NASA is about to take significant financial hits. The space agency will need to pay additional funding to send items up to the International Space Station.
A New Report
On Thursday, April 26, the space agency's Office of Inspector General released a report regarding the future changes to how NASA pays for delivering cargo to the ISS. Since NASA shut down the Space Shuttle program in 2011, it has been using three different aerospace companies to assist it in bringing items into space.
The OIG discovered that NASA divided the assignments into two different groups under Commercial Resupply Services: CRS-1 and CRS-2. NASA assigned both Orbital ATK and SpaceX to CRS-1. Both companies were awarded over $5.9 billion to complete 31 missions.
Following the completion of the CRS-1 assignments, NASA leaders decided to keep both companies on their payroll and brought in the Sierra Nevada Corporation to complete the CRS-2 tasks. The regulators pointed out that the space agency gave them $14 billion for their services. As of publication, there have been only eight CRS-2 missions, and those assignments already cost $2.6 billion.
Expensive Reasoning
NASA's auditors dug deep into the organization's paperwork and discovered several reasons why the space agency was paying more for the CRS-2 assignments. First, SpaceX's prices increased by 50 percent. SpaceX did tell NASA that the increase was due to the company upgrading its signature Dragon spacecraft. The updated version of the rocket is expected to be able to carry additional cargo up to the ISS.
Secondly, the Inspector General noted that NASA was contracting three different companies for their services. The space agency's leaders indicated that it was becoming hindersome to have three companies on this project. They also noted that both SpaceX and Sierra Nevada have rockets with capability to return the cargo to and from the ISS.
A Potential Dream Chaser Headache
NASA is concerned that Sierra Nevada is gambling with the development of its Dream Chaser rocket. The Inspector General reported that the company built only one version of the rocket. Also, NASA is anxious that Sierra Nevada has refused to conduct a demonstration flight and that the Dream Chaser has a lack of flight history.
Possible Solutions
The Inspector General recommended several solutions to help NASA save money. The office believes that if the space agency uses just one contractor, it would be able to save the agency $300 million. The report also suggested for agency officials to organize the ISS Program Planning and Control Office for the 2020 Fiscal Year. It also advised that by January 2020, NASA should have already decided whether to continue business with its three contracted companies or not.
Tech Times reached out to NASA for a comment about this story.
