We are pleased Jim Bridenstine is here to discuss the future of Space Exploration. Signed, President Trump returning humans to the moon for the First Time Since 1972. This time, it will be for longterm exploration and use and will be followed by manned missions to mars. To theanned to return moon by 2028, but in a speech in april, Vice President pence announced a dramatic acceleration of that timeline. , wer the Artemis Program will name the next woman and man on the moon by 2024 and establish a presence on the moon and lunar orbit by 2025. As i told the administrator before this appearance, the United States has entered a new byce race driven primarily the expansion of chinas space power ambitions and the potential growth for space commerce. On Ambitious Goals timelines to achieve mission success. In order to reach these goals, nasa and its partners will have to accomplish a great deal of work in a short amount of time. System, crewnch capsule need to be tested soon as possible. We also need to build multicomponent Lunar Landing systems and the gateway orbiting landers. Capsule ann needs to be and landers. Needs to be assembled in space. Nasa maintains a commitment to safety. These,green run tests of and there is no better place to do that than this space center in mississippi. The cost is a challenge for nasa. In may, the administration submitted in fy 20 Budget Amendment for 1. 6 billion in additional funding related to the accelerated artemis schedule, an amount that has been called a down payment. The program could cost 20 billion to 30 billion over the next five years. By my math, that calls on congress to appropriate for billion dollars to 6 billion in extra funding each year. Congress needs more details on the funding requirements so we can be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. Concerns have been raised about nasa moving funding from important priorities to pay for artemis. Reprioritization needs to toe early and detailed ensure critical programs are not undermined. I look forward to mr. Bryden tine sheddingens light on this. To they orbiter anniversary of apollo 11 reminds us of potential, but constantly changing Mission Priorities and goals set too far in the future have caused the Space Program to suffer. Congress will provide oversight but we need to provide nasa with consistent direction, clarity of purpose, and funding it needs for success. I want you to succeed. I am excited about this. I hope this hearing will provide insight necessary to make good on the legacy of apollo. , rankingn to my friend member cantwell. thank you. 50 years ago yesterday, nasa launched the apollo 11 mission and five days later on july 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and buzz aldrin became the first people to walk on the moon. Five Subsequent Missions successfully landed 10 more americans and three lunar rovers built in the state of washington. We are proud of the role we played. Just as importantly, the Apollo Program inspired an entire generation of engineers and scientists who went on to many careers in high technology. This generation of dreamers and thinkers establish the United States as a Global Leader of innovation and tech knology. Technology. A commercial space industry exists today, very proud of those Companies Residing in washington, using the expertise of scientists and engineers to help us achieve this mission. Nasa should continue to push the boundaries of space, science, exploration, and technology, and im pleased nasa has started to outline a plan deep in space. I am pleased nash nasa is looking at the nontraditional means. Nasa has been developing the rocket need for deep Space Exploration for nine years, and be estimate is that it not ready to fly until 2022 earliest. Nasa has started to study the lunar landers. It is hard to believe these key pieces can fall together in just the next five years. Last week, i know you made some theges at the organization, head of human exploration, and so that and with masses retirement nasas of the space shuttle, the question of wheres the leadership to deliver on this goal are some things i will drill down on in this hearing. Nasa has yet to deliver a congressional budget for the mission the on 2020, so it is difficult for us to approve the mission if we dont know the ultimate cost to taxpayers. While we celebrate this accomplishment and the fact that you are continuing to be pioneers in space, we also need to look at the next chapter and make sure it is six x fall successful. I look forward to hearing from the administrator on how we will meet this challenge. Thank you, mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing, and i would like to include the testimony of dr. Patricia sanders who has highlighted some of the challenges i mentioned. Without objection, it will be added. Thank you, senator cant well. Well. Nt thank you for the members of the Community Committee for having me here today. We are celebrating 50 years of apollo and in that era, we had this great contest of great powers. We were trying to demonstrate our technological prowess, our ability to lead the world. It was not just about technological prowess. We were trying to demonstrate that our political and Economic System was superior to that of the former soviet union. We are also proud of what nasa did in those days when our astronauts buzz aldrin and Neil Armstrong walked on this surface of the moon for the first time in history and here we are, 50 years later celebrating that monumental achievement. As the Ranking Member identified, we did five missions after that, 12 people walked on the moon, and then the program ended. We want to continue doing the stunning achievements and go further and do more and that is what this new program is all about and we call it artemis. We think about the history of the Apollo Program and what it meant to america. In great mythology come apollo had a twin sister and she was artemis, the goddess of the moon. Under the artemiprogram, when we go to to the moon sustainably, we go with a highly Diverse Workforce including women. We have direction from the Vice President , chairman of the National Space council, that within five minutes we will land the next man and the first woman on the south pole of the moon. An important distinction. All of these years, we believed the moon was bone dry. Now, we know there are hundreds of millions of tons of water ice. It represents water to drink and hydrogen and oxygen. And it is available in hundreds and millions of tons on the south pole of the moon. This time, when we go to the moon, we are doing it differently. Sustainably. To have access to the moon at any time and also access to the entirety of the moon so we dont miss another stunning discovery like water ice which we missed for 40 years. We want to go back to the moon sustainably, have access to all parts of the moon whenever we want, and we want this to be a proving ground. To work and learn live on another world using the resources of that world to take that technology and capability to mars. That is the longterm vision. We have a good start. As the chairman identified, we certainly have in the president s budget president s budget request what we need to get out of the gate. We willsuggest that have more details by the 2021 budget request as far as what we need to go to the moon sustainably with a knife or mars and at the same time, with an eye for mars, and at the same time where it will be commensurate with the budget of the United States. I look forward to answering any questions. Thank you very much, administrator bria. Idenstie. Im afraid i may have misspoken earlier that this was the 50th anniversary of the moon landing. I was a freshman in college at the time and that could not possibly have been 50 years ago. Im going to ask my staff to recalculate know in question deal. [laughter] no one questioned you [laughter] we are going to have to get the money right. Thank you for being ambitious. And thank you to the administration for saying that we can move this five years earlier and make it a priority and something we can be proud of but something that will be safe. There is talk of not having a budget number four defense and nondefense nondefense discretionary. 1 and movedctober it to a cr. That would be if to get you where you need to go. Is that correct . Yes,er, it would sir, it would be devastating. What we lack right now is a lander. The u. S. Has not had a moon landers and 1972 1972. We have had commercial partners investing their own money and we are thrilled about that. We have opportunities to achieve that goal because of investments. Some are ready made. A number of them. A number of private companies that have already invested money. That said, it is not cheap to build a lander. We believe doing a Publicprivate Partnership is an important thing. They will be able to have customers that are not nasa. More access for a lesser cost and grow this ace economy. All of that being said, if we end up in ace the art, the lander will not continue to get developed. Developed. And we dont have money in the budget to develop a lander. It we dont have money in the budget to develop a lander. The next man and woman. A c. R. , continuing resolution sounds innocuous. Its way worse than that . It is. A lot of people associate and i can tell you, they associate a c. R. With keeping things steady. The reality is we then do not make investments we need to make but even worse, we continue to make investments that we dont need to make. It is a waste of money when we end up in a c. R. And that is one of my biggest concerns we will be spending money on things we dont need. You told the committee in martha nasa would examine all available options to ensure the first flight of the s. L. S. Now mis. D arte how confident are you that we can meet that deadline . I think 2020 one is definitely achievable for the arguments one lunch vehicle. As has already been identified but the Ranking Member, we have made some changes at the head of the Human Exploration Missions directory. Some of the key challenges we have had as an agencys cost and schedule, being realistic about cost and schedule, and meeting the cost and schedule milestones that we ourselves set. So in order to reset the cost and schedule of some of these programs, we have made changes at the top of the mission directory. We are moving rapidly to put the right folks in place, but i want them to be in place before we set out a new deadline for artemis one. I say that because we need by and from people who make the gency. Some of the challenges we have had in the past, nasa has not been good at setting realistic budgets and schedules and we need to get better at that. So before we announce a new date, i want to make sure we have new leadership in place. Quickly, with regard to green run, are you still determined to do it . Green run is absolutely in the baseline plan. Suarez the scope of the green run, i dont know what that will like. We will get a team in place to assess the situation and i would be more than happy to report. Some senator . Thank you, mr. Chairman. You mentioned the human space expiration administrators. Who will be making decisions on artemis . We want to make sure that we have new leadership in place before we make those decisions. Ertainly, we have experienced, qualified folks in acting positions. Amely, human extortion and Operations Command the associate administrator command the Development Division with an human expiration. We have acting folks who have been at the agency long time. In fact, they are just getting the positions. Want to find the absolute best talent and move quickly. That does not affect your decisionmaking . Within the next six weeks, it will not heard not. But before we make commitments on the scope or timelines, i want to make sure the new team is in place and have realistic costs and schedules. So that it is their cost and schedule and they can be held accountable. You think that was something that was missing before . We have a long history of costs of schedules not being set in a realistic way and not achieving our cost of schedules. In many cases, that leads to a lack of confidence from the key people that we need, namely folks on this committee i definitely believe in system testing through testing. Very important. When can we expect to see a udget . The 2021 Budget Development is underway right now. She was working within the administration. Within that budget, you will see the out your funding for the Artemis Program through 2024. You think we will be able to see an extrapolation of that number. I think you will see the dollars that we are looking at spending for the years in order to achieve that milestone to achieve in order to achieve hat milestone. Thank you. I thank you for artemis. I hope that in this next mission, we can use whatever tools we have to call on americas brightest women engineers to participate in the process. As we have all looked at video of the last launch, we can see one thing is missing. We dont see women in the control rooms or in those pictures, but i appreciate the fact that you are trying to uphold an image and i hope that we will do some serious work at trying to use that as a tool. I hope that we are able to do that. One thing we can do here is make sure that we get this weather situation correct one of the hings, when chairman of ajit pai was here chairman achieved by ajit pai was here, he sadi said there was no progress. Can i get your opinion on that . Yes, maam. When we think about the 24 gigahertz part of the electromagnetic spectrum, depending on the decibel level, it will definitely bleed over to the 23. 6 gigahertz part of the spectrum. There is risk of air that when it leads over, some of the sensors in space that are looking at the earth to characterize water vapor and energy of that water vapor, some of that data could be interfered with, corrupted. I want to be really clear, this was a study done by nasa on behalf of noah. Nasa did not have a dog in this fight, other than having great scientists and engineers to do this analysis. We do have one or two missions that use that part of the spectrum, but nothing compared to what no a has for weather prediction. This is a weather prediction effort, and i can tell you that depending on the decibel level and that 23 point six gigahertz, we could lose significant data. Depending on that level, we could lose up to 70 of that data. And if that were to happen, it would affect our ability to predict whether, without question. I do think there could be an elegant solution. And this is outside my area, it is not nasas job to do this. There is an elegant solution where the decibel level could be modified the point were we could get all the data we need to still be able to operate and 24 gigahertz. Might require additional cell towers, that kind of thing. But there are others who should be considering that. But i will tell you, there is a riskier. A risk here. Thank you, chairman. Although it is not your thing, it is a vitally important it is vitally important. It is. Have you had a conversation about this issue . I have not. Nasa did the study formula four noah for noah. Thank you. Next, we have senator scott. He is not here. Senator gardner. Thank you for being here. Last night, i have the opportunity to walk down the mall and see thousands of people from around the globe that are around the mall to watch the incredible projection of the saturn rocket on the washington monument. And it was a time to see families together. Some were having picnics or telescopes out on the mall. They had cameras and tshirts emblazoned with the nasa logo in celebration of a historic accomplishment 50 years ago. It made me incredibly proud of this country and i hope that we can find more moments like that to celebrate. Not just in this, but in sony achievements this country has accomplished. In times of Great Division and political strife, things like this can bring the country together. And he saw it last night on the mall, i think i even taxes do a picture of it. Thank you for doing that. It was a great picture. When you look back to the opportunities we have in space, just around the hearing room, my guess is that a significant majority of people were not here years ago when the United States embarked on this incredible effort. So our generation, mars could mean an incredible amount of new opportunity and hope for our country. What are two or three things this congress ought to be looking at that will ensure we are successful in prioritizing that we get back to the moon and mars. What are things we ought to be indful of . What we have to think about, as a nation, that is what nasa does for the country. It provides vision. I love these hawked about the turmoil our country was in at the time. Vietnam was raging, we had protests in the streets, we have civil rights abuses and protests. The country was torn apart, and yet there was this moment in time where all of the country, in bipartisan fashion, the entire world watched. In fact seen or heard by tens of millions of people behind the iron curtain in russia and cuba at a time when relationships ere as bad as they have ever been. So i think what we needed to be focused on as a country is here we are 50 years later when we think about apollo and the popularity of apollo when we lost three brave astronauts, there were times when apollo was a risk. It was never tremendously popular as a program until we accomplished that stunning achievement. Once we, which that achievement, here we are, 50 years after, commemorating that achievement the question is what are we doing today that 50 years after we achieve the new stunning achievement that 50 years later people will be commemorating. Hat is how we inspi