An Alabama lawmaker just wants NASA to fly SLS, doesn’t care about payloads
The US House Appropriations Committee passed a budget bill for NASA on Thursday, and it's generally good for the space agency. The legislation provides $25.04 billion, and it funds most of NASA's top spaceflight priorities, including the Artemis Moon program.
Notably, the bill appropriates $1.345 billion for a Human Landing System as part of the Artemis Program. And although some House members grumbled during hearings this week about NASA's decision in April to select SpaceX as the sole provider of the first demonstration landing, the legislation does not block NASA from moving forward with the contract.
As part of its plan to return humans to the Moon, NASA has sought to balance its reliance on traditional space contractors such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin—generally favored by members of Congress due to their largesse in political donations and willingness to spread jobs across numerous districts—and new space companies such as SpaceX that deliver more bang for the buck while not playing as well with elected officials.
One major implication of NASA's $2.89 billion award to SpaceX in April for the Human Landing System is that the contract provided significant funding for the Starship rocket and its Super Heavy booster. This advanced launch system will directly compete with NASA's Space Launch System rocket, which is built by traditional space contractors and provides thousands of jobs in all 50 states. If Starship works, which seems increasingly likely, it will launch more payload than the SLS booster, for substantially less money, all while being reusable. In short, it should be superior to NASA's SLS rocket in every conceivable way, except politically.
