal money goes through a long process before it is given out. "One has to remember the budget is like a baseball game; there are a lot of innings and this is only the first."
Marcia Smith, a space policy analyst at the Congressional Research Service, said the space science items in the budget -- including a program to examine the relationship between the Earth and the sun -- reflect a new direction for the agency.
Under the budget for space science, $940 million is allotted for missions to explore the solar system, a 17-percent increase over last year.
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