So, we knew that Trump would have some sort of space policy and yesterday he revealed it. Space Policy Directive 1 according to Trump “marks a first step in returning American astronauts to the Moon for the first time since 1972, for long-term exploration and use. This time, we will not only plant our flag and leave our footprints — we will establish a foundation for an eventual mission to Mars, and perhaps someday, to many worlds beyond.” This sound sort of like Newt Gingrich’s idea from back in 2012 to build a colony on the Moon. It sort of is a tweak to Obama’s plans as we will no longer be going to an asteroid. Now NASA and science haven’t been at the forefront of the Trump Presidency with facts taking a seat behind feelings, sure the race back to the moon seems to be a common Republican goal but it would be great if they could “make NASA great again”. (#MNASAGA, anyone?) Previous attempts to make it back to the moon from the past Republican Presidents have failed to pick up steam. It’s nice that there are some guidelines being set out but it would be a whole lot better if NASA had an Administrator and one who knows that Climate Change is a thing.
However, I doubt anything will be coming of this unless Congress approves some more funding for NASA, in the 2012 Neil deGrasse Tyson told the Senate Science Committee that “Right now, NASA’s annual budget is half a penny on your tax dollar. For twice that—a penny on a dollar—we can transform the country from a sullen, dispirited nation, weary of economic struggle, to one where it has reclaimed its 20th-century birthright to dream of tomorrow.” For just a penny basically the same budget that NASA got in the 70s-90s a lot could be done and I doubt that we’d get anywhere to the 3- 4% of the Federal Budget that it got building the Apollo program. Let alone that fact that it won’t be until 2019 that the first test flight of the new Orion Spacecraft will be launched and that most likely will be unmanned and it won’t be until 2021 that we will see a manned mission. Will this policy include that new cis-lunar space station built with Roscosmos, the second International Space Station or perhaps an American space station or something else? It just want to set America as a leader in Space once again so it seem doubtful. Yet, the good news is that in 2018 the US can finally send people back up to space from its own soil with the Commercial Crew systems by SpaceX and Boeing. I guess we will have to wait and see what all happens.