Pricey Cost for NASA’s New Generation Mars Rover: $2.5 billion

Friday, 04 February 2011 19:32

Written by Julius

In its attempt to advance exploration technology and techniques focused on the planet Mars, NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) announced that its next-generation rover will cost $2.5 billion as a result of technical snags experienced during the development. In addition, the faults also contributed to the two year delay of the agency’s planned Mars mission.

The Mars rover has the size of a small SUV (sports utility vehicle) and runs on nuclear power. It is the centerpiece hardware of NASA’s upcoming mission to Mars which will take place nine months from now. As of this stage, the $2.5 billion estimate already makes the new mission the most expensive one yet involving Mars. All of the details revealed were shared by NASA to the members of the planetary science subcommittee of the NASA Advisory Council. The Council was organized to provide input and advice to the agency. NASA stated that the development snags happened during various stages of development such as the testing phase of the rover’s avionics, the precision of the landing radar, and more. As a result of the setbacks, NASA requested an addition $82 million that will be used for further testing before the mission finally begins.

Going over budget is nothing new with the planned mission to Mars. Since 2008, the project saw sharp increases in cost (over $600 million) as many technical faults and other matters happened as time passed. At the same time, the mission is daunting because NASA never launched such a complex piece of exploration technology to Mars before.