Hubble successor survives brush with death

David Shiga, reporter

The James Webb Space Telescope will go forward after all, despite threats to cancel it. But lawmakers warned that the troubled flagship mission will be under close scrutiny. Meanwhile, Congress has approved less than half of the money requested by the White House for developing commercial space taxis.

JWST is meant to follow up on the work of the Hubble Space Telescope, peering back farther in time to the formation of the first galaxies and possibly looking for signatures of life in the atmospheres of Earth-like exoplanets.

But its ballooning costs and schedule delays led the US House of Representatives to threaten its cancellation in July. Researchers have been conflicted about this, with some strongly supporting JWST and others fretting that continuing it will leave too little cash for other possible missions.

Now it appears JWST will fly after all, as the US Congress has agreed to keep funding it ? at least through 2012.

On 17 November, lawmakers approved a 2012 budget for NASA, which includes $530 million to keep JWST on track for launch in 2018. But they also warned that the project will be reviewed again if its overall cost looks likely to grow beyond the latest estimate of $8 billion.

Even JWST's chief advocate in Congress, Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland, is warning NASA to keep the project's costs under control. "We cannot accept any further overruns," she said.

While JWST moves full speed ahead, NASA is cutting back on support for commercial space taxis, meant to ferry astronauts to the International Space Station in the post-shuttle era.

Congress approved just $406 million in assistance for companies developing space taxis, less than half of what the White House had proposed. That could mean a longer wait before these vehicles are ready to fly, previously estimated to be in 2017 (assuming funding of $500 million per year).

Source: http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/1a478204/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Cblogs0Cshortsharpscience0C20A110C110Chubble0Esuccessor0Esurvives0Ebrus0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

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