NASA and Budgets

NASA is a complex and often inefficient organization. Nature notes the just announced delay in the new space telescope.

NASA will delay the launch of its ambitious James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) by nearly a year, until approximately May 2020. That is likely to push the cost of the mission — the most complex space-science telescope ever built — over the US$8-billion limit set by the US Congress. It is the first major setback since NASA revised its plans for the project in 2011, after years of slipping schedules and rising costs. NASA announced the delay on 27 March, saying that engineers needed more time to assemble and test the components of the spacecraft at its main contractor, Northrop Grumman in Redondo Beach, California. Among other problems, the collapsible, tennis-court-sized sunshield that protects the observatory’s 6.5-metre mirror took weeks longer than expected to fold and refold during testing.

The $8 billion will most likely become $9 billion and hopefully they have not messed up like the last one. There is now some sixty years of project management methods and procedures in systems like this and it is amazing that after all of those capabilities we see this again and again!