Life on Earth is Better Because of NASA

In fact, life on Earth is continuously improving because of the nation’s investment to fund NASA’s missions, programs, and projects here on Earth, in the skies, and among the stars.  It isn’t just technological advancements, increased knowledge, and quenching the thirst for discovery that result from these programs. NASA directly stimulates economic growth and development throughout our nation.  To better understand this impact, NASA commissioned a comprehensive analysis of the Agency’s economic impact both to the nation as a whole and to individual states for fiscal year 2019 (FY19).

With a budget of $21.5 billion, only 0.5% of the overall federal budget, NASA generated an economic output of more than $64 billion in FY19, tripling the nation’s initial investment.  Truly a national endeavor, every single state benefited economically from NASA activity.  Forty-three states saw an economic impact of $10 million or greater, while eight of those states received an impact of $1 billion or more.

This report, conducted by the Nathalie P. Voorhees Center for Neighborhood and Community Improvement at the University of Illinois at Chicago, recognized as one of the foremost organizations conducting economic impact studies, found that NASA supports more than 312,000 jobs nation-wide.  These jobs come in the form of not only civil servants and government contractors, but also the doctors, schoolteachers, dining and retail workers, and others necessary to support the nation’s mission.

NASA employees, as well as the people in the aforementioned jobs, spend money in their communities producing significant tax revenues.  In total, NASA generates an estimated $7 billion in federal, state, and local taxes.  This tax revenue is equal to nearly a third of NASA’s FY19 budget allotment.

NASA’s Artemis program aims to achieve a continued presence at the moon where we will learn what we need to know to send humans on to explore Mars.

In FY19, NASA’s Moon-to-Mars programs generated $14 billion in economic output, supported nearly 70,000 jobs, and produced $1.5 billion in tax revenue.  And thanks to the historic support of President Donald Trump, NASA’s economic impact will grow even more as we prepare to land humans on the Moon in 2024.

Access to the heavens is something humans have longed for as long as they have looked to the night sky in awe.  Currently, the global space economy is exploding with growth and has potential for significant increases.  Governments in 81 nations spend more than $85 billion and employ more than one million people in space-related industries.  The emerging space economy is valued at over $400 billion and is well on its way to becoming a trillion-dollar industry in the coming years.

NASA takes considerable pride in our efforts to improve the quality of life on Earth.  As such, we develop hundreds of innovative technologies every year that are then transferred to the private sector.  NASA technology is everywhere and touches American lives well beyond just dollars and jobs.

NASA is making a difference.  The American taxpayer’s investment in NASA missions and programs is paying dividends to our nation as well as the world.  As NASA continues to make strides in achieving our goals of exploring the heavens, we will also continue our commitment to be good stewards of the nation’s investment and do our part to keep the economy thriving.

Venus is One Stop in Our Search for Life

Today, we are on the cusp of amazing discoveries that could tell us more about the possibility of life off the Earth. In fact, astrobiology, which includes the search for life elsewhere, is one of our key priorities at NASA.

The Spirit and Opportunity rovers enabled NASA to discover that Mars had a massive ocean, a thick atmosphere, and a magnetosphere that protected it from the radiation of deep space. In other words, at one time Mars was potentially habitable! The Phoenix lander discovered pure water ice on Mars, and the Curiosity rover found complex organic compounds and methane cycles on Mars. The probability of finding life or past life on another world keeps going up.

Now, the Perseverance rover is en route to Mars on NASA’s first dedicated astrobiology mission. Samples returned from this trip could conclusively determine whether microbial life lived on Mars. Upcoming missions like Dragonfly to Saturn’s moon Titan and the Europa Clipper to study Jupiter’s ocean moon Europa will once again assess the possibilities of life on other worlds. Data from Saturn’s moon Enceladus and other bodies point to many exciting discoveries yet to be made.

NASA’s deep space astrophysics capabilities are also being used for astrobiology. Our telescopes not only peer into other galaxies and discover exoplanets around other stars, they also assess exoplanet atmospheres to find the elements necessary to host life and even look for atmospheric biosignatures. An intriguing discovery recently released by the Royal Astronomical Society about the atmosphere of Venus could also point toward biosignatures.

As we seek to expand our knowledge of our own solar system, four spectacular missions are being considered for up to two Discovery missions to be selected next year. Among them are an astrobiology mission to Neptune’s moon Triton and a geological mission to the most volcanically active planetary body in the solar system, Jupiter’s moon Io. The other two missions being considered have proposed missions to Venus. One is focused on understanding its atmosphere and the other is focused on understanding Venus’ geological history. There is no doubt that NASA’s Science Mission Directorate will have a tough time evaluating and selecting from among these very compelling targets and missions, but I know the process will be fair and unbiased. The U.S. is also partnering with Europe on another proposed Venus mission called EnVision that could be selected to go to our next-door neighbor.

As is normal in science, the more we learn, the more questions we have. This is the virtuous cycle of discovery, including the discovery of potential biosignatures on other worlds. We at NASA are incredibly fortunate to have so many opportunities to pursue and such talented scientists, engineers, and partners capable of pursuing them. Every day gets more exciting for all of us and I can’t wait for the next discovery!

Space Resources are the Key to Safe and Sustainable Lunar Exploration

As we at NASA are working aggressively to meet our near-term goal of landing the first woman and next man on the Moon by 2024, our Artemis program also is focused on taking steps that will establish a safe and sustainable lunar exploration architecture.

Moreover, leveraging commercial involvement as part of Artemis will enhance our ability to safely return to the Moon in a sustainable, innovative, and affordable fashion. The President’s Executive Order on Encouraging International Support for the Recovery and Use of Space Resources clarifies Congress’ intent clarifies that it is the policy of the United States to encourage international support for the public and private recovery and use of resources in outer space, consistent with applicable law. We know a supportive policy regarding the recovery and use of space resources is important to the creation of a stable and predictable investment environment for commercial space innovators and entrepreneurs.

Today, we’re taking a critical step forward by releasing a solicitation for commercial companies to provide proposals for the collection of space resources. When considering such proposals, we will require that all actions be taken in a transparent fashion, in full compliance with the Registration Convention, Article II and other provisions of the Outer Space Treaty, and all of our other international obligations. We are putting our policies into practice to fuel a new era of exploration and discovery that will benefit all of humanity.

The requirements we’ve outlined are that a company will collect a small amount of Moon “dirt” or rocks from any location on the lunar surface, provide imagery to NASA of the collection and the collected material, along with data that identifies the collection location, and conduct an “in-place” transfer of ownership of the lunar regolith or rocks to NASA. After ownership transfer, the collected material becomes the sole property of NASA for our use.

NASA’s goal is that the retrieval and transfer of ownership will be completed before 2024. The solicitation creates a full and open competition, not limited to U.S. companies, and the agency may make one or more awards. NASA’s payment is exclusively for the lunar regolith, with any awardee receiving 10 percent at award, 10 percent upon launch, and the remaining 80 percent upon successful completion. The agency will determine retrieval methods for the transferred lunar regolith at a later date.

Next-generation lunar science and technology is a main objective for returning to the Moon and preparing for Mars. Over the next decade, the Artemis program will lay the foundation for a sustained long-term presence on the lunar surface and use the Moon to validate deep space systems and operations before embarking on the much farther voyage to Mars. The ability to conduct in-situ resources utilization (ISRU) will be incredibly important on Mars, which is why we must proceed with alacrity to develop techniques and gain experience with ISRU on the surface of the Moon.

The scientific discoveries gained through robust, sustainable, and safe lunar exploration will benefit all of humanity. By continuing to publicly release our data, NASA will ensure the whole world joins us and benefits from the Artemis journey.