NASA's giant lunar rocket "can't afford," according to accountability report
NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) rocket is parked on a launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, a successful unmanned test mission ahead of the Artemis I mission, which completed a successful unmanned test mission last year.
Senior NASA officials said the agency's space launch system — a large rocket designed to fuel its ambitious Artemis program to establish a base on the moon — was "unaffordable," according to a report Thursday by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
The report, which breaks down SLS program spending, shockingly acknowledges that senior NASA officials believe the rocket is unsustainable "at current cost levels" and criticizes what the GAO says lacks transparency about the program's ongoing costs. The report doesn't say which NASA officials — or how many — made such claims.
A spokesman for NASA headquarters did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
However, the GAO report does note that NASA "recognizes the need to improve affordability."
"With input from NASA management, the SLS program has developed a roadmap outlining short- and long-term strategies that it hopes will lead to future cost savings," the report said.
The GAO said the plan includes efforts to "stabilize flight schedules," improve efficiency, "encourage innovation" and "adjust acquisition strategies to reduce cost risk."
The SLS rocket is at the heart of NASA's Artemis program, the agency's flagship effort to return humans to the lunar surface later this decade, which also involves various exploration and science missions aimed at establishing permanent lunar settlements.
The mission, while behind schedule, was considered a stunning success, allowing NASA to launch the first manned test mission around the moon. It is expected to be followed by Artemis III, the first attempt to return American astronauts to the moon since the Apollo program.
But Artemis I's success hasn't insulated NASA from criticism from the program.
Government regulators, including the GAO and NASA inspector general, have repeatedly blasted the space agency's SLS program in reports dating back to 2014, as the GAO spelled out in its latest filing. The GAO is an investigative arm of the U.S. government that oversees public spending.
Much of the criticism raised by these regulators has focused on contractual issues, such as cost overruns for the SLS program prime contractor. The regulator also reported transparency issues, saying NASA did not give a full cost estimate for the scheduled Artemis launch and did not do enough to try to break down the program's ongoing costs.
The GAO report also noted that it recommended to NASA in 2014 that the agency should "develop a baseline of costs to capture production costs" for missions using SLS Block I — or the first version of the rocket, which is expected to pave the way for a larger, more powerful version in the development pipeline. But despite NASA's "partial consent," the agency "has not yet implemented this recommendation," the GAO report said.
The report found that the space agency "does not intend to measure production costs to monitor the affordability of its most powerful rockets."
In addition to the nearly $1.2 billion already spent to develop the SLS rocket, NASA reportedly requested more than $1.1 billion in its recent budget request to fund programs for the next four years.
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