Throughout the changes in its funding and launch date projections, the Webb telescope occupied between 1.5% and 4.0% of NASA’s total budget. How much of NASA’s overall budget went to the Webb telescope? In total, NASA plans to spend about $1.1 billion more on the telescope through 2027. Once the telescope was launched in 2021, costs decreased significantly and are expected to remain lower for the duration of the telescope’s time in space. Costs began to decrease after most construction was completed in 2016, but according to a Government Accountability Office report, challenges in engineering and oversight resulted in rising costs and project delays from 2019 to 2021. Most of its funding was spent on the development of the telescope including initial modeling of the project, construction of each of its components, and testing before its launch.Īs development progressed in the early 2010s, increasing engineering challenges resulted in rising costs that reached a peak in 2014. It surpassed $1.2 billion in total spending by 2007, three years after development began.Īccording to NASA budget documents, the project has cost about $10 billion through the 2021 fiscal year. The Webb telescope was initially given a $1 billion total budget with a projected launch date of 2010.
How did the budget for the James Webb Space Telescope change over time? This is the same process used for conducting research with the Hubble Space Telescope and other space and ground-based observatories. In addition to NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency already are conducting research with the Webb telescope. A team of other scientists review, rank, and select which proposals get access. While NASA was responsible for building the telescope, it’s considered a “General Observatory,” meaning scientists can make research proposals for using the telescope. The telescope will spend the remainder of its time taking images of deep space, using devices that capture infrared light, which isn’t observable by humans with the naked eye. Other goals for the project are observing the formation of stars from their early stages and investigating whether distant planets have the potential for life. It can also help determine how galaxies evolved after they formed. So when researchers use the telescope, they’re essentially looking backwards in time, to some of the earliest periods of our universe.Īccording to NASA, the telescope will help scientists search for the first galaxies formed after the creation of the universe. Light from these distant objects takes thousands of years to reach Earth. These features give it the ability to look deeper into space. The James Webb Space Telescope is a “large, space-based observatory.” Considered a successor or expansion on the Hubble Space Telescope, the Webb telescope is more sensitive than Hubble and is optimized for infrared light. What does the James Webb Space Telescope do?
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