The Bicker Board

[Durian Fiend]

 ...The issue is the proposed funding cuts to end these missions and the underlying rationale behind it.

Or one could close their minds to THAT debate and continue to argue whether is drizzling or sprinkling outside.

Good point.  OK, let's bicker about it.  From the article:

"The cost of maintaining the two OCO satellite missions up in space is a small fraction of the amount of money taxpayers already spent to design and launch the instruments. The two missions cost about $750 million to design, build and launch, according to David Crisp, the retired NASA scientist...
By comparison, maintaining both OCO missions in orbit costs about $15 million per year, Crisp says...   

( DF adds, the two missions were launched in 2014 and 2019.)

"Just from an economic standpoint, it makes no economic sense to terminate NASA missions that are returning incredibly valuable data," Crisp says.

NASA's recent call for universities and companies to potentially take over the cost of maintaining the OCO instrument attached to the International Space Station suggests the agency is also considering privatizing NASA science missions. Such partnerships raise a host of thorny questions, says Michalak, who has worked with private companies, nonprofit groups, universities and the federal government on greenhouse gas monitoring satellite projects.
"On the one hand the private sector is really starting to have a role," Michalak says. In recent years, multiple private groups in the U.S. have launched satellites that measure methane, a potent planet-warming gas that is poorly monitored compared to carbon dioxide.
"Looking at it from the outside, it can look like the private sector is really picking up some of what the federal agencies were doing in terms of Earth observations," she explains. "And it's true that they're contributing." But, she says, "Those efforts would not be possible without this underlying investment from public funding."



 Of course, it's the responsibility of Congress to fund NASA.  Up until this point, they've indicated an interest in maintaining a status quo budget.  The question is whether their Republican members will eventually cave to Russell Vought's Project 2025 desire to cut NASA funding by 25%.  I suspect the answer will be "yes".