Europa Clipper

The Office of Inspector General's audit from May warned of cost and schedule problems for the Europa Clipper program.

NASA's letter to Congress urges the removal of the requirement to launch the Europa Clipper on an SLS.

The findings align with the objectives of NASA's Europa Clipper mission, which was launched in 2024 to perform multiple close flybys of Europa to investigate its ice shell, subsurface ocean, and potential to support life.

By December 2018, the understaffing for the Europa Clipper mission at JPL grew to 67 positions.

NASA’s budget proposal offered $264,700,000 for Europa Clipper and did not include funding for a Europa lander.

NASA’s budget proposal sought to launch Europa Clipper in 2025 on a commercial vehicle.

NASA’s budget proposal projected a 2025 launch for Europa Clipper using a commercially procured launch vehicle.

NASA’s fiscal year 2019 budget request proposed launching Europa Clipper in 2025 on a commercially procured vehicle.

NASA would seek to launch Europa Clipper on a commercial launch vehicle rather than SLS in fiscal year 2020 planning, a move projected to save over $700,000,000.

NASA’s fiscal year 2020 budget proposal calls for using a commercially procured launch vehicle for Europa Clipper to save over $700,000,000 compared with SLS while requiring gravity assist maneuvers and increasing travel time by several years.

The Europa Clipper mission, planned for a 2023 launch, plans to use the same JPL clean room and has stricter cleanliness requirements that could force Psyche integration and testing to be conducted off-site.

A follow-up OIG letter in August concluded NASA could save up to $1,000,000,000 by launching Europa Clipper on a commercial vehicle instead of the SLS and that NASA needed to decide how to launch the mission within months to support a potential 2023 launch.

The omnibus requires NASA to launch the Europa Clipper mission on a Space Launch System vehicle by 2025.

Europa Clipper met a JPL recommendation of 25% unallocated future expenses (UFE) after completing a final delta preliminary design review in June 2019.

A House appropriations bill introduced 2020-07-07 conditions Europa Clipper launching on SLS only 'if available', granting NASA some flexibility compared with previous spending bills.

The House CJS bill directs $403,500,000 for the Europa Clipper mission, the same amount as NASA requested.

The House provides $403,500,000 for the Europa Clipper mission, matching NASA’s requested amount.

NASA’s budget proposals sought to launch Europa Clipper on a commercial vehicle to save the agency as much as $1,500,000,000 and free SLS vehicles for the Artemis lunar exploration program.

A 2021-01-25 memo from NASA’s Planetary Missions Program Office directed the agency to immediately cease efforts to maintain SLS compatibility for Europa Clipper and move forward with a commercial launch vehicle.

NASA estimated that using a commercial launch vehicle for Europa Clipper could save as much as $1,500,000,000.