![]() This article was provided by Space News, dedicated to covering all aspects of the space industry. Whereas Hubble makes its observations in visible light spectrum - and to a lesser degree in the ultraviolet and infrared spectra - JWST is optimized for observations in infrared wavelengths. Hubble, on the other hand, is in a low Earth orbit and was deployed and later serviced by space shuttle astronauts. The Webb telescope, unlike Hubble, would be deployed far from the Earth at an Earth-sun Lagrange point - a point in space where the respective gravitational pulls of the two bodies cancel one another out. What they have planned is that there will be offsets to pay for JWST because it is now a priority of the entire agency."īoth astronomy groups denied lobbying either Congress or NASA to cut specific programs in order to fund Webb. "NASA has a clear vision for JWST," said Bethany Johns, a public policy fellow at the American Astronomical Society. Webb's budget issues are "so large that they just can't be resolved purely within" the Science Mission Directorate, Smith said. "What we have advocated is that the scale of the problem and the prominence of James Webb for the agency was such that it should be considered an agency-wide solution," William Smith, president of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, told Space News Friday (Aug. Two Washington-based astronomy groups now say preserving the JWST mission will require funding contributions from both inside and outside NASA's Science Mission Directorate. Perrotto said "final decisions regarding implementation of the JWST replan will be reflected in the 2013 budget request." That means the effect of JWST overruns on other NASA science programs - and possibly on programs outside the Science Mission Directorate - will not be unveiled until February, when the White House, per tradition, submits its annual budget request to Congress. Following the release of the Casani report, NASA created a separate JWST program office that reports directly to Ed Weiler, associate administrator for NASA's $5 billion Science Mission Directorate. NASA, meanwhile, is not saying how it plans to funnel the necessary extra funds to the Webb program, which previously was part of the agency's Astrophysics Division funding account. The Senate has yet to weigh in with its version of the 2012 NASA spending bill. As the largest optical telescope in space, it is equipped with high-resolution and high-sensitivity instruments, allowing it to view objects too old, distant, or faint for the Hubble Space Telescope. Wolf subsequently put that cost estimate as high as $8.7 billion. The James Webb Space Telescope ( JWST) is a space telescope currently conducting infrared astronomy. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), who chairs the House Appropriations subcommittee that drafted the legislation, cited an $8 billion cost estimate for the program during the full committee markup of the bill. The report triggered the NASA replanning exercise, but the agency up to now had been mum about how much the JWST program would ultimately cost.Ĭiting JWST's chronic cost- growth problems, the House Appropriations Committee in July recommended canceling the program in its version of the 2012 NASA spending bill.
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