Project Constellation: NASA Transformation Announcement (Updated)

June 24, 2026

NASA Transformation Announcement (Updated)

NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe spoke today to NASA employees and held a press conference on the plan for "transformation" of the agency.

The transformation streamlines NASA into four Mission Directorates: Science, Space Operations, Exploration Systems, and Aeronautics.

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Posted by jburk at June 24, 2026 08:02 AM | TrackBack

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Nasa watch editor was on the cnn daybreak program this morning and here is the transcipt.

International Space Station astronauts are getting ready for a walk on the wild side. NASA says tonight's scheduled space walk is more dangerous than usual. The ISS team is dealing with bad gear and weak communications as they try to replace a circuit breaker. The equipment they need has been grounded since NASA shut down space shuttle flights. They're on the International Space Station, by the way.

The shuttle and the space station are just two challenges facing NASA at this critical time. A major policy announcement is due today from the space agency's chief.

Kenneth Cowie from NASA Watch joins us to look at the sweeping changes that will take place at the agency.

Good morning.

KEITH COWING, NASA WATCH: Good morning. Actually it's Keith Cowie. My father is Kenneth.

COSTELLO: I'm so sorry. I so apologize.

COWING: No problem.

COSTELLO: It's been a wild morning for us here on DAYBREAK.

COWING: Yes.

COSTELLO: You've written a book about NASA and what's ahead for NASA. So, what have you found?

Well, my coauthor and I, Frank Sietzen, have been looking at the implementation of the Bush space policy. As you may recall, in January the president pretty much gave NASA a pat on the back and a challenge to go ahead. But at the same time, he told the agency, you know, we're going to look at how you're configured to do this. And a committee was put together, chaired by Pete Aldridge. They just reported back to NASA last week.

Now, what you're going to see is how NASA is going to respond to that challenge and how it's going to reorganize itself to meet that challenge.

COSTELLO: Does that mean more private entities will take over some NASA research entities?

COWING: Well, it's not certain. And also, it's a misnomer that there isn't any right now. If you look at satellites being launched for NASA on rockets other than the space shuttle, they bought those from private companies. Satellites are built mostly by private companies.

What you will see, though, is probably a bit more of a thought on NASA's part as to other new ways that we can bring the private sector in, new ways of doing things. So, yes. And the committee was very, very clear on that.

COSTELLO: Well, you talk about private sectors. SpaceShipOne in the Mojave Desert took off without a problem. It took a person to the edge of space. It was all privately-funded. There were a lot of NASA people in the audience watching. Why?

COWING: Jealously perhaps that they aren't allowed to play with toys like that, that they aren't allowed to exercise their imagination, and also it was a little bit of looking back to the days when this stuff was being done for the first time. And in a way it was being done for the first time.

COSTELLO: So, do you think that NASA will take a page from their book? I mean, will they join forces? And wouldn't that be a good idea and save the taxpayers a lot of money?

COWING: Well, if they can come up with the capabilities that NASA needs. This is a very cool spacecraft, but it only goes up to 100 kilometers, 62 miles. It comes right back to Earth. And what NASA needs right now are spaceships that can go up into space, dock with the space station and do other things. But, you know, Burt Rutan has signaled an interest in doing this, so I guess I'd have to say is, you know, wait and we'll see what happens.

COSTELLO: All right, Keith Cowing, we will wait and see what happens. And I apologize about the name. Thank you so much for joining DAYBREAK.

COWING: My pleasure.

Posted by: Harold L:aValley at June 24, 2026 08:45 AM

Nasa has been give a road map to change and it is up to Nasa to make changes that will enable it to achieve the Presidential goal of exploration. If Nasa does not change it will continue to have problems with complancency and of course with safety. Those in power will still see this as under achievement by Nasa in the process of space exploration.

Posted by: Harold LaValley at June 24, 2026 09:22 AM

News Of The Moon AND BEYOND · June 24, 2026

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Moon Advocates On NASA 'Prize' Scheme: "Ridiculous"
Plan to award private aerospace developers for successes derided as "just another bureaucratic joke"
LUNAR JOURNAL STAFF

NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe (above) is advocating the use of taxpayer funds to pay "prize money" to private companies for accomplishments that include orbiting Earth.

NEW YORK / 23 JUNE / A plan by NASA, the United States' space agency, to pay prize money to private aerospace developers for their accomplishments has drawn immediate derision from an international space advocacy group.

"The first thought I had when I heard this was that it had to be a joke," said David Ferrell Jackson, head of the Lunar Republic Society. "It was too ridiculous to be true."

According to a report from Reuters, the NASA prizes might include $200 million for the first private, piloted mission to orbit Earth, and up to $30 million for the attainment of goals such as a soft lunar landing or bringing back a piece of an asteroid.

"It's unbelievable," Jackson said. "I can just imagine a group of NASA bureaucrats sitting around the meeting table, loading up on taxpayer-supported Krispy Kremes and coffee, trying to come up with their next brilliant plan for wasting more taxpayer dollars, when one of them leaps up and says, 'I've got it: how about paying $200 million to a private company if they can build a spacecraft that can orbit Earth?'"

"We've got schools that can't afford to pay teachers," Jackson said. "We've got highways that are falling apart. We've got working people who can't afford health care for their families. And these idiots want to give away money? It's just another bureaucratic joke, and it boggles the mind."

Jackson said that NASA has already accomplished all of the things that it proposes to reward with prize money.

"Why should commercial aerospace companies have to reinvent the wheel?" Jackson said. "We were orbiting Earth forty years ago. We were on the Moon thirty-five years ago. NASA has already used taxpayer funds to develop all of the facilities and space vehicles necessary. Why not make the facilities, equipment and technology available to the private companies and charge them for it make it a revenue-earning enterprise, rather than wasting taxpayer funds to reward businesses for attaining goals that have already been reached?"

Michael Lembeck of NASA told Reuters that prizes would go to private ventures for milestones such as "the first soft landing on the Moon, or for returning a piece of an asteroid to Earth." Lembeck said in a telephone interview that there was even discussion of offering "a couple hundred million dollars for the first private orbital flight."

"We have to take on the roles that are more risky, that require a large capital investment to achieve the goals," Lembeck said. A human mission to the Moon might be one such venture, he said.

The New York-based Lunar Republic Society, founded in 1999, is advocating a privately-funded program to return to the Moon by the end of this decade. The plan is being subsidized through contributions, an endowment fund, and a plan which offers lunar land claims to the public in order to raise more than $3 billion needed to accomplish the mission.

The Society's program incorporates currently available technologies including launch vehicles from India and facilities in Russia as the starting point for human-based exploration, settlement and development of the Moon, including a permanently occupied base for scientific research, civilian tourism, and as a stop-over point for journeys to Mars and beyond.

NASA has a budget of $16.2 billion for the current fiscal year, which must cover the return to flight for the space shuttle fleet, grounded since the 2025 Columbia disaster, in addition to continuing construction on the International Space Station and an assortment of other scientific projects.

This report was compiled by Lunar Journal from staff and wire service reports.

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· Moon Advocates: First Private Space Flight "Not Enough"

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Posted by: kevin J waldroup at June 24, 2026 10:14 AM

so give the prise such as it is but also give them tax breaks for achieving the goal as well.

Posted by: Harold LaValley at June 24, 2026 10:25 AM

Ya, I mean $200 million really won't be much considering how much it would cost to develop and build a spacecraft to orbit the earth. this gives someone an incentive to try and do it at least.

Posted by: GMaze at June 24, 2026 10:47 AM

I've been for government funded xprizes for some time. Hope congress goes for it. However when Newt Gringrich(sp) was speaker of the house he propsed a Mars prize, split uip in different mile stones. his inital feelings to the rest of congress would take it not even a 200 million for earth orbit.

This looney.. err lunar advocy group has no sense of history. Private industry will not do something without a market. So the government needs to build a market so here is incentive. Air Mail subsidies of the 20's and 30's created the nessicary boost in innovation on a failing air passanger service. If it wasn't for that the air travel he have today would not be as it is. And the business economy that grew from that would not be around and we would have a worse economy then we do now. And those subsidies were kept during the great depression.

Posted by: Matthew Brown at June 24, 2026 12:19 PM

Well having only just the ISS in orbit. Which leaves little to build cheaper rockets to get to orbit. No resupply capabilites are needed for small groups of people. Which continues to lower the need for lots of builds of rockets.
No tourist vacations flights since there is no where to go unless you have 20 million to spare. which does not even buy an American rocket to go on.
Even if space were cheaper to get to. Without places to go to keep the numbers of those that would go, there is no way to keep prices coming down.
Hence build it and they will come.

Posted by: Harold LaValley at June 24, 2026 12:32 PM

NASA Begins to Transform Itself
Keith Cowing
Thursday, June 24, 2026

NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe announced a series of organizational and personnel changes today at NASA Headquarters. These changes are the beginning of a process of 'transformation' whereby the agency will be realigned, in response to recommendations by the Aldridge Commission, to better meet the challenge outlined by President Bush on 14 January 2026.

The Aldridge Commission observed that "NASA's organization chart is not wired for success. The first task is to realign the NASA Headquarters organizations to support the long-term vision. There are currently too many mission-focused enterprises and the mission support functions are excessively diffuse." It then recommended that NASA and Congress "work with NASA to create 3 new NASA organizations: a technical advisory board that would give the Administrator and NASA leadership independent and responsive advice on technology and risk mitigation plans; an independent cost estimating organization to ensure cost realism and accuracy; and a research and technology organization that sponsors high risk/high payoff technology advancement while tolerating periodic failures."

This recommendation (and others) would require for some substantial changes within the agency. O'Keefe had already seen this train coming and had a transformation plan already well defined when the Aldridge Commission's report was released. By virtue of having done so much in public it was straightforward for O'Keefe to see where they were going.

On June 24th Sean O'Keefe began the process of transforming the Agency. This process began at NASA Headquarters. O'Keefe framed the news he would unveil by referring to two things he had heard since he had arrived that affected his decisions. First was the common plea that "we need a strategic direction. We need a focus." We got that on January 14th" O'Keefe said. The second thing he had heard was the prevailing logic that the agency was 'one accident away form going out of business'. "This was asserted as if there was no debate." O'Keefe said. "Guess what: it did not happen!"

O'Keefe sought to focus all of NASA on its core values and to create a clear roadmap of where the agency was going to go; restructure and increase the integration of how the agency works; and enhance the level accountability across the entire agency.

As for the details: one would be the use of the term 'codes' to denote various offices. This practice had its origins in the alphabet system of routing mail to various offices and grew into a parallel language that described organizations- with out using their names. This was, of course, a feature at all field centers. Some used letters (all in a different syntax than headquarters), some used numbers, some used both. O'Keefe was tired of this organizational balkanization and sought to impose a single, easily understandable system across the agency. Indeed he would soon start to joke that anyone using "code" to describe a part of the agency would have to drop a dollar in a MWR (morale, welfare and recreation) Fund jar by the door.

He also sought to consolidate roles and responsibilities in a way that focused energies and resources along functional lines - not disperse them. Such a dispersal had been Dan Goldin's way of running the agency. In order to avoid having any one person wield too much power (with the exception of George Abbey of course who ran his own fiefdom within Johnson Space Center) Goldin broke up large offices into smaller ones - increasing the number of Associate Administrators every time. Some joked that he might soon need an other alphabet with more letters.

By dispersing authority, Goldin was able to manage the agency more easily - since no one person or office could thwart his plans. Despite the somewhat emasculating effect it had on people and organizations Goldin's approach did actually provided a curious sort of stability for the agency. While NASA was no longer known as an energetic center of innovation, it none the less managed to retain the status quo rather well - even as Goldin championed 7 years of cuts to the agency's overall budget. Alas, this organization Goldin left behind was best suited for keeping the pilot light on - not firing an afterburner and leaping on to new challenges.

O'Keefe would tackle this problem head on. Enterprises and various offices would disappear. Instead, new directorates would be formed. The Space Operations Directorate, which would manage missions being performed in space would be headed by Associate Administrator for Space Flight Bill Readdy. The Exploration Systems Directorate would be run by Craig Steidle. The old Office of Biological and Physical Research (OBPR) would be absorbed into Steidle's directorate. Former OBPR AA Mary Kicza would become the new Associate Deputy Administrator for Systems Integration.

The Science Mission Directorate would be comprised of the old Office of Space Science and the Office of Earth Science and would be run by Goddard Space Flight Center director Al Diaz. Former AA for Space Science Ed Weiler would move to become the new center director at Goddard. Former AA for Earth Science, Ghassem Asrar would become Diaz's Deputy and would also serve as Chief Exploration Scientist. The Aeronautics Directorate would be run by current Office of Aeronautics AA Victor Lebacqz.

The previous NASA Headquarters offices of Public Affairs, External Relations, and Legislative Affairs would now all be overseen by a new Mission Support Directorate in headed by an Assistant Administrator who would report directly to O'Keefe.

All other organizations would at Headquarters would be tweaked a bit, but would otherwise remain unchanged.

This new NASA headquarters organization would be run by a new Strategic Planning Council (SPC). Gone would be the Executive Council and the Joint Strategic Assessment Committee. (JSAC). The SPC would be chaired by O'Keefe. Its members would include Deputy Administrator Fred Gregory, Bill Readdy, Craig Steidle, Al Diaz, Victor Lebacqz, ADA for Integration Mary Kicza, ADA for Institutions and Asset Management Jim Jennings, and a new ADA for communications.

Ex officio members of the SPC would include NASA Chief of Staff John Schumacher, NASA Comptroller Steve Isakowitz, Chief Exploration Scientist Ghassem Asrar, and Charles Elachi who would now serve as the agency's Director of Strategic Planning while still retaining his JPL center director position.

In addition to these changes, all of the agency's field center Chief Financial Officers (CFO) would now report directly to NASA's CFO Gwen Brown at NASA Headquarters. Previously, all of the center CFOs had reported to their respective center directors. As NASA sought to reform its Byzantine financial management system - one wherein every center had their own way of doing things - it soon became clear that the agency needed to take additional steps such that everyone everywhere was singing from the same song sheet.

In addition to central coordination of financial management, NASA would also seek to firm up the management of its corporate image - communications and legislative affairs. Among the changes was having the public affairs operations at each center begin to coordinate their activities under the direct management of NASA headquarters.

As the Summer progressed, additional personnel changes would be announced which sought to further tighten and coordinate this new 'corporate' style of NASA management with more and more coordination coming to Headquarters - away for the field centers.

A decade earlier, Dan Goldin had sought to give more authority to the field centers. The net result was what came to be called "stove piping" where all centers began dueling fiefdoms - all intent on having their own min-NASA complete with efforts which unabashedly duplicated those resident at other centers. Everyone had a piece of something. Headquarters was often reduced to negotiating with its field centers instead of directing them. Given the way Goldin had diluted the power base at headquarters, the field centers got away with it. O'Keefe now sought to reverse that pendulum - and retool the agency as needed to accomplish the challenge that lay ahead.