14 DAY TRIAL // NASA is supporting the development of several private spacecraft, with the purpose of choosing the best of them when the time comes. But Representative Frank Wolf (R-Va.) asked the agency some time ago to narrow down the list of candidates considerably.
On June 5 Wolf, who is the chairman of the House appropriations committee that oversees NASA spending, announced that he came to an agreement with space agency Administrator Charles Bolden, which allows the organization to sign funded Space Act Agreements.
These are the type of documents that NASA needs to sign with private companies in order to be able to fund the latter properly. The good news here is that it will now be able to support multiple developers, potentially increasing the quality and number of end-products available to choose from.
But Wolf did not renounce his original idea entirely, Space reports. “I remain convinced that the approach outlined in the committee’s report is the most appropriate way forward for the program,” he said in a statement released on Tuesday.