Budget. He was asked about cuts to programs in a such as education, science and satellite servicing technology. The Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing is about one hour. The hearing will come to order. Im pleased to welcome acting administrator Robert Lightfoot to the commerce of justice and science appropriations subcommittee hearing to examine nasa fiscal year 2018 budget request. Mr. Lightfoot and i worked well together in his tenure as director of Nasa Marshall Space Flight Center in huntsville, alabama. Mr. Lightfoot, thank you for serving as nasa leader during this time of change and appreciate you joining us here today. The administration has proposed a fiscal year 2018 budget of 19. 1 billion for nasa which is a reduction of 2. 9 for the current year level. While this overall cut is lessening of agencies that have experienced in the present budget request, it still reflects a significant reduction of 561 million. His budget request attempt to navigate a challenging fiscal environment but would disrupt Ongoing Missions and delay future exploration for years to come. There are proposals to cut Science Missions and to eliminate the entire education directorate using the rationale that nasa could do without these programs under a reduced budget. Of the Research Programs left with insufficient Financial Resources which will make it impossible for nasa to meet its own management plans and launch schedules. On human exploration, the Current Administration picks up with the Previous Administration left off, by projecting a lofty vision for space while providing a budget that keeps the vision from leaving earth. The space launch system and your jan Paul Ryan Paul ryan free of its decades long tether to low or overtook eventually sending astronauts to mars. In addition sls will provide nasa with a versatile platform to deliver planetary robotic science and spacebased astronomy missions. Sls is a vehicle that will make it possible, will make possible meaning of nasas goals to push the boundaries of exploration. I look forward to initial launch of sls and work to see that a crew large will follow soon after that i believe we must have an active budget reflect these launch decisions and to meet our nationals nations goals. If of the pieces necessary for exploration are not ready we will lose time and waistlines in the near term. It could be used for other important activities down the road. Nasa i believe must ensure that the rigor with which it reviews its own missions is applied all of its activities and avoid pressure to send astronauts to space at any cost. This growing segment that nasa should change the way it does business. It should be when lives in the roof sources of the nation are at stake. Nasa is very popular with the public. It also has a significant amount of data for sciences to use and understanding the universe around us. I believe its incumbent that they be able to share their findings but the agency must also maintain a secure cyber environment of operation. Their innovative ideas involve significant risk and also require significant investment. The subcommittee strives to provide balance to the overall portfolio while also ensuring the ongoing activities are appropriately funded to accomplish nasas mission. As with any administration the proposed budget represents a snapshot in time based on decisions made with the most relevant information available. As the subcommittee moves ahead, i look forward to working with you to achieve the appropriate balance. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you administrator lightfoot for being here this morning. This is my first nasa hearing. Im especially pleased to hear your comments and testimony and i want you to know that coming from a state like alabama where you have facilities and a history of space as part of your economy, you may not think of New Hampshire as the space state but we have our own claim to space. The First American in space, alan shepard is from New Hampshire and the teacher in space who died tragically in the challenger accident was from New Hampshire. Today New Hampshire companies are working to supply nasa with technology to improve flow, orbit and deep space exploration. They are a leader in space weather and in designing, building and operating major instruments on nasa satellites to study solar physics. The New Hampshire space grant is inspiring a love of science and k12 students in helping undergraduate and graduate students through scholarship, fellowships and internship. The Research Grants and education like space graha space grant, every state is a space state. Unfortunately the budget request for nasa cuts many of the programs that keep the agency connected to the rest of america. It eliminates nasa Education Mission including the space grant and app score. The programs have had challenges but i dont think the way to meet those challenges is to illuminate the program. Mr. Lightfoot, when you and i met my office we agreed one of nasas most important jobs is to help kids learn to love science and technology. I look forward to working with you and the chairman to ensure nasa can continue to help inspire and train the next generation of technical workers whether they are building rockets or american industry and products in the private sector. Overall the budget request is 19. 1 billion. Thats a cut of 3 below the fy 2017 level. Those cuts werent applied equally. In addition to eliminating Education Programs, the budget proposes the cuts to nextgeneration Transportation Systems and Earth Science. Items that are priorities of this committee because they help nasa reach the agencies calling to explore, discover, teach and inspire. The chairman discussed the need to fund orion and the space launch system needed to send humans beyond low earth orbit. I will take a minute and talk about Earth Science. When it comes to climate change, nasas job is to observe the earth, to tell us actually what is happening to our planet. Nasa doesnt say why earths climate is changing or what policies we need to take in response, but we do know from surveys published by the university of New Hampshires school of Public Policy the spring that 73 of americans say theys trust science agencies such as nasa for information about climate change. Nearly twice as many trust friends and families or political leaders. Its a solemn responsibility for nasa. Yet, the 2018 budget request cuts earths observation by more than 8 , ending five missions. Now, closing our eyes to whats happening to our planet doesnt mean that its not happening. People in my state of New Hampshire have no doubt that the climate is changing because in the Granite State we see it every day. The steady increase in nearly temperatures, the rise in annual precipitation are already affecting our tourism and Outdoor Recreation economy that contributes more than 4 billion to New Hampshire. This isnt the time to cut back on nasas earth observations. I look forward to working with you on the committee to ensure that nasa continues progress on highpriority earth Science Missions and research. Finally i want to end by noting that nasa contracting remains on the Government Accountability office highrisk list where it has been listed since 1990. We all recognize how challenging the produc programs are and how important your Technological Development is, but the quality of the Program Management needs to match the quality of its science, and i think that is the point of the gao, continuing to list nasa. Again, thank you for testifying in thank you, mr. Chairman for holding this hearing. Welcome again to the committee. Your written testimony will be made part of the hearing record. Thank you both for having me. Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, i am pleased to have the opportunity to discuss nasas fy 18 budget request. We appreciate the subcommittee support, especially your bipartisan commitments. The fy 2017 consolidated appropriations act and emergency supplemental funding for Kennedy Space center are concrete contributions to this vital continuity. We appreciate the subcommittees hard work on nasas behalf. Nasas historic and enduring purpose can be summarized in three major thrust. Discover, explore and develop. These correspond for missions of scientific discovery, exploration, new Technology Development in aeronautics and space. Nasas missions inspire the next generation. They inject innovation into the national economy. They provide critical information to address National Challenges and they support Global Engagement in international leadership. He fy 18 request is 19. 1 billion and it supports a vigorous program that leads the world in space and aeronautics bradwell we had to make difficult decisions, this remains a good budget for nasa as we move forward. They advanced Global Leadership by developing and transferring key enabling technologies. In fy 2018 we were awarded contracts for detailed aircraft design build invalidation of a low boom flight demonstrator that will demonstrate quiet flight, open a new market to u. S. Industry. In science they are currently using 20 space bar missions to study the earth as a system which supply weather forecasting, farming, water management, Disaster Response and even disease early warning. It supports two missions by the end of 2018. It will track water across the planet by measuring the gravitational field. It also measures. [inaudible] in september they will make the final daring dive through the 1500mile wide gap between the planet, saturn and its rings as part of its grand finale end of mission maneuvers. They will conduct a search for objects known as earth trojan asteroids. On the journey, in 2023 will return a sample back to earth. We launch mars lander in 2018 tos that he the structure of mars and on track to launch the next Mars Rover Mission in 2020. The telescope continues schedule in 2018 will launch the solar probe on a mission to fight closer to the sun than any previous mission. They will join 18 missions dedicating to studying our nearest star. There Space Technology request includes investment in optical communications, high power solar propulsion technologies and advanced material. Both the green propellant spacecraft in the deep space will be delivered to orbit. They want to keep us safe healthy and productive on increasing duration. Working with commercial crew partners they want to return it to american soil in 2018. We also continuing development on the space launch system rocket. Yet orion crew capsule and the Research Needed to support a robust human exploration program. In 2019 we plan to launch an Exploration Mission using the new heavy lift launch vehicle and the orion spacecraft on a mission to lunar orbit. In the early mid 2020s, we will develop and apply critical lifesupport and habitation technologies beyond the moon system. They will establish the capability to operate safely and productively in deep space. With your continued support we look forward to extending human presence in the state deeper understanding of our home planet, and pushing our observations of the universe back to the time when the first stars were formed in opening the space frontier. I would be pleased to respond to questions and other members of the subcommittee. Thank you very much. First i recognize senator mansion. He has a conflict. Thank you very much for your consideration. Mr. Lightfoot, over many decades virginia has developed an aerospace of excellence. We are the home of the state of the rocket boys, the start of the recent film Hidden Figures with Catherine Johnson and we are proud to have nasa independent verification and validation facility. [inaudible] our own West Virginia university supports nasa and the asteroid redirect mission. Its hard to d believe we do all those things. Id like to refer to this as an ecosystem of technology that supports one another, the region and the nation. This has been a result of hard work over the years. We are now carrying the torch and proud to be part of the nasa team and i trust we can work with you and your colleagues to continue to build and develop the capability for the benefit of this nation. While i am disappointed in the administrations decision to eliminate the nasa office of administration, i am puzzled at the explanation provided in your testimony that nasa will continue to inspire the next generation through its mission in many ways and that our work encourages discovery by learners of many ages. They believe it will move to a spectator support experience. In my state of West Virginia through the nasa space grant, thousands of students ranging from k12, undergraduate or postgraduate, the students have interned at nasa facilities and a part of your workforce and engineers. If you could describe how you plan to replicate the same kind of handson development of activities that grow the workforce with elimination of the nasa office of education and provides training to our next generation scientist but i dont know how it can be done without handson. Great question senator. For us, the way we are looking at this is with the balance of the work we do in our mission which is several Research Grants, several challenges. May have won the challenge related to robotics two years in a row. Our goal is to try to use those technical challenges we have in our Mission Together the next teams that come in. Now, will it replace what we have in Education Today . No. I would never say that. But i do believe its a way we can inspire, and we been working on pulling together our outreach activities that we do through the mission to try to compare those with what were doing an education and bring a more integrated solution to help inspire the next generation. I truly believe our missions actually do inspire the next generation as much as the handson work does and so thats what were trying to do. Let me ask this question. And like to talk to about masses restore l program. A satellite Servicing Mission to show that they can be refueled in space and has significant cost savings with commercial satellites in providing new methods for spacecraft management. Its my understanding nasa recently designated it as a confirmed mission and is on schedule for lunch date to refuel the geological satellite. In considering these developments im concerned by the budget request for the restore l program. The specific funding line has been zeroed out but the budget request indicates they should proceed with restore l tasks. I dont have as possible to be done. How can you request for the restore l program to include conflicting messages that cancels the outright. We believe they should develop the technology and the teams of virginia will him part of that team. We will still develop the technologies that allow us to do satellite servicing, whether thats run review and operation. How is that in sync with your 2018 budget. Weve got 48 million to do that effort. Thats the satellite servicing effort. Then we take that, we think this is a great opportunity for Publicprivate Partnership to allow commercial folks to take our technologies and build the systems that you are talking about. Whether we need to demonstrate that in an actual mission, i think we think we can do this technology and let the commercial publicprivate side decide if they want to be servicing satellites in orbit. I would respectfully ask you to reconsider the program for how it continues to be done. Im not sure the private sector will step in with so much left undone. Our goal is to not those Technology Items down so they will jump in. Thats what were trying to do. We will be monitoring very closely. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it very much. Mr. Lightfoot, i have a number of questions. I will start with expiration budgeting. In the year 2017, appropriations bill, it directed nasa to provide a consolidated budget by exploration not accounts for the schedule that nasa is actually managing. My understanding that the proposed exploration budget is set to a slower timeline and the disconnect between nasas funding and management schedule create some uncertainty in the decisionmaking. I believe in the aerospace business, uncertainty equals more cost, at least we found this on this committee. I have a number of questions. When will nasa provide the subcommittee the funding subcommittee with the required budget detailing the actual cost necessary for the initial launches of sls rather than what is being proposed . As you know we are in the middle of a relook at the schedule based on a Breach Report we sent you. How long will that take . The relook . We, theyre getting back with me at the end of august with what they think its going to be. We still have a technical challenge with the weld and our European Service modules over trying to get an understanding of where those are before we come back with the fallout plan. What is really causing the the delay in providing us. The challenge is actually making sure weve got these two technical items knocked out before we come out and tell you what we need. If i dont have them knocked out and i bring you a number we have more challenges in that area, that will make it tough on us. The plan, once we launch the m1 is to launch the m2 30 months after that and go into an annual cadence of launches. That wont change. The real challenge is when will that first launch b and thats what we all you. Russian engines, youre very familiar with these. The department of defense is complying with launch activity from vehicles that use russianmade rocket engines to those which use a domestically produced engine by the end of 2022. They are maintaining shared access to space which is a National Security factor. We are grateful to congress and nasa that has provided expertise in this area and experience in producing a report that evaluated some of the various options currently being pursued by space launch companies. Couple of questions. As we continue to debate how best to preserve dod space launch capabilities, while transitioning to americanmade rocket engines, will you work with the subcommittee to ensure that nasas findings inform the policy discussion. In your talk about our independent study. Absolutely. I would be glad to provide that report to you. Understand there is proprietary information in the report that nasa produced. We provide a copy to the subcommittee under the appropriate transmittal parameter. Yes or we will. Habitat research which you know a lot about, in the 2017 appropriations bill, providing no less than 75 million for Research Activities to support human exploration beyond lower orbit. The committee supported this activity. Marshall Space Flight Center that youre very familiar with has been the center of space habitation since the development of the skylab in the late 60s and continues today with the handling the lifesupport systems and science operations of the International Space station. The fiscal 2000 budget proposes 120 million for this emerging habitat research. And i want to know more about nasas longrange plans for managing the funding. My question is, what role do you see Marshall Space Flight center having in this new habitat activities beyond low earth orbit . When you think about marshall you and immediately think lifesupport in the advanced systems we need for the future that will probably be inside the habitat. We already know we will pull on those capabilities as we move forward. They also have experience in building the nodes that we had for the space station so there is a structural support there as well. What i would love to do is get our team appear and share what were doing and where we are in the process. I think that will help your team understand the layout of where we are in the decisions we need to make. They do have a lot of experience there. Absolutely. The commercial crew, for the commercial crew program, gao has identified milestone delays and increased program cost of 130 million. The original commercial crew Program Contract stipulated certification for crew launches by 2017. The reality is the anticipated certification will now be in 2019. The nature of the contract puts the burden of delay an additional cost of the company but math is also accountable is the scope of the contracts change. Further costs are incurred by nasa as it continues to depend on russia to fire astronauts to the space station. With respect to delays and Cost Increases, the nasa failed to accurately specify the contract requirements when awarded these commercial contracts or, did the companies themselves failed to fully grasp the scope of what they were bidding on . I think for us its the standard Development Activities to Start Building for the first time and theres some challenges that come into play. We have debates with our providers often on the environment, but i think you can argue that its a little of both in terms of understanding our requirements but also them going to the process of developing hardware for the first time. What assurance can you give this committee that there will be no more Cost Increases or delays. I think the fixedprice contract. I dont expect any more Cost Increases. The sheer nature of what theyre trying to do and what were trying to accomplish. Crew safety. Is nasa experiencing any pressure from the commercial crew providers to loosen contract requirements to enable flying to the space station. No, what weve done is weve use the loss of crew and loss of Mission Metrics to actually drive design changes into their systems. If you look at the last Advisory Panel meeting, the content we got from them was that we were using that system effectively and doing it the right way to increase safety. Is nasa open to submitting to an independent review any waivers they grant that would impact safety requirements for crew vehicles. I believe we are ready do that with our own teams. Im not sure who independent would come in to help us better teams do that pretty well already. Thats part of our role in terms of certifying whether the vehicle flies. As the associated ministry there, i have to sign off of the certification of the design. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I want to follow up on senator mansions questions about what would replace the elimination of the Education Program. I grew up in the post sputnik era and i think in response to sputnik, what congress and president eisenhower did was to understand that the best way to compete was to make sure we had kids who are educated in science and math some of the stem subjects who could then go on to careers to places like nasa who could develop the next generation of technologies and we followed those programs with a number of very High Profile Missions from nasa. I remember sitting in my class, listening to alan shepard when he went up in space. I remember being with the rest of the country, enthralled with landed on the moon, and those were unifying factors for the country. They were premised on this idea that we need to make sure everybody understands what nasa is doing, is excited about that, and particularly, when it comes to kids that they have the Educational Opportunities to be able to participate in growing the technology of this country and of nasa. You know you spent 28 years growing 52 Space Grant Consortium and 850 affiliates nationwide, and that has been critical to continuing to keeping kids engaged in whats happening at nasa and in space and stem, so how are you going to keep that network together if you eliminate the Education Program. Is a said earlier, one of the things we were working on before this budget came out was a better execution of our education process so were already looking at that General Motors always a connection with our outreach program. Will i get to that same network, honestly i dont think ill have the same network but when we look at the ability to actually still use our missions just like you described, those kind of missions that inspire the next generation tuesday and science and math, utilize her actual technical challenges needed in our missions to get challenges out there for the students, for education organizations to engage in, thats the way we are going to go more in that direction and that was just the decision we made with the. How you reach out to underserved and underrepresented groups because those are the ones most at risk in terms of getting excited about stem and Scientific Foundation that nasa is built upon. We believe we can set up our challenges by things we do in Space Technology, the Research Grants, we can look to the hbcus as an example of where we can go for Research Grants for Space Technology in our stem activation technology. Those are all funded. I certainly disagree with the idea they are going to zero the Education Program and up score. I hope this committee will be persuaded thats not the right direction to go. One of the other areas of im concerned about is the Budget Proposal that would end nasas prestige of patient. Now we sen spent nearly 120 million on discover can i missions currently functioning on orbit in the context of the federal budget, thats not a huge piece of nasas budget or the federal budget, and under your proposal the Earth Science instrument would not be turned off, its just that the satellite would continue to generate data but nasa would no longer process, store and analyze the data. Why does that make sense. We believe we have 20 spacecraft already on orbit and they give us the same data if not better data based on the sensors weve had with rather put our research and analysis around no space craft instead of discovery in terms of the science level but were getting. Is there a list of those other instruments, and can you detail exactly how those would provide better information. Absolutely. Ill get that to you. All. It seems the which to me to spend 1. 7 million which is what analyzing that data would continue to cost weve already made this Huge Investment and to decide not to use the instruments that matter has already built seems like the kind of thing people in New Hampshire and across the country are frustrated about the way government works, to make a huge expenditure and then say will collect information but were not in use of the consummate he has a political issue with that information. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Welcome. First of all, i want to thank you for the funds put in the budget to help upgrade the flight facility which you would agree is an important part of the nasas system. Do you agree with that. Absolutely. We are grateful to see that an additional investment. I have a followup to a question i understand mr. Mansion asked. The proposal to somehow merge the into a darpa program. As im sure you know the servicing activity occurs in geosynchronous orbit which is a very different orbit in the operational environment that the low earth orbit which is currently will what restore l services. By transitioning this away, by defunding restore l, are you saying youre going to abandon the low earth orbit and not provide a refueling capability and that orbit . I think what were saying is we think, just like weve done on the International Space station where weve demonstrated techniques on orbit today, we believe we can develop the technologies and let the Public Private partnership take our technology to build the system. If you could please get this committee a cost analysis about how that actually will be more costeffective given the investment weve already made in restore, can you provide that for the committee. Would be glad too. Let me ask about the pace condition because this is a mission designed to get Important Information about the oceans, especially with respect to the help of various fisheries and important to all the coastal areas in the united states. My question is, given your budget proposes to zero out the pace mission, how do you propose we get that Important Information for our coastal economies . We have a couple other opportunities will. First well can explain how we made the decision we made. We did a programmatic assessment and the cato assessment. Pace was not mentioned. We think theres a way to go get that data differently. We also want to see what comes out in 2018. With the budget locks that we were in dropping from the 1. 9 to 1. 7 that we did, that was how we made the decision we made. Were already talking about how can we get the data you talked about in a different way than during an entire pace mission. So i understand the answer, i think i do, you are essentially given a number by omb that you were supposed to hit. Is that right . Yes. So it was not a decision, it started out with an instruction of fine cut. We were given a total number and we had a managed to that number. I got it. I think all of us would like to see the budgets put together by what the countries need. Mr. Chairman, i look forward to working with you as we consider this budget because in addition to those cuts which i think will have harmful impacts theres also a cut to the hubble space telescope, theres some language in there saying were going to find some efficiencies with no information of what that is. It sounds like another example of youve got a number and you said cut by 15 million and we will find efficiencies. Does that sum it up. I have to go back and look but the hubble cut. I may have missed that one thing what weve got i can take that for record and let you know but i think we did that for different reason. Can i get back to you on that one. That would be very helpful. Im pleased to hear you say that. I think there are lots of areas where further investment would help our economy and innovation. The ig said that nasa has still not implemented in agencywide Risk Management process for Information Security and i know in 2018 you have submitted a request for 270 million for it services. That is an increase of 18 million above the 2017 level. Do you think that will address the it needs of the agency, and will that accomplish recommendations that the Inspector General has for nasa . We hope so. As you know the Cyber Security challenge that we have is tough for everybody and its always changing. We try to put in place the structure we need to address those issues. We are also trying to address requirements that weve got with the increase, i think its a total of 32 million. Can you explain what those requirements are. Those requirements are for every agency on how youre handling your Cyber Security and your networks. Its a much larger set of requirements that we were given about two years ago. Part of this is to actually implement those requirements as well that are to make sure your Cyber Security is okay and make sure youre doing acquisition in the right way, protecting what you buy in Cyber Security. Thats what were doing with the money weve got in the Budget Proposal. Where you going to get the expertise to help you figure out what you need to do. Thats great question. And thats one of the challenges we have federal wide in terms of meetings ive been in, getting the Cyber Security professional professionals, its been tough. Weve had a couple people come in and a couple people leave quickly because they are marketable in the private sector and so we are trying to utilize our contract workforce if we can, bring in people to help us from that perspective and see if we can hire folks to have the experience and actually have a better understanding of our networks and how they work. It is a challenge. Ive been in several pmcs, even from the Previous Administration where the hiring of Cyber Security professionals was a challenge for us. Are you working with the department of homeland security. Absolutely. They do continuous diagnostic monitoring and so we are piggybacking on what theyre doing in there helping us look at our networks as we go forward. Thats probably 80 million. Thank you. One of the things we are very proud of in New Hampshire as the university of New Hampshire where researchers have played a central role in expanding knowledge about a number of phenomenon that nasa looks at. One of which is physics and theyve been part of the helio physics mission including the Multiscale Mission which was all launched in 2015. Can you talk about the impact that the mns mission has had on our understanding of helio physics and why thats been important. Absolutely. One of the phenomenon that they are helping us with his magnetic reconnection. They are trying to understand the connection because what happens with energy. Where does the energy go. We have actually discovered 30 of those with mms. What they allow us to do, because its for spacecraft flying information, we can actually get a threedimensional view only have one of those occur. Its a phenomenon thats really advancing our understanding of that energy and plasma connection as we go forward. It has been a fascinating mission for us, no doubt about it. As you point out its really critical because as weve seen changing space weather condition, it really poses risks to our solid infrastructure to our power. , to her other National Security assets. This is something were talking about in the Armed Services committee. According to a 2012 report, a severe space weather event could cripple the u. S. Economy and cost up to 2. 6 trillion. Can you talk a little bit more about the roles that nasa and noaa play in understanding and predicting space weather. Mckenna break it into the Research Side and operation side. Nasa is responsible for helping develop the Research Models that help us predict these activities and noaa has the operationa aspect of the warnings and telling us when we should expect to flare or storm. Are you confident in our space weather infrastructure. I think we are doing what we can do today. We will see, if an event occurs. Ill tell you the other thing about space weather is are humans. We worry about our human perspective and we worry will go deeper in space. I believe were getting the tools we need to make our models better. The models are just that. They are models and until we exercise them with an event we hope doesnt happen, i think we are as good as we can be with what we know that we continue to learn every mission we fly answers one question but causes more. Thats the challenge. I think interaction between noah is working pretty well. Thank you. Thank you. I apologize for not hearing your opening statement. I think im probably going to ask a repeating question but i do want to hear your answer. Most of our nations civil space assets support our commercial enterprise are housed in the low earth orbit leo. The ability to service these assets, rather than replace them has potential to save hundreds of millions of dollars without loss of Public Safety in critical scientific data. Dan coats whos the director of the National Intelligence recently testified that china and russia are developing a range of weapons to disable our low earth orbit, our satellites in low earth orbit yet the president s budget proposed no funding for the program which operates. Isnt it more important than ever now to bolster the resilience of her assets while also enhancing the capability and lowering operational cost by demonstrating the ability to refuel the satellites . What we are doing is to develop technologies to allow those missions to be built and let commercial folks take the technologies we develop. Weve got to do the robotics works but we think if we can have the industry pick up the technology and build the missions themselves the we can have a good Publicprivate Partnership. s industry doing that now. Yes. So in the space, how much is nasa and how much is private industry. It doesnt have to be one 100 accurate. Megatrend number. I think i can probably come back with a much better answer to that. I will make it perfect but ill get you a good answer. Okay so you are comfortable with the phasing out of this funding that the Core Missions will be picked up by the private sector that will them perform government functions as well. Actually believe there is a demand, as you said, theres a demand for servicing satellites as we go forward. The real question is, actually think satellite servicing is very important. The real question is should nasa be building matters we build the technology and let industry supply that servicing is a commercial by . As you see that now, is that a different direction from nass in the past. I dont think so. We always thought we should do the technology. Thank you. I will move to the Education Office and the programs within it. Real West Virginia is proud to be home of the next generation of rocket boys and we dont lose us. We were the first generation. Justin this past week, two different teams have won national honors. The team won the three day mars ice challenge which challenge teams to extract water and across the country at the intercollegiate competition a Team Won First Place in the category against 100 teams, also emboldened on the side. These are just recent examples of great accomplishments and 18 jobs of the future for West Virginias virginia students. Im deeply concerned about funding. We will work to restore these cuts because i think it could have a Chilling Effect on the Educational Programs that nasa is offering all across the country or otherwise they might not be available. What would you say to these programs as to how their important and the importance of value to the overall mission. The programs youve talked about are critically important and funded by our mission director. There is a challenge that Space Technology does and will continue those challenges. What weve been trying to do with those challenges is set those up so folks can help us solve our problems. That particular example is funded in space tech not an education. Those things will continue. Are those the programs that are in the office of education. The programs in the office of education are app score. Thats elimination . Thats another one thats important in our state as well to a lot of her educational institutions. I think we need to rethink the strategy. I will be working on that. Thank you. Coming from arkansas, i also want to emphasize the importance of those programs. Uniting that they were important so whats going to happen once you eliminate the office of education. Are those going to go away or are you planning on doing it differently. The Budget Proposal is pretty clear. We are eliminating app score. And you agree those are important programs. I think theres value in those program so as an agency what i have to do is figure out a way within my other Mission Directors to not necessarily repeat those programs but get the value out that it allows me to connect with the kids and students. I will still have down links and challenges and those things that we will do in our Mission Directed area. Thats the difference. Again, the other thing that was mentioned that i want to follow up with, i think its also a theme of the committee is the Cyber Security. Have you all been successfully hacked. We get attacked, but we have whats called the Security Operations center that, im trying to think, id have to go look and see. I would be surprised if you havent. We have been, but i will make sure that i dont imply that the hack has a lot of different levels, if that makes sense. So what id rather do is provide you the data on how many attacks weve had and how many we staved off. I think i can get you that information quickly. We are target just like most federal agencies but because of our data we pay very close attention to that in our Security Operations center. I understand. Opm, irs, theyve all been hacked very successfully. I would be surprised if you have an awful. I guess the question is, 32 million in additional, you talk about, and understand how difficult it is to compete at the level that youre trying to, but i think that something that really needs to be looked at or were going to get ourselves in trouble. We absolutely agree. I think if you look at what we need to do for time and Cyber Security, a lot of the things that are coming now from dhs and other agencies, what we really were to do is improve our connections with them because they have information we need sometimes and our teams, weve put in Enterprise Protection Program and it talks not just about cyber but all the other vulnerabilities you might have as an agency Going Forward. We are trying to improve that and thats why we ask for more money in that area. So are you working with homeland security, i guess this is the recommendation from the agency, the additional 32 million or does this come from omb or what. This is from the agency. Its what we think we need. Very good. How confident are you that the nasa budget, that you can reach return launch capability to american soil in 2018. With the budget we have, i think we can do it for the technical challenge may cause a delay. Those are fixedprice contracts so i dont expect any increase in dollars. There are all dealing with technical challenges Going Forward but one of the reasons we did fix priced was the additional cost. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Lankford, youve been associated with nasa for a long time. What today, in your judgment, is the biggest challenge nasa has . I know you have many challenges. Your challenging everything. I think the biggest challenge for us is stability, thats why set up started my remarks that weve been pretty fortunate to have good bipartisan support from the hill. We keep that going, the ups and downs that you can get if you dont have a really difficult on the teams. I believe the senator from New Hampshire. I think thats the biggest threat from me. Certainty is important. Certainty of of funding is important. Its important for us to do longterm planning. We are not working on one your programs but if you look at things like flat out years, if you look over the next five years thats one half billion dollars in lost, potential lost buying power. How do i plan for that . When you look at fy 18 and all that out years, its hard for us to do the right kind of planning that we need to do. Thats the biggest challenge for me. Nasa, for years, has been on the cutting edge and has to maintain the cutting edge of science and we all benefit from that. Its not just what we put up in space, but all the ancillary benefits that come to our economy and our scientists and engineers and. And what we do in aeronautics is in incredibly important as well. Thank you. I have one final question. Mr. Lightfoot, in my opening statement, i talked about nasas challenges with the gao highrisk list and i know this is something youve been working on, but does nasa have the budgetary and Human Resources to address the concerns that nasa has raised, and what is it going to take to get off that highrisk list. Im trying. That has been an interesting, ive been here for five years now is the associate administrator and we been on the highrisk list since it first started. There are five categories they ask you to get graded on. Three of those we are fully compliant. We went five years ago but we are now. Two of them we are. The two that they havent fully complied with is what they call proving it over time. Proving that were doing better over time. If you look at the highrisk report, while we are still on it, they give us a lot of credit for improvement and the teams have put a lot of things in place, whether its earned Value Management or joint confidence levels that we use, the challenge we have is we have some big programs coming up. We have james webb and space launch system in orion. Those are big multi billiondollar programs that we have to prove we can manage appropriately. I understand that piece of it, i think the challenge will be when ive talked to the ja o about it and they say you have to prove that were gonna do those and maybe well get you off the list. My worry is that im been have another set of programs for behind that that will be just as complex and just as complicated. I understand the point that they want to make sure were being good stewards of the tax payer dollar, but in some respects, i kind of hope nasa is on the high risk list because that means were trying to do some hard stuff and if we get it wrong from up programmatic perspective we need to learn and do better but if i get so riskaverse, i dont really push the envelope, and to me, youve got a balance that. Youve got to balance pushing versus being too vanilla to get off that list. Thats my personal opinion. I will tell you this, they have been outstanding in helping us with our practices. I give them a lot of credit for helping us better in the Program Project management arena. Its been a good partnership. Were probably not there as well as they want us to be but i think were improving. Thank you. The senators may submit additional questions to you for the record. It would request nasa response within 30 days. We appreciate you appearing before us today. The committee now stands and resource subject to the call of the chair. Thank you. [inaudible conversations] this afternoon, south korean president will be at the center for strategic and International Studies here in washington. They will talk about u. S. South korean relations. We will have live coverage of that starting at 6 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. This weekend, cspan city tours with the help of our comcast partners takes books tv and American History tv to Portland Oregon as we explore its rich history and literary culture. Saturday at noon on book tv we will visit powell city of books covering an entire city block. We will go inside to see the vast collections of and about the history of the largest independent bookstores. When we first moved into this building, we were 15000 square feet of books and now we are 75000 retail square feet of books. I think its a reason that some authors moved to portland. We hear that quite often from authors that this is a resource for them. Former state senator broadly shares her personal and professional journey as an africanamerican growing up in oregon with her book remembering the power of word, the life of an organ activist, legislator and community leader. Knowing that we, that i could be a part of the march in the demonstrations and the conversations that went on in our local community was very empowering. Thats what it was. It was also connecting to what was happening all those many, many miles away. On sunday at 2 00 p. M. Eastern on it in history tv, we will step inside the historic mansion built in 1914 for the home belonged to the former owner and publisher of the oregonian newspaper. They worked there for a number of years and pretty much proved himself invaluable. He was the one that kept it going. The owner was rather distracted with politics to the point that he owed henry a lot of back wages. In 1860 they decided to give the paper to henry in return for back wages that he was owed. He turned it into exhibits us, invested in a lot of real estate as the town group and was able to build a house as grand as this one. Watch cspan city tour of Portland Oregon saturday at noon eastern on cspan to book tv and sunday at 2 00 p. M. On American History tv on cspan three. Working with our cable affiliates across the country. Earlier this week the senate ci