Research, environmental efforts in Hampton Roads benefit from federal spending plan
The $1.1 trillion spending bill that just cleared Congress includes millions of dollars toward advanced aircraft, a cleaner Chesapeake Bay, stiffer standards for oil tank cars and repairs to the state's spaceport damaged by a rocket explosion in October.
In fact, aeronautics and environmental efforts in Hampton Roads and the Eastern Shore are looking at tens of millions of dollars under the compromise fiscal year 2015 plan that funds the federal government through next September. The bill now moves to President Barack Obama for his signature.
Local NASA facilities are big winners under the plan. U.S. Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner announced in a joint statement over the weekend that NASA Langley Research Center would get much of a $90 million increase in NASA's aeronautics research, while the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) at NASA Wallops would get $20 million to fully fund launch pad repairs.
At NASA Langley, director Steve Jurczyk said Monday it's unclear yet how much of that extra aeronautics money will be coming directly to the Hampton center.
NASA Langley leads the agency's Advanced Composites Project to drastically shrink the time it takes to develop a new composite material and get it certified for aircraft structures. Jurczyk said his center is also working with other NASA centers on a new project called Convergent Aeronautics Solutions, focusing on "more basic, more high-risk and high-payoff technologies" for next-generation aircraft and air traffic management systems.
"We view it as very positive," Jurczyk said of the budget increase, "with respect to being able to make more rapid progress on advancing the strategic implementation plan that our Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate established for us."
The $20 million for MARS is intended to fully fund repairs after an Antares rocket exploded just after launch on Oct. 28, damaging the pad and surrounding support facilities. The rocket had been boosting a Cygnus cargo craft to the International Space Station when its first-stage engine apparently malfunctioned. No one was injured, but state officials had fretted over how to pay to fix the state-owned launch pad.
The spending plan also bumps up funding by $3 million to the Chesapeake Bay Program, a partnership of federal, state and local governments, nonprofit agencies and academic groups to restore the polluted estuary. The program's federal funding is to go from $70 million to $73 million.
"It's great news that the bay program is receiving a slight boost in funding," Christy Everett, Hampton Roads director of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, said Monday. "Prior investments in bay restoration are starting to produce results. It's vital that the federal government continues to be a strong partner in the cleanup effort."
The spending plan also addresses concerns over the safety of rail tank cars that carry volatile crude oil and other hazardous materials through states including Virginia after a disastrous derailment in downtown Lynchburg in April that resulted in 20,000 gallons of Bakken crude spilling into the James River and catching fire.
Kaine and Warner said the legislation directs the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration to improve standards for the DOT-111 tank car by Jan. 15.
But one vocal proponent of rail car safety claims that directive falls far short of what's needed to keep the public safe. Fred Millar of Arlington said it's unclear if tank cars can be made puncture-proof under current rail conditions, and doubtful that understaffed federal regulators can come up with workable standards in time.
"It's a very tough deadline to try to meet," Millar said. "It just means we're going to have inadequate regulations sooner than if we gave them a few more months."
Adrienne Kotula, policy specialist with the James River Association, said the provision was good news nonetheless.
"Any improvements in tank car standards for crude by rail would be a welcome change and something that would be necessary to protect the James from these trains that are coming through every week," Kotula said.
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