AAS Issues Statement On Proposed Cancellation Of James Webb Space Telescope

The American Astronomical Society (AAS) today issued a strong statement protesting yesterday's proposal from the House Appropriations Committee to cancel the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), Hubble's successor and the centerpiece of U.S. space astronomy for the next two decades.

"The proposed cancellation of JWST is such a bad idea," says AAS Executive Officer Dr. Kevin B. Marvel.

"Several billion dollars have already been spent developing new cutting-edge technology, and the last thing the American people want is for Congress to throw good money away. The U.S. will rightly be proud of the accomplishments of JWST, but first we need to finish it and launch it."

JWST is much larger than the Hubble telescope - 6.5 meters (21.3 feet) in diameter compared with 2.4 meters (7.9 feet) - and is designed to see much farther out in space and much farther back in time, to the era when the first stars and galaxies lit up the infant universe. Conceived in 1996 and under construction since 2004, JWST is passing one technical milestone after another en route to a launch later this decade. Just last month opticians finished polishing the last of its 18 primary-mirror segments.

The House move to cancel JWST is part of a larger congressional effort to impose belt-tightening at NASA, the National Science Foundation (NSF), and other federal science agencies. In the Appropriations Committee's draft bill, for example, NASA is funded at $16.8 billion, which is $1.6 billion below last year's level and $1.9 billion below President Obama's request, and NSF would receive $6.9 billion, the same as last year's funding and $907 million below the president's request.

The AAS recognizes that these are difficult and challenging economic times but feels strongly that any short-term budgetary gains from canceling JWST would be more than offset by the associated loss of high-tech jobs, damage to U.S. preeminence in science and technology, and loss of a mission that, like Hubble, is guaranteed to inspire the public and motivate large numbers of American schoolchildren to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

"JWST will lay the foundation on which a better understanding of the early universe will be built," says AAS President Dr. Debra M. Elmegreen. "It has the potential to transform astronomy even more than the Hubble Space Telescope did, and it will serve thousands of astronomers in the decades ahead. We cannot abandon it now."