Despite NASA's somewhat contentious relationship with Congress over the past few years — evidenced by an open letter to the government body written by NASA Administrator Major General Charles Bolden — Congress has now called for the space agency to begin working on a deep space habitat in conjunction with their plans to launch a mission to Mars within the next few decades.
According to SpaceNews, Congress has issued a bill — more precisely, an omnibus spending bill, which ties any given number of smaller appropriation bills into one large one, and can afford money to government agencies contingent to where those monies are directed — that requires NASA to allocate at least $55 million in funding towards building a full-fledged "habitation augmentation module."
As per SpaceNews, the bill states that "NASA shall develop a prototype deep space habitation module within the advanced exploration systems program no later than 2018," and that the agency must also update Congress on its progress after 180 days have passed.
The news site also reported that as of Dec. 16, International Space Station director at NASA Headquarters Sam Scimemi had no updates on plans for launching a program to begin working on a space habitat for future missions.
"It's much too early for that," said Scimemi at a Space Transportation Association luncheon. "As soon as I put a picture up there, somebody is going to assume what the configuration [for the habitat] is."
While NASA's current plans call for a mission to Mars somewhere in the 2030s, the agency also announced its intention to build a settlement on the moon in the 2020s, making the need for a habitat more immediate.
If NASA wants to beat out Russia for first dibs on the moon, the agency has to start quickly — Roscosmos and the European Space Agency announced plans earlier this year to send a lander up to the moon in 5 years, with intentions of eventual colonization.
Via: Popular Science
Source: SpaceNews
