NASA Backs Off Its Document That Riled Private Space

December 15, 2011 3:22 PM Text Size: A . A . A A couple months ago Elon Musk told Popular Mechanics that he might back out of a NASA program to deliver astronauts to orbit if the space agency didn't change the restrictive rules of a traditional request for proposal (RFP). The RFP featured common caveats of government contracts?the kind that introduce delays and micromanagement. Musk and spokespeople for his company, Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX), made it plain that they'd rather do business the nontraditional way that NASA handled earlier cargo contracts.

Today, Musk got his way?NASA changed its mind. Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA Associate Administrator for Space Operations, announced in a press conference that the contentious Commercial Crew Integrated Design Contract RFP would not be released. The crew program's next two-year phase will continue to be handled under the Space Act Agreement, which does not have the provisions that SpaceX and other companies found so onorous.

The reasons that contract spawned so much ire from private space are that it would have let NASA exert more control over the hardware design than many in the industry are comfortable with, installed NASA staff in the companies' facilities, and left open the question of how many changes the agency could force companies to make. Every space company we contacted for an earlier story about the proposed RFP complained about some part of it.

Gerstenmaier said that a budget shortfall, not industry complaints, prompted NASA to throw out the controversial contract. "It is really tough to lock into a firm fixed-price contract with the number of providers that can keep us moving forward," Gerstenmaier said to reporters. Congress, which clearly has its doubts about private spaceflight, gave NASA only about half the $850 million the Obama administration requested for the Commercial Crew program.

SpaceX sent a statement to PM, which reads as a polite victory lap. "Given budget realities, NASA and domestic space companies need to innovate more than ever," SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell says. "Space Act Agreements yield amazing results?we need only look at the Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket, both highly advanced, all-American vehicles designed using 21st-century technology. We applaud NASA's decision to use Space Act Agreements for the next round of Commercial Crew and look forward to the competition."

Source: http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/space/nasa/nasa-backs-off-its-document-that-riled-private-space-6617870?src=rss

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