Transcripts For CSPAN2 Presidents 2018 NASA Budget Request 20170630

At the hearing will come to order. I am pleased to welcome acting administrator Robert Lightfoot to the commerce and science appropriations subcommittee hearing to examine nasas fiscal year 2018 budget request. Mr. Lightfoot my works well together during his tenure as the director of nasas Flight Center in huntsville alabama. Mr. Lightfoot thank you for serving as nasas leader during this time of change and i 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 from the current year level. While this overall cut is less than many other agencies that have experienced the president s budget request reflects a significant reduction of 561 million dollars. This budget request attempts to navigate a challenging fiscal environment that would disrupt Ongoing Missions and delay future explorations for years to come. There are proposals to eliminate the entire education director at using the rationale that nasa can do without these programs under a budget. Other Research Programs are left with Financial Resources which make it impossible for nasa to meet its own management plans. Human exploration the Current Administration picks up where the Previous Administration left off by projecting a the lofty vision to space while providing a budget that keeps the mission from leaving earth. The space system and they orion capsule designed to break our Human Space Program from its decades long tether. In addition sls will provide nasa with the versatile platform to deliver planetary robotics science and spacebased astronomy missions. Sls will make it will make possible many of nasas goals to push the boundaries of exploration. Look forward to the launch of sls and will work to see that a launch will follow soon. I believe you must have an accurate budget to reflect these launch decisions and to meet our nations exploration goals. To fund the pieces necessary for exploration we will lose time and waste funds in the near term. It could be used for other important activities down the road. Nass i believe must ensure that the rigor with which it uses its own missions apply to all of its activities and avoid pressure to send astronauts into space at any cost. Its a long sentiment that nasa should what change the way this business. It should be commercial transportation services. Were it not for millions in Development Funds for nasa acting as Venture Capital there would be no company that attempted to one day take crews to space. Even with this investment that companies nasa will use for Crew Services are behind schedule. The program has increase costs and independent observers cite the inability of our partners to meet safety standards. While the risk is inherent in anything nasa chooses to undertake there is no replacement for proper analysis and percussion with lines and resources of the nations current state when it comes to Agency Operations i would encourage to see the investments in Information Technology cybersecurity in his proposed budget. Nasa is very popular with the public and has a significant amount of data in understanding the universe around us but i believe its incumbent that nasa be able to share its findings that the agency must also maintain a secure cyber environment operation. Nasas innovative ideas often involve significant risks and also require significant investments. The subcommittee provides balance for funding and overall portfolio while also ensuring ongoing activities are appropriately funded to accomplish nasas missions. As with any of ministers and the proposed that represents a snapshot in time based on decisions made with the most relevant information available. Is the subcommittee moves ahead to reduce her their annual spending bill i look forward to working with you to achieve the appropriate balance for nasas missions. Senator shaheen. Thank you mr. Chairman thank you to mr. Lightfoot for being here this morning. This is my first nasa hearing so im especially pleased to hear your comments and testimony and i want you to know mr. Chairman that coming from a state like alabama where you have massive facilities and you have a history of your economy may not think of New Hampshire is a space state that we have our own claim to space. The First American in space alan shepard is from their New Hampshire and of course the teacher in space krysta mcauliffe who died in the challenger accident was from answer printed was from mancher pic today New Hampshire companies are helping to supply a nasa with technology to improve orbit in deepspace exploration. New hampshire is also a leader in space weather and designing building and operating major instruments on nasas satellites to study solar systems. The New Hampshire is helping undergraduates and graduate students with scholarships, fellowships and internships and other Research Grants and Education Programs like every state is spacebased. Unfortunately they have full 18 budget request for nasa cuts many the programs they keep the agency connected to the rest of america. Eliminates nasa Education Mission directorate including the space grants. Nasa Education Programs have had challenges but i dont think the way to meet those challenges is to eliminate the program. Mr. Lightfoot when you and i met in my office we agreed one of nasas most important jobs is to help kids learn to love science and technology and i look forward to working with you and the chairman to ensure that nasa can continue to help inspire and train the next generation of technical workers whether they are building rockets are building american industry in the private sector. Overall nasas budget request of 19. 1 billion, a cut of 3 below the fy2017 level but those cuts werent applied equally. In addition to eliminating Education Programs the budget proposes deep cuts to nextgeneration Transportation Systems and Earth Science. The priorities of this Committee Help nasa reach the agency calling to explore discovered teach and inspire. Chairman shelby has discussed the need to fund the orion and the space launch system the sls needed to send humans beyond low earth orbit so i will take a minute and talk about Earth Science. When it comes to Climate Change nasas job is to observe the earth and tell us factly what is happening to our planet. Nasa doesnt say why earths climate is changing our policies we need to take in response but we do know from surveys published by the university of New Hampshires Mccarthy School of Public Policy this spring that 73 of americans say they trust science agencies such as nasa for information about Climate Change. Nearly twice as many as Friends Family or political leaders with solemn responsibility for nasa. Yet nasas 22 budget request cuts observation by more than a ending five missions. Closing our eyes to what is happening to our planet doesnt mean its not happening in people in my state of New Hampshire have no doubt that the climate is changing because in the Granite State we see it everyday. The steady increase in early temperatures to rise in annual precipitation are already affecting our tourism and outdoor ration that contributes more than 4 billion a year to New Hampshire. This isnt the time to cut back on earth observations. Look forward to working with chairman shelby and mike colleagues on the committee to ensure that nasa continues progress on highpriority Earth Science missions in research. Finally want to end by noting that nasa contracting remains the Accountability Office highrisk list where it has been listed since 1990. We all recognize how challenging Nasas Programs are and how important the Technological Development is that the quality of Nasas Program management means needs to match the quality of the science and i think thats the point is the gao, continuing to list nasa. Again thank you for testifying today and thank you mr. Chairman for holding this hearing. Welcome to the committee. All of your written testimony will be made part of the hearing record. You may proceed. Thank you both for having me. Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee them pleased to have the opportunity to discuss nasas fy18 budget request. Your bipartisan commitment the purpose for nasa the fy20 teen appropriations act and emergency supplemental funding for Kennedy Space center are concrete contributions to this vital continuity and we appreciate the subcommittees hard work on nasas behalf. The historic purpose can be summarized in three discover explore and develop. These these correspond her missions of scientific discovery exploration new Technology Development in aeronautics and space. Nasas missions inspire the next generation. They inject innovation economy provide critical information to address National Challenges and they support local engagement in international leadership. The fy18 request of 19. 1 billion supports a vigorous program that leads the world in space and aeronautics. While the estimate difficult decision with regard to Earth Science and education this remains a good budget for now as we move forward. By developing and transferring technologies fy2018 will award a contract for detailed aircraft assigned a below boom flight demonstrator which will demonstrate quiet overland supersonic flight opened a new market to u. S. Industry. In science nasa is currently using 20 space Borne Missions to study the earth and the system. It will supply Earth Science data for weather forecasting farming Water Management Disaster Response and even disease early warning. This supports two new missions by the end of 2018 the following mission which will track water across the planet by precisely measuring their gravitational pull and ice sheets clouds and vegetation canopy heights. September it will make a final series of daring daish to the 50mile wide gap between the planet saturn and its rings as part of its grand finale. It will conduct the search for elusive objects known as earth trojan asteroids on his journey to the asteroid and in 2023 we will return a sample back to earth. We launched amar since i landed in may of 20 teen to study the interior structure of mars and on track to launch the next Mars Rover Mission in 2020. The James Webb Space Telescope continues on schedule for its 2018 launch to understand the universe and their origins. 20 teen we launched the recently named parker solar probe on a mission to fly closer to the sun parker will join a Team Missions dedicated to studying our nearest star. Nasa Space Technology request includes investment in deepspace optical for medications highpowered solar electric Propulsion Technology and advanced materials. In late 2017 the green propellant fusion spacecraft in the deepspace clock instrument will be delivered torbit to the International Space station are first up on the road to deepspace exploration is living the knowledge and technology we need to keep our astronauts safe healthy and productive on deepSpace Missions of increasing duration and working with commercial partners nasa plans to return crew launch capability to american soil and 2018. We are continuing development on the space rocket. The orion crew capsule ground systems and the technology and Research Needs support the robust Human Exploration Program we plan to launch a crude expiration system using the heavy lifting equal and the orion spacecraft. On a mission to lunar over the cremation will follow not later than 202330 in the early mid2020s who will develop and deploy lifesupport inhabitation capabilities leading to crude Missions Beyond the earths moon systems. Missions launched on sls will establish the capability to operate safely and effectively in deepspace. With your continued support we look forward to going into space exploring habitable environments around the solar system deepening our understanding of our home planet and pushing our observation of the universe back to the time when the first verse performed in opening the space frontier. Ms. Jour chairman i would be pleased to respond to your questions and other members of the subcommittee. I will first. Administrator to a lightfoot my state of virginia has developed an airspace of excellence. We are the home of the state of the space launch. We are proud to have independent verification and validation facility no of backup first operational satellites in the commercial sector and atk lockheedmartin and others prepare West Virginia university supports nasa nasa restore and they asteroid redirect mission. Hard to believe we do all those things and people sometimes forget that i like to refer to this as an ecosystem of technology that forges one another in the region and the nation. This is a rope of the hard work of congressmen abuse and now senator n. I are 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 capabilities for the benefit of this nation. Im disappointed in the decision to eliminate the opposite demonstration. Im puzzled that this nasa with intent to inspire the next generation for its mission in many ways. They suggest or the suggest nasa will move to a spectator sport verses the handson experience of developing instruments and office of education funds. In my state of West Virginia through the space grant thousands of students ranging from k12 undergraduates to postgraduates students have an intern at nasa facilities now part of your workforce and then if you could describe how you plan to replicate the same handson development of activities as a grower s. T. E. M. Workforce with the elimination of the office of education in provide training to our next generation because i dont know how it can be done without handson . A great question senator. For us to where we are looking at this is with the balance of the work we do in our Mission Directives which is civil Research Grants and prizes. That is funded in our Space Technology directorate and not an education so our goal is to use those technical challenges we have in our Mission Directives to gather the next teams that come in. Now will it replace what we have an Education Today . I would never say that but i do believe its a way we can inspire and we have been working on pulling together our outreach activities we do that we do through the Mission Directives to compare those with what we are doing in education with a more integrated solution to help inspire the next generation. I truly believe our mission does inspire the next generation as much as the handson work does and so thats what we are trying to do. Let me ask you this question if i may sir. I would like to talk to botnet nasas restore health program. The Satellite Service commission can be robotically refueled and repaired in space. It provides the methods for space traffic management. Its my understanding nasa doesnt it their program is to confirm mission and is on schedule for 2020 launch date to refuel the u. S. Geological survey satellite. In considering these developments im perplexed by nasas fiscal year 20 teen budget request for the restore health program. For one it has been zeroed out that the budget request indicates its asked to proceed with an extensive amount of restored al tabs. I dont know how its possible for that to be done. It includes conflicting messages to outright cancellations. What we are doing in Satellite Technology is we believe nasa should develop technologies in godard and West Virginia and part of that team. We are still going to develop the technologies that allow us to do satellite servicing whether thats rendezvous operations. How to set sync with your 20 teen budget . We have 48 million in there for that effort that Satellite Service effort and we take that. Its a great opportunity for Publicprivate Partnership to allow commercial votes to take her technology and build the systems that you are talking about. Whether we need to demonstrate that an omission i think we can do this technology on the publicprivate side. I would respectfully ask you to reconsider the program for what its the doing and how it continues to be done. Im not sure the private sector is going to step them. I dont think they will joke then jump in. Our goal is to knock this Technology Items down so that they will jump in. Thank you mr. Chairman. I appreciate it very much. Mr. Lightfoot i have a number of questions and i will start with the exploration budgeting. In the year 2017 appropriations bill you directed nasa to provide a consolidated budget for exploration with a launch schedule nasa is actually managing. Its my understanding that the proposed exploration budget is set to a slower timeline between nasas requested funding and managing schedule creating uncertainty and driving and decision. In aerospace and certainty equals more costs, lease we found on this committee. I have a number of questions. When will massar provide the subcommittee funding subcommittee with the required budget detailing the actual costs necessary for the initial launches of sls rather than what is being proposed . As you know we were in the middle of a read look at the schedule based on the report. Think we sent it to you guys, the brief notification that we sent to you guys. They are getting back with me at the end of august. We have a technical challenge with our European Service module so we are trying to get an understanding of where those are to come back with a plan. What has really caused the delay in providing us with the consolidated budget . The challenge is making sure we have these two technical items knocked out. If i dont have them knocked out i cant wring her number and the more challenges in the area that will make it tough on us. The plan is once we launch the m1 to launch the m. To 30 months after that and the annual cadence of launches. The real challenge is that first launch date and that is what we owe you. The department of defenses complying with congressional direction in transition of launch activity by the end of 2026 while maintaining access to space which is a National Security factor. We are grateful for nasa which is provided folks with expertise in this area and experience to produce a report that a value wait some of the various options currently being pursued by space launch numbers. The first couple questions, as we continue to debate how best to preserve space launch capabilities while transitioning to americanmade rocket engines will you work with the subcommittee to ensure that nasas findings inform the policy discussion . Are you talking about are ended independent study we did . I would be glad to provide a. Reporter you guys. I understand there is proprietary information in the report that nasa produced. Will you provide a copy to the subcommittee . Yes, sir they will. Habitat research which you know a lot about. In the 2017 on the plus appropriations bill provided no less than 75 million for habitation and Research Activities to support human exploration beyond lower orbit. The committee supported this activity. Partial spaceflights which you are very familiar with has been at the center of space habitation since the development of the skylab in the late 60s and continues today with the handling 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 these programs. My question is what role do you see marshall spaceFlight Center having in this new habitat activity beyond the low earth . When you think about marshaling immediately think Environmental Control and life support the advanced systems we need for the future the structure of the habitat. We know we are going to polodnas capabilities as would move forward. Marshall has experienced building the nodes that we had for the space station so there is structural support there as well. What i would love to do is get our team appear and share what we are doing and where we are in the next process. That will help your team understand the layout of where we are in the decisions we need to make probably in the 2019 2020 timeframe. They do have a lot of experience. The commercial crews, for the commercial crew program the gao has identified milestone delays in programs of 138 million. Commercial crew Program Contract stipulated certification for crew launches by 2017. The reality is the anticipated certification will now mean 2019 the fixed nature of the contract puts the burden of delays and additional costs on the companies that nasa is also accountable in the scope of the contract change. Further costs are incurred by nasa as the agency continues to fly our astronauts into space. A couple of questions. With respect to delays and Cost Increases that nasa failed to accurately specify the contract requirements when it awarded these commercial contracts or did the companies themselves fail to fully grasp the scope of what they were bidding on . I think for us its the standard Development Activities like you see on sls and orion to build for the first time there are challenges to come into play. We have debates with their providers often on flights but you could argue its a little of both in terms of understanding our requirements but going through the process of developing for the first time. What insurance assurance can you get this committee that there will be no more Cost Increases . I think its a fixedprice. There may be delays but the sheer nature what they are trying to do and what we are trying to accomplish. Crew safety. Is nasa experiencing any pressure from the commercial prior for data providers to loosen contracts to allow flights to the space station . We have used the loss of crew and loss of Mission Metrics to drive design changes into their systems. If you look at the last Aerospace Advisory Panel Meeting the comment we got that we were using data system effectively and increase the safety of it. Nasa opened the submitting to an independent review of any waivers the agency grants that would impact safety. I believe we do that with her teams. Im not sure who would come and help us. Thats part of our role in terms of certifying whether that vehicle flies or not. In my day job is the associate administrator i have to sign off on the certifications. Thank you. Senator shaheen. Thank you mr. Chairman to want to follow up on senator manchins question about what would replace the elimination of the Education Program and nasa. I grew up in the postsputnik era and i think in response to sputnik with congress and president eisenhower did was to understand that the best way was to make sure we had kids who were educated in science and math in the s. T. E. M. Subjects could then go on to careers in places like nasa who could develop the next generation of technologies and we followed those programs with a number of highprofile missions from nasa. I remember sitting in my last listening to alan shepard when he went up into space on that launch. I remember being with the rest of the country enthralled when we landed on the moon and those were unifying factors for the country and they were premised on this idea that we need to make sure everybody understands what nasa is is doing and 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 company and this country and nasa. So i want i know you have spent 28 years growing 52 Space Grant Consortium sent 850 billion nationwide and that has been critical to continuing keeping kids engaged in what is happening at nassau and in space and s. T. E. M. So how are you going to keep that network together if you eliminate the Education Program . As i said earlier one of the things we were working on before the budget came out with a better execution arm of our education process so we are looking at that in general and thats when we so we have connection with her outreach program. Will i get to that same network . And are standard on the same network that when we look at the ability to instill our mission like you described those missions that inspired this stay in science and math utilizer technical challenges needed in our mission, challenges for students and education and organizations to engage in. Thats the way we are going to go forward, in that direction. That was just the decision we made when we put the budget together. How would you reach out to those underserved and upper underrepresented because those are the ones most at risk in terms of getting excited about s. T. E. M. And Scientific Foundation that nasa still fun. We believe we can set up our challenges that we have today the Space Technology Research Grants. We went to hbcu is a place we can go for Research Grant for Space Technology and our science activation activity. Those are funded by the Mission Directors not by education. I certainly disagree with the idea in zeroing out the Education Program and i hope this committee will be persuaded that thats not the right direction to go in. One of the other areas is the Budget Proposal that would and nasas participation in the discover mission. We have spent nearly 120 million undiscovered. The mission is currently functioning in orbit in the context of the federal budget. That is not a huge piece of either massive budget or a federal budget and under your proposal for Earth Science instrument would not be turned off. The satellite would continue to generate data but nasa would no longer process and analyze the data. I understand what the justification is. Why does that make sense . We believe we have 20 spacecraft in orbit to give us the same data if not better data than some fashion based on our research and analysis. The science level we are getting from instruments on discover. So there are lists of those other instruments and can you detail exactly how those would provide better information . Absolutely. I will take that for the record and we will be glad to give you information. 1. 7 million which is what the analyzing processing the data would cause when we party made a Huge Investment and to decide we are not going to use the instruments that nasa has already belt seems like the kind of thing that the people in New Hampshire and across this country are frustrated about the way government works. Take a huge expenditure and to say what we are going to collect this information but we are not going to use it. Somebody has a political issue with that information is what it says so thank you mr. Chairman. Mr. Van hollen. Thank you mr. Chairman, Ranking Member and administrator 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 i hope is an important part of the nasa system. Do you agree with that . Absolutely. We are grateful for that additional investment. I have a followup to a question that i understand mr. Manchin asked to restoring health and the proposal works that into a darpa program. Im sure you know the darpa satellite servicing activity occurs in geosynchronous orbit which of course is a very different orbit funded by operational permits below earth orbit which is currently what restore health services. By transitioning this away, by defunding restored al are you saying you are going to abandon the lower earth orbit and not provide refueling capability in orbit . I think what we are saying is the International Space station where we have demonstrated technique and godard overtime to refueling as we are doing in orbit today i believe they can stop the technology and let the public or the partnerships build systems to do that. We at nasa dont need to do that. We just need to do the. If you could get this committee a cost analysis about how that will be more costeffective given the investment we have already made in restore al. Can you provide that to the committee . I would be glad to. Let me ask you about the Peace Mission because this is a mission decide to get Important Information about the oceans especially with respect to the health of various fisheries and its important to all the coastal areas in the united states. My question is given your budget proposes to zero out the Peace Mission how do you propose we get that Important Information for our coastal economies . Do we have a couple of other opportunities . Let me explain the way we made our decisions. We did a programmatic assessment as you know pace was not in the decade goes. Pace was. We think theres a way to get that data differently and we want to see how the science comes out in 2018. Pace and a couple of others because they wont perform as well in a couple of others where we had other missions with the budget talks we were in dropping from 1. 9 to 1. 7 in Earth Science that is how we made the decisions we made. Parents talking with godard about how can we get that data we are talking about a different way for the Space Mission . Just so i understand the answer and i think i do. You were essentially given the number by owen b. That you were supposed to hit, that right . It was not a decision based on the merits of the program in a sense. Started out as an instruction to you to find cuts cuts. Is that the case . We were given the total number in the budget. I think all of us like to see the budgets put together by the experts originally on what the country needs Going Forward and mr. Chairman and the Ranking Member working with you as we consider this budget because in addition to those cuts which i think will have harmful impacts theres also cut in the public space telescope program. There is some language in there saying we are going to find efficiencies with no indication of what that is. Sounds like another example frankly of you have got a number you just said we are going to cut this budget by 8 million and we are going to find efficiencies. Does that sum it up . I will have to go back and look. I may have missed that one so i can take for the further record in let you know but i thought we did that pic and i take that one and get back to you on that one . That would be very helpful, thank you. Thank you for the question. Mr. Chairman im pleased to hear you say that. There are lots of areas where further investment help our economy and the nation. Thank you. I. T. Mr. Chairman. Thank you. The ig at nasa is not implemented an agencywide Risk Management process for Information Security and i know in 2018 you have submitted a request for 278 million for i. T. Services. Thats an increase of 18 million about the 2017 level. Do you think that while address i. T. Needs of the agency and will that accomplish the recommendations that the Inspector General has for nasa . We go up so. As you know the cybersecurity challenges we have come its tough for everybody and its always changing so we have tried to put in place the structure we need to address those issues. We are also trying to address the requirements of we have got in this bill. An increase of 42 million. Can you explain what the fitara requirements are . You are going to make me remember that acronym. Its limited on every agency in terms of how you are handling your networks. Theres a set of requirements were given about two years ago that we been working on an part of this is to actually implement those requirements as well. A couple of things to make sure cybersecuritys okay but also make sure you are acquisitions in the right ways while protecting what you buy in cybersecurity as well. That is what we are doing with the extra money we got. Blair can you get the expertise to help you figure out what you are going to do . Thats a great question. Thats one of the challenges we have. From some meetings have been in getting cybersecurity professionals has been tough. We have had a couple people commented a couple of people leave pretty quickly because they are pretty marketable in the private sector so what we are trying to do is utilize our contract workforce to bring in people to help us from that perspective but hire folks to have the experience and actually have a better understanding of our networks and how they work. It is a challenge. We have been in several pfcs from the Previous Administration where the hiring of cybersecurity professionals as a challenge to us. Are you working with the department of Homeland Security . They do continuous diagnostic monitoring so we are feeding back on what they are doing in there helping us with our networks. Thank you. One of the things we are very proud of in New Hampshires the university of New Hampshire where our researchers have played a central role in expanding knowledge about a number of the phenomenon that nasa was passed one of which was physics and part of the helio physics mission including the Multiscale Mission which was launched in 2015. Can you talk about the impact that the mms mission has had on her understanding of helio physics and why thats important . Absolutely. One of the phenomenon is magnetic reconnection that is kind of the plasma universe out there. As trying to understand the connection because what happens with energy . What is the dashboard is the Energy Energy go when connection occurs . We have discovered 30 of those and what mms allows us to do tweeting get a threedimensional view. The phenomenon everyone wonders if that happens in the entire universe of pacing her understanding of that particular Energy Plasma connection as we go forward. Its been a fascinating mission for us, no doubt about it. As you point out its critical because as we have seen changing space weather conditions poses risk to our satellite infrastructure, to our power grid to our National Security assets and something we are talking about in the Armed Services committee. According to a 2012 report released by a voice of london a severe space weather that could cripple the u. S. Economy and cost up to 2. 6 trillion with a t dollars. Can you talk a little more about the role that nasa and noah play in predicting space whether . We do what nasa, break it into the Research Site in the operational side for nasas responsible for developing the Research Models and noaa has the operation aspect of the warnings and tells us when we should expect a flare or a 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. The other thing about space weather we are looking at it from a human perspective. I believe where getting the tools that we need from writing missions to better make our models better. The models are just that, they are just models so until we exercise them with an event which we hope doesnt happen i think we are as good as we can be right now with what we normally continue to learn. Every mission we fly answers one question spent causes more. Interaction between nasa and noaa is working pretty well. Thank you mr. Chairman. Senator capito. Thank you mr. Chairman and i apologize. Think im going to ask you repeating question but i do want to hear your answer. Most of our nations civil space assets for commercial enterprises are housed in the lower orbit leo weather in particular. The ability to service these assets rather than replace them at potentially millions of dollars without the loss of Public Safety and critical scientific data. Dan coats the director of National Intelligence recently testified before the senate Armed Services company that china and russia are developing developing our satellites in low earth orbit. The president s budget proposes no funding for the restorel program. He is no more important than ever now i think to bolster the resilience of our assets for enhancing nasas capabilities and lowering operational costs by demonstrating the abilities to refuel the satellites . What we are doing is we think our job is to develop the technology to allow those missions to be built in the commercial folks take the industry we have developed. The robotics work that we are doing we think if we can have industry pickup the technologies and build the missions themselves we can have a good Publicprivate Partnership. Is industry doing that now . Gas. How much as nasa and how much is private industry and you dont have to be 100 accurate. Can i give you numbers . I think i can probably come back with a much better answer for that. I wont make it perfect that i will get you a good answer on that. You are flexible with the phasing out of this bonding that Core Missions will be picked up by the private sector that will perform government functions as well. I believe there is a demand that issue said theres a demand for servicing satellites as we go forward. The row question is and i think Satellite Service is very important to the row question should nasa be building better should we build the Technology Transfer and let industries apply that as a commercial by . Is that a different direction from nasa in the past . I dont think so necessarily. Im going to move to the Education Office of programs that home of next generation of rocket boys. Just in this past week to different have won honors. Across the country the intercollegiate Rocket Engineering competition won first place in the 10,000foot launch category against 100 teams also emboldened on the side. These are just recent examples of great accomplishments and they think the job of a future. Im deeply concerned about the elimination and funding. We are going to work, think youve heard from others to restore these cuts because they think it could have a Chilling Effect on Educational Programs that nasa has offered across the country were otherwise they might not be available. What would you say to these programs as to how they are important in nasas Overall Mission . I think the programs youre talking about are funded by her Space Technology mission earth. Those are challenges that Space Technology does. We will continue those challenges and what we have been trying to do with those challenges like the mars ice challenges to set those up so folks, its almost Citizen Science in some ways to help us solve our problems. That was funded in space and not in education. I know nasa travel to elementary schools. Are those the programs in the office of education . The programs we are talking about myriad and. Thats the elimination . I think we need to rethink the strategy and i will be working on that across the aisle with the chair, right . Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Debose. I also want to emphasize the importance of those programs. You are nodding that they were important so what is going to happen once you illuminate the office of education . Are those going to go away or are you planning on doing it in a different way . The 2018 Budget Proposal is clear. Do you agree that those are important programs. I think there is die to those programs so as an agency would have to do is pick figure out a way within my other Mission Directives should not necessarily repeat those programs but to get the value out to connect with the kids and students. I will still have those kinds of things in our. I think if you polled the committee there is probably significant concern in that area. The other thing that was mentioned that i want to follow up on is cybersecurity. Have you all been successfully hacked . Successfully hacked. We get attacked. We have what is called the Security Operations center. Im trying to think, i would have to go look and see. That would be surprised if you havent. We have been but i want to make sure i dont hack is a lot of Different Levels of that makes sense to what i would rather do is provide you the data on how many tax we have had and how many we have staved off. I think i can get you that information pretty quickly but we are a target just like most federal agencies because of our data. We pay close attention to that and their Security Operations. I understand. I would be surprised if you havent also so i guess the question is again an i understand how difficult it is to compete at the level you are trying but i think that some thing that needs to be looked at or we are going to get ourselves in trouble. We absolutely reign if you look at what we need to do for cybersecurity a lot of the things coming from dhs and other agencies what we really worked on was trying to improve our connections with them because they have information we need sometimes in our teams have put in something called the enterprise Protection Program. Enterprise Protection Program talks not just about cyber but all the other possibilities you might have Going Forward. Thats why we have asked for more money in that area. So you are working with Homeland Security so this is the recommendation from the agency, the additional 32 million orders come from all and the . This is from the agency. Very good. How confident are you with the nasa budget that he will be able to return crew launch capability in 2018 . With the budget we have a think we can do it. The technical challenges may cause a delay. I dont expect any increase in dollars. A think we all do with technical challenges Going Forward. The dollars are there. Absolutely. Thank you mr. Chairman. Mr. Lightfoot you have been associated with nasa for a long time. What today in your judgment is the biggest challenge nasa has . You are out there challenging everything. Pick one. The biggest challenge for us is stability constancy of purpose and thats why i said what i said at the start of my remarks. We have been. Fortunate to have good bipartisan support on this bill. To keep that constancy going. The ups and downs that you can get if you dont have that are really difficult. I believe the senator from New Hampshire and said term mikulski and i will work together. The technical stuff is hard and thats what we love to do. Certainty is important funding is important. Certainty of funding is as much certainty as you can bring to your program. Its good to do longterm planning. We are not working i won your program so we look at things like flat outyears. If you look into the next five years as 4. 5 billion in lost buying power. How do i plan for that . You look at fy18 and all the outyears of sometimes for us sometimes. Thats the biggest challenge. Nasa over the years has been on the cuttingedge and has maintained a cuttingedge of science. We all benefit from that. Its not just what we put up in all the ancillary benefits that come to our economy and our scientists and engineers. And they aeronautics our brain as well. What we do in aeronautics is critically important also. Tanks mr. Chairman today could have one final question mr. Lightfoot my Opening Statement i talked about nasas challenges with the gao highrisk list and i know this is something that youve been working on but does nasa have the touch of terry and Human Resources to address the concerns that nasa has raised and whats it going to take to get off that highrisk list . Thats an interesting, ive been here for five years and is associate administrator i think we have been on the high list since i started. There are five categories that they ask you to get graded on. Three of those are compliance. We are fully compliant. The two that they havent fully complied with is what they call proving over time. If you look at the gao report while we are still on it they give us a lot of credit over the last five years and teams have put a lot of things in place with whether its Value Management joints conference levels that we use. The challenge we have is we have some big programs coming up. We have james webb, with a space launch system and orion. Those are multibilliondollar programs so i understand that piece of it. I think the challenge is going to be when i talk to the gao about this and they said you have to prove that you are going to do those and we may get you off the list. My worry is we will have another set of programs find that it will be just as complex and complicated and i understand the point. Make sure you are being good stewards of taxpayer dollars. In some respects i kind of hope nasa is on the list because that means we are trying to do hard stuff and if we get it wrong on a programmatic perspective we need to learn from it and do better. If i get so riskaverse i dont push the envelope and to me thats where you have to balance that. Yes to balance the mission versus being too vanilla. [inaudible conversations] often draw some parallels between detroit and new york in the book. Look at the draft riots there is a comparison between what was happening in new york and what was happening in detroit. All of those were in the same reason in terms of jobs and housing so if you go back to the 1943 you go down to 68 and 67 its the same conditions that created that. They all look next to each other and benefits the class of amalgamation going on. We talked about a bit but certainly that would be the opportunity to have contact and that is the beginning of a