NASA Lunar Programs:

Opportunities Exist to Strengthen Analyses and Plans for Moon Landing

GAO-20-68: Published: Dec 19, 2019. Publicly Released: Dec 19, 2019.

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Cristina Chaplain
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chaplainc@gao.gov

 

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In March 2019, the White House directed NASA to accelerate its plans to return humans to the moon by 2024—4 years earlier than NASA had planned.

To meet this new goal, NASA made some changes to its approach. But it is still pursuing an array of complex efforts, including a small platform in lunar orbit called the Gateway, where crew could transit to and from the moon. Some have questioned the path NASA is taking and NASA has not fully explained how it arrived at its plans. So we recommended that NASA document its rationale for these decisions.

We also recommended that NASA develop an official cost estimate for the 2024 lunar landing mission.

A Potential Configuration of the Systems Needed for 2024 Moon Landing

Illustration of components of potential moon landing system and the moon

Illustration of components of potential moon landing system and the moon

Multimedia:

Additional Materials:

Contact:

Cristina Chaplain
(202) 512-4841
chaplainc@gao.gov

 

Office of Public Affairs
(202) 512-4800
youngc1@gao.gov

What GAO Found

To support accelerated plans to land astronauts on the moon by 2024—four years earlier than planned—the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) quickly refocused its acquisition plans. In particular, NASA separated its lunar plans into two phases, with the first phase focused on the systems NASA identified to support the new timeline (see figure). One system, Gateway, includes three components—power and propulsion, habitation, and logistics—to form a small platform in lunar orbit.

Systems NASA Identified for the 2024 Moon Landing

HL_5_v1-103314

NASA has begun making decisions related to requirements, cost, and schedule for programs, but is behind in taking these steps for the whole lunar mission:

NASA risks the discovery of integration challenges and needed changes late in the development process because it established some requirements for individual lunar programs before finalizing requirements for the overall lunar mission. NASA plans to take steps to mitigate this risk, such as by holding reviews to ensure that requirements align across programs, but has not yet defined these reviews or determined when they would occur.

NASA has made some decisions that will increase visibility into the costs and schedules for individual lunar programs, but does not plan to develop a cost estimate for the first mission. Cost estimates provide management with critical cost-risk information to improve control of resources. Without a cost estimate for this mission, Congress will not have insight into affordability and NASA will not have insight into monitoring total mission costs.

NASA conducted studies to inform its lunar plans, but did not fully assess a range of alternatives to these plans. GAO best practices state that analyzing alternatives provides a framework to help ensure that entities consistently and reliably select the alternative that best meets the mission need and justify agency decisions. Given NASA's schedule, conducting this analysis is no longer viable. Instead, NASA intends to create a summary of the studies that informed its lunar plans. However, it has not committed to a completion date. Without a documented rationale, NASA is ill-positioned to effectively communicate its decisions to stakeholders and facilitate a better understanding of its plans.

Why GAO Did This Study

In March 2019, the White House directed NASA to accelerate its plans to return humans to the moon by 4 years, to 2024. To accomplish a lunar landing, NASA is developing programs including a small platform in lunar orbit, known as Gateway, and a lunar lander. NASA plans to use the Space Launch System and Orion crew capsule—two programs with a history of cost growth and schedule delays—to launch and transport crew to Gateway.

The House Committee on Appropriations included a provision in its 2018 report for GAO to review NASA's proposed lunar-focused programs, including the Gateway program. GAO's report assesses (1) how NASA updated its lunar plans to support the accelerated 2024 landing timeline; (2) the extent to which NASA has made initial decisions about requirements, cost, and schedule for its lunar mission and programs; and (3) the extent to which NASA analyzed alternatives for its lunar plans, including the Gateway program. GAO analyzed NASA lunar mission and program documents, assessed NASA studies that informed NASA's lunar plans, and interviewed NASA officials.

What GAO Recommends

GAO is making a total of 6 recommendations to NASA, including to define and schedule reviews that align requirements across lunar programs; create a cost estimate for the first lunar mission; and commit to a completion date and finalize a cohesive document outlining the rationale for selecting its current lunar plans. NASA concurred with the recommendations made in this report.

For more information, contact Cristina Chaplain at (202) 512-4841 or chaplainc@gao.gov.

Recommendations for Executive Action

  1. Status: Open

    Comments: NASA agreed with this recommendation and stated that the Advanced Exploration Systems division will review program life-cycle review plans to ensure enterprise and program requirements are reconciled across the mission. NASA is in the process of determining the organizational structure of the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate. Following this completion, NASA officials stated that the appropriate control board and division structures for review and program direction will become active.

    Recommendation: The NASA Administrator should ensure that the NASA Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations directs the Advanced Exploration Systems division to define and determine a schedule for synchronization reviews, including the role of the proposed Lunar Exploration Control Board, to help ensure that requirements between mission and program levels are reconciled. (Recommendation 1)

    Agency Affected: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

  2. Status: Open

    Comments: NASA agreed with this recommendation and stated it would conduct a joint cost and schedule confidence level analysis or equivalent. The Gateway program is planning to conduct a series of project- and program-level reviews and assessments aligned with key decision point reviews. This includes conducting a joint cost and schedule confidence level analysis or equivalent of the Gateway initial configuration to support a program key decision point planned for fall 2021. NASA has not yet taken action on this recommendation.

    Recommendation: The NASA Administrator should ensure that the NASA Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations directs the Gateway program to conduct a joint cost and schedule confidence level at the program level for the Artemis III mission. (Recommendation 2)

    Agency Affected: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

  3. Status: Open

    Comments: NASA agreed with this recommendation, but has not yet taken action on it. NASA stated that it would provide a schedule for future reviews, including whether there will be a Key Decision Point (KDP) II, at the KDP-I review currently scheduled for fall 2021.

    Recommendation: The NASA Administrator should ensure that the NASA Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations directs the Gateway program to update its overall schedule for 2024 to add a KDP II to occur before system integration. (Recommendation 3)

    Agency Affected: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

  4. Status: Open

    Priority recommendation

    Comments: NASA agreed with the recommendation and stated that the agency will provide a preliminary cost estimate for the Artemis III mission by the end of 2020. Further, NASA stated that it will provide an updated cost estimate for the Artemis III mission after it establishes cost and schedule commitments for some of the projects that compose the lunar mission, currently planned for the Spring of 2021. To fully implement this recommendation, NASA will need to provide a cost estimate.

    Recommendation: The NASA Administrator should ensure that the NASA Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations creates a life-cycle cost estimate for the Artemis III mission. (Recommendation 4)

    Agency Affected: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

  5. Status: Open

    Comments: NASA agreed with this recommendation and stated that it is developing a document that will summarize the trades and architectural studies, but the document is not yet complete.

    Recommendation: The NASA Administrator should ensure that the NASA Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations directs the Advanced Exploration Systems division to commit to a completion date and finalize a cohesive document outlining the rationale for selecting its current lunar architecture and lunar programs. (Recommendation 5)

    Agency Affected: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

  6. Status: Open

    Comments: NASA agreed with this recommendation, but has not yet taken any action on it. NASA stated that it will provide additional clarifying guidance for conducting analyses of alternatives for new programs in the next update to NASA Procedural Requirements 7120.5E, "NASA Space Flight Program and Project Management Requirements." NASA plans to complete the update of the procedural requirement in September 2021.

    Recommendation: The NASA Administrator should ensure that the Office of the Chief Engineer determines under what conditions it is appropriate to complete an analysis of alternatives, particularly when there are multiple pathways—including architectures or programs—that NASA could pursue in the future, and document the justification for not completing an analysis. (Recommendation 6)

    Agency Affected: National Aeronautics and Space Administration

 

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