"If we tell the government to give us $4.5 billion and we’re going to come up with a miracle in five years, they are going to be disappointed when we don’t do it," Coats said. "That sounds like a lot of money. But the fact of the matter is, it’s not," he said.
Coats said that setting the "appropriate expectations as an aerospace team" is critical. "We really haven’t done a good job of doing that," he said.
Old technology needs facelift.
NASA’s budget continues to go down, not even keeping up with inflation. So times are tough, the former astronaut said.
"When I was an astronaut, I used to think it’s obvious that we need a space program. But it has become obvious to me since then that it isn’t obvious to everybody," Coats said.
Coats said he was "dumbfounded" by a lack of understanding in the U.S. Congress about NASA and the space program. "I’ve been asked by members in Congress why NASA never comes over to explain what the space program is all about," he said.
"We seem to be having a real problem getting a new NASA administrator," Coats said. "They are not exactly lining up at the door; which doesn’t say very much about the job we’ve done selling the importance of NASA and the space program," he said.
"We need to sell the new NASA administrator on the importance of space…let him become the advocate for space," Coats said.
On-ramp traffic
"NASA spends $3 billion to $4 billion a year on transportation, just getting to and from space," said Brant Sponberg, an examiner for the Office of Management and Budget’s science and space programs branch. "That’s money not spent on doing science, developing new technologies or exploring space," he said.
Those monies tally up to about one-fourth to one-third of
.
"If each of us spent that much of our individual budget on just getting to work or going to the grocery store, we’d all be pretty poor," Sponberg said. There needs to be transition from shuttle to something cheaper, he said.
"There’s a real need here for NASA to get onto something that’s more cheap," Sponberg said.
SLI’s aim is for the country to move toward commercially competitive, privately owned and operated vehicles for human spaceflight in the 2010-to-2012 time frame, Sponberg said.
"Early in the next decade, we could be in an era where we cut NASA’s launch cost by half or more from where they are today," Sponberg said.
Investment portfolio
Scott Pace, senior advisor at NASA Headquarters, said the SLI seeks to improve the space agency’s risk management skills, enabling it to better invest monies for maximum payoff. "This is a large amount of money that’s being put on the table. This is no fooling. This is about an investment portfolio in the future," he said.
Lori Garver, former head of NASA’s policy and planning, and now director of space programs at DFI International, likened the highway to space to the creation of America’s Interstate Highway System. Billions of dollars of government funds and 40 years of work led to completion of the Interstate, she said, yielding a huge return on investment.
"I think that’s the same with space transportation," Garver said. "The government should serve as an enabler as it has been in the past…, a role that is not quite finished."
"It’s tough to cheat gravity," said Ben Goldberg, director of engineering and research in space propulsion for rocket-engine maker, Pratt & Whitney. He cited a long list of past projects -- including the
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