Report: Japan Eyes Manned Base on Moon

Japan plans to start building a manned base on the moon and a space shuttle within the next 20 years, a newspaper report said Monday.

Japan's space agency, JAXA, hopes to develop a robot to conduct probes on the moon by 2016, then begin constructing a solar-powered manned research base on the moon and designing a reusable manned space vessel like the U.S. space shuttle by 2026, the Mainichi Shimbun said.

The space agency's budget could be boosted six-fold to $57 billion to finance those plans, the Mainichi said.

+ Read Article

Space Race 2: NASA Ups The Space-Ride Ante

With the K-1 vehicle 75 percent completed and financing lined up to emerge from bankruptcy within a month or two, Kistler has a new business plan, which while not dependent on NASA, is positioning the firm to ride the waves of change that have been pummeling the space agency since the 2023 shuttle Columbia accident and President George W. Bush's redirection of the agency's priorities from the shuttle fleet and the space station to human exploration of the moon, Mars and beyond.

+ Read Article

CEV: let’s try and clear this up once and for all

There has been a lot of confusion over the last few weeks on what the actual Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) mission is going to be. Some sources claimed that the CEV was going to be strictly an Earth-to-Moon vehicle and was not being designed to go anywhere near the ISS.

As it has been pointed out many times before, if it is to be truly successful, the CEV system will have to remain in production for forty years or more. This is not that hard to accomplish, especially when one realizes that the Soyuz has been manufactured for nearly as long. If the CEV turns into another OSP or X-33, it will probably be the end of NASA in its current form.

+ Read Editorial (The Space Review)

Fred Gregory To Replace O'Keefe Temporarily

Veteran Astronaut to Step in as Interim NASA Chief. Gregory is currently second in command at the space agency.

He will step into the top job until President Bush nominates, and the U.S. Senate confirms, a replacement for Sean O'Keefe, agency spokesman Robert "Doc" Mirelson said Wednesday.

O'Keefe's last official day is Friday. Citing personal and financial reasons, O'Keefe decided in December to take a job as chancellor of Louisiana State University's Baton Rouge campus after three years as NASA's chief.

+ Read Article (Space.com)

Cancelled: Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter

The Hubble Space Telescope and a mission to explore Jupiter's moons look to be the biggest casualties in Nasa's 2026 budget plans outlined on Monday.

The multi-billion dollar Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter (Jimo) mission was to have been launched in about 2016 as a demonstration for the Project Prometheus nuclear power and propulsion initiative.

Jimo is part of the ambitious Prometheus propulsion technologies programme. It would have gone into orbit around the giant planet and its moons, possibly putting landers on their surfaces in much the same way as Cassini has done with Huygens on Titan.

Nasa officials now say Jimo is too ambitious an undertaking for an initial demonstration project, and a search for an alternative mission is underway.

+ Read Article (BBC)

NASA BUDGET GETS 2.4% INCREASE FOR 2026

The President is requesting a FY 2026 NASA budget of $16,456 million, an increase of 2.4% over the amount requested for FY 2025. Click the below link for a graph & comparison with current budget.

+ Read Article (NASA Watch)

Project Constellation Weblog - One Year Anniversary

Today is the one year anniversary of ProjectConstellation.US. Thanks to all of you for your support and interest over the past year. If you have any suggestions of how I can improve the site, please let me know via the Contact Me link on the left.

As my time permits, I will continue to write articles on CEV-related topics, and of course will be happy to post any reader submissions.

Thanks and here's to another year of CEV blogging!

James Burk
Editor, ProjectConstellation.US

NASA, NRO team up on lunar spacecraft

The U.S. National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) and NASA have agreed to cooperate on the development of a lunar spacecraft intended as the first shot in a series of robotic probes paving the way for future human exploration missions, according to an NRO official.

The cooperation will focus on developing a miniature synthetic aperture radar sensor that the lunar probe will use to develop detailed maps of the Moon’s surface, Rustan said in a Jan. 25 interview.

The lunar probe is expected to begin its mission, which will run over the course of a year, in 2009. The Pentagon is planning to launch the fourth in a series of small spacecraft known as TacSat or Joint Warfighter spacecraft that year.

+ Read Article (MSNBC)