    [House Hearing, 113 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

                              THREATS FROM SPACE:
                      A REVIEW OF U.S. GOVERNMENT EFFORTS
                        TO TRACK AND MITIGATE ASTEROIDS
                         AND METEORS (PART I & PART II)

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   BEFORE THE

                  COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                        ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   __________

                            TUESDAY, MARCH 19, 2013
                                      and
                           WEDNESDAY, APRIL 10, 2013

                                   __________

                               Serial No. 113-14
                                      and
                               Serial No. 113-17

                                   __________

     Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology

           Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov

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                  COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY

                       HON. LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas, Chair
    DANA ROHRABACHER, California         EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
    RALPH M. HALL, Texas                 ZOE LOFGREN, California
    F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR.,         DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois
        Wisconsin                        DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland
    FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma             FREDERICA S. WILSON, Florida
    RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas              SUZANNE BONAMICI, Oregon
    MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas             ERIC SWALWELL, California
    PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia               DAN MAFFEI, New York
    STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi       ALAN GRAYSON, Florida
    MO BROOKS, Alabama                   JOSEPH KENNEDY III, Massachusetts
    RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois             SCOTT PETERS, California
    LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana               DEREK KILMER, Washington
    STEVE STOCKMAN, Texas                AMI BERA, California
    BILL POSEY, Florida                  ELIZABETH ESTY, Connecticut
    CYNTHIA LUMMIS, Wyoming              MARC VEASEY, Texas
    DAVID SCHWEIKERT, Arizona            JULIA BROWNLEY, California
    Thomas Massie, Kentucky              MARK TAKANO, California
    KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota           VACANCY
    JIM BRIDENSTINE, Oklahoma
    RANDY WEBER, Texas
    CHRIS STEWART, Utah
    VACANCY

                                C O N T E N T S

                            Tuesday, March 19, 2013

                                                                       Page
    Witness List.....................................................     2

    Hearing Charter..................................................     3

                               Opening Statements

    Statement by Representative Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, Committee
      on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
      Representatives................................................     5
        Written Statement............................................     6

    Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Ranking
      Member, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House
      of Representatives.............................................     6

        Written Statement............................................     7

    Statement by Representative Donna F. Edwards, Committee on
      Science, Space and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives...     8
        Written Statement............................................     8

                                   Witnesses:

    The Honorable John P. Holdren, Director, Office of Science and
      Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President
        Oral Statement...............................................    10
        Written Statement............................................    12

    Gen. William L. Shelton, Commander, U.S. Air Force Space Command
        Oral Statement...............................................    19
        Written Statement............................................    20

    The Honorable Charles F. Bolden, Jr., Administrator, National
      Aeronautics and Space Administration
        Oral Statement...............................................    27
        Written Statement............................................    30

    Discussion.......................................................    38

                 Appendix I: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions

    The Honorable John P. Holdren, Director, Office of Science and
      Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President...........    64

    Gen. William L. Shelton, Commander, U.S. Air Force Space Command.    73

    The Honorable Charles F. Bolden, Jr., Administrator, National
      Aeronautics and Space Administration...........................    82

                Appendix II: Additional Material for the Record

    Submitted statement by Representative Steve Stockman, Committee
      on Science, Space and Technology...............................    94

    Letter submitted by Dr. Dante Lauretta, Department of Planetary
      Sciences, Lunar and Planetary Laboratory.......................    95

    Additional responses submitted by The Honorable Charles F.
      Bolden, Jr., Administrator, National Aeronautics and Space
      Administration.................................................    97
                                C O N T E N T S

                           Wednesday, April 10, 2013

                                                                       Page
    Witness List.....................................................   102

    Hearing Charter..................................................   103

                               Opening Statements

    Statement by Representative Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, Committee
      on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of
      Representatives................................................   105
        Written Statement............................................   105

    Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Ranking
      Member, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House
      of Representatives.............................................   106
        Written Statement............................................   107

                                   Witnesses:

    Dr. Ed Lu, Chairman and CEO, B612 Foundation
        Oral Statement...............................................   108
        Written Statement............................................   112

    Dr. Donald K. Yeomans, Manager, Near-Earth Objects Program
      Office, Jet Propulsion Laboratory
        Oral Statement...............................................   117
        Written Statement............................................   119

    Dr. Michael F. A'Hearn, Vice-Chair, Committee to Review Near-
      Earth Object Surveys and Hazard Mitigation Strategies, National
      Resource Council
        Oral Statement...............................................   126
        Written Statement............................................   128

    Discussion.......................................................   136

                 Appendix I: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions

    Dr. Ed Lu, Chairman and CEO, B612 Foundation.....................   150

    Dr. Donald K. Yeomans, Manager, Near-Earth Objects Program
      Office, Jet Propulsion Laboratory..............................   156

    Dr. Michael F. A'Hearn, Vice-Chair, Committee to Review Near-
      Earth Object Surveys and Hazard Mitigation Strategies, National
      Resource Council...............................................   169

                Appendix II: Additional Material for the Record

    Submitted statement by Representative Steve Stockman, Committee
      on Science, Space and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives   184

    Submitted statement by Representative Donna F. Edwards, Committee
      on Science, Space and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives   186

    Planetary Society Report submitted by Representative Dana
      Rohrabacher, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, U.S.
      House of Representatives.......................................   187

                              THREATS FROM SPACE:
                      A REVIEW OF U.S. GOVERNMENT EFFORTS
                        TO TRACK AND MITIGATE ASTEROIDS
                              AND METEORS, PART I

                                  ----------

                            TUESDAY, MARCH 19, 2013

                      House of Representatives,
                   Committee on Science, Space, and Technology,
                                                       Washington, D.C.

        The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 10:11 a.m., in Room
    2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Lamar Smith
    [Chairman of the Committee] presiding.

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0552.002

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0552.003

        Chairman Smith. The Committee on Science, Space, and
    Technology will come to order. Good morning. I am going to
    recognize myself for an opening statement, then the Ranking
    Member, the gentlewoman from Texas, will be recognized as well.
        Today's hearing is on a subject important to our Nation and
    to our world. This is the first hearing of two on space threats
    to Earth, reviewing U.S. Government efforts to track incoming
    asteroids and meteors.
        Although many may be only aware of this subject due to
    recent events, it is actually one as old as our planet. And I
    am going to hold up a copy of Time magazine from nearly 20
    years ago where this topic was featured on the cover. Here is
    Time, ``Cosmic Crash.'' This is 20 years ago. I don't know if
    they were ahead of their time or not, but in any case, the
    subject has been around for a while. This was actually given to
    me by a former staff member, who I had research the subject 20
    years ago as well.
        Though the issue has been around for a number of years,
    there are many questions still to be asked and answered. The
    range of questions are broad and complex, from how to track an
    object millions of miles away to how to respond if an asteroid
    or meteor is headed toward Earth.
        The two events of Friday, February 15, the harmless flyby
    of asteroid 2012 DA14 and the not-so-harmless impact of a
    meteor in Russia, are a stark reminder of the need to invest in
    space science. The asteroid passed just 17,000 miles from
    Earth, a distance less than the Earth's circumference. Fifty
    years ago, we would have had no way of seeing the asteroid
    coming, and even so, it was discovered by amateur astronomers.
    The United States has come a long way in its ability to track
    and characterize asteroids, meteors, comets and meteorites. But
    we still have a long way to go.
        NASA believes it has discovered 93 percent of the largest
    asteroids in near-Earth orbit, those 1 kilometer or larger, but
    what about the other seven percent remaining, about 70, or even
    those smaller than 1 kilometer, estimated to be in the
    thousands? An asteroid as small as 100 meters could destroy an
    entire city upon a direct hit. Are we tracking those? The
    meteor that struck Russia was estimated to be 17 meters, and
    wasn't tracked at all. The smaller they are, the harder they
    are to spot, and yet they can be life threatening.
        The broad scope of our efforts include participation of
    governments, research institutions, industries and amateur
    astronomers in their backyard or on home computers. Some space
    challenges require innovation, commitment and diligence. This
    is one of them. And this Committee will strive to continue to
    lead in this area. For all of the attention and publicity the
    two events of February 15 received, it was still too late for
    us to have acted to change the course of the incoming objects.
    We are in the same position today and for the foreseeable
    future unless we take actions now that improve our means of
    detection.
        Part of our discussion today is about how to achieve this
    in the current budget environment. I do not believe that NASA
    is going to somehow defy budget gravity and get an increase
    when everyone else is getting cuts. But we need to find ways to
    prioritize NASA's projects and squeeze as much productivity as
    we can out of the funds we have. Examining and exploring ways
    to protect the Earth from asteroids and meteors is a priority
    for the American people and should be a priority for NASA.
        We were fortunate that the events of last month were simply
    an interesting coincidence rather than a catastrophe. However,
    we still need to make investments and improvements in our
    capability to anticipate what may occur decades from now, or
    tomorrow.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Smith follows:]

      Prepared Statement of Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, House Committee on
                         Science, Space, and Technology

        Good morning. Today's hearing is on a subject important to our
    nation and to our world. This is the first hearing of two on Space
    Threats to Earth, reviewing U.S. Government efforts to track incoming
    asteroids and meteors.
        Although many may be only aware of this subject due to recent
    events, it is actually one as old as our planet. This is a copy of TIME
    Magazine from nearly 20 years ago (1994) where this topic was featured
    on the cover.
        Though the issue has been around for a number of years, there are
    many questions still to be asked and answered.
        The range of questions are broad and complex, from how to track an
    object millions of miles away to how to respond if an asteroid or
    meteor is headed toward Earth.
        The two events of Friday, February 15--the harmless flyby of
    asteroid 2012 DA14 and the not so harmless impact of a meteor in
    Russia--are a stark reminder of the need to invest in space science.
        The asteroid passed just 17,000 miles from Earth, a distance less
    than the Earth's circumference. Fifty years ago, we would have had no
    way of seeing the asteroid coming, and even so it was discovered by
    amateur astronomers.
        The U.S. has come a long way in its ability to track and
    characterize asteroids, meteors, comets and meteorites. But we still
    have a long way to go. NASA believes it has discovered 93 percent of
    the largest asteroids in near-Earth orbit, those one kilometer or
    larger.
        But what about the other seven percent remaining, about 70, or even
    those smaller than one kilometer, estimated to be in the thousands? An
    asteroid as small as 100 meters could destroy an entire city upon a
    direct hit. Are we tracking those?
        The meteor that struck Russia was estimated to be 17 meters, and
    wasn't tracked at all. The smaller they are, the harder they are to
    spot, and yet they can be life-threatening.
        The broad scope of our efforts include participation of
    governments, research institutions, industries and amateur astronomers
    in their backyard or on home computers.
        Some space challenges require innovation, commitment and diligence.
    This is one of them. And this Committee will strive to continue to lead
    in this area.
        For all of the attention and publicity the two events of February
    15 received, it was still too late for us to have acted to change the
    course of the incoming objects. We are in the same position today and
    for the foreseeable future unless we take actions now that improve our
    means of detection.
        Part of our discussion today is about how to achieve this in the
    current budget environment.
        I do not believe that NASA is going to somehow defy budget gravity
    and get an increase when everyone else is getting cuts. But we need to
    find ways to prioritize NASA's projects and squeeze as much
    productivity as we can out of the funds we have.
        Examining and exploring ways to protect the Earth from asteroids
    and meteors is a priority for the American people and should be a
    priority for NASA.
        We were fortunate that the events of last month were simply an
    interesting coincidence rather than a catastrophe.
        However, we still need to make investments and improvements in our
    capability to anticipate what may occur decades from now, or tomorrow.

        Chairman Smith. That concludes my opening statement, and
    the gentlewoman from Texas, Ms. Johnson, is recognized for
    hers.
        Ms. Johnson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and good
    morning. I would like to welcome each of our witnesses to
    today's hearing, and I would like to thank you for your
    patience as we postponed this hearing a couple weeks ago.
        As the chairman has indicated, this hearing was called in
    response to recent events in which a large meteor unexpectedly
    exploded in the sky over Russia, damaging property and injuring
    people at almost the same time that a small asteroid passed
    less than 18,000 miles from Earth's surface. While scientists
    indicate that those two events apparently were unrelated, they
    both serve as evidence that we live in an active solar system
    with potentially hazardous objects passing through our
    neighborhoods with surprising frequency.
        Indeed, there is increasing scientific evidence that
    impacts by large asteroids and comets have had profound
    consequences for life on Earth at various times in the past,
    even contributing to mass extinctions. While such events are
    very rare, they obviously can cause untold damage, and are not
    something we want to have happen if we can avoid it.
        I think it is our increased scientific understanding of
    near-Earth objects and their potential to impact the Earth that
    has led Congress to take this subject seriously in recent
    years. In that regard, this Committee has taken a leadership
    role on these issues dating back to the efforts of former
    Chairman George Brown, Jr. in the early 1990s, a time when
    references to killer asteroids could still lead to giggles and
    eye-rolling. Since then, Members on both sides of the aisle,
    including Representative Rohrabacher, former Chairman Hall and
    former Representative Giffords have taken an active and
    productive interest in this topic, and progress has been made.
        I hope that today's hearing will provide us with a good
    update on the Federal Government's efforts to detect, monitor
    and potentially mitigate such hazardous near-Earth objects.
    Much has been accomplished over the last decade, and I look
    forward to hearing about those efforts. In addition, I would
    like to know if there are additional steps that we should be
    taking as a country, whether an expanded detection program or
    international collaborations or other such measures.
        Well, we have much to discuss today and a distinguished
    panel of witnesses to help us in our oversight. I look forward
    to hearing from each of you.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Johnson follows:]

           Prepared Statement of Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson

        Good morning. I would like to welcome each of our witnesses to
    today's hearing. And I would like to thank you for your patience when
    we were forced to reschedule this hearing in the wake of the Washington
    snow event two weeks ago.
        As the Chairman has indicated, this hearing was called in response
    to recent events in which a large meteor unexpectedly exploded in the
    sky over Russia, damaging property and injuring people at almost the
    same time that a small asteroid passed less than 18,000 miles from
    Earth's surface. While scientists indicate that those two events
    apparently were unrelated, they both serve as evidence that we live in
    an active solar system, with potentially hazardous objects passing
    through our neighborhood with surprising frequency.
        Indeed, there is increasing scientific evidence that impacts by
    large asteroids and comets have had profound consequences for life on
    Earth at various times in the past, even contributing to mass
    extinctions. While such events are very rare, they obviously can cause
    untold damage, and are not something we want to have happen if we can
    avoid it.
        I think it is our increased scientific understanding of Near Earth
    Objects and their potential to impact the Earth that has led Congress
    to take this subject seriously in recent years. In that regard, this
    Committee has taken a leadership role on these issues dating back to
    the efforts of former Chairman George Brown, Jr. in the early 1990s--a
    time when references to ``killer asteroids'' could still lead to
    giggles and eye-rolling. Since then, Members on both sides of the
    aisle, including Rep. Rohrabacher, former Chairman Hall, and former
    Rep. Giffords have all taken an active and productive interest in this
    topic, and progress has been made.
        I hope that today's hearing will provide us with a good update on
    the federal government's efforts to detect, monitor, and potentially
    mitigate such hazardous Near Earth Objects. Much has been accomplished
    over the last decade, and I look forward to hearing about those
    efforts.
        In addition, I would like to know if there are additional steps
    that we should be taking as a country, whether an expanded detection
    program or international collaborations or other such measures.
        Well, we have much to discuss today and a distinguished panel of
    witnesses to help us in our oversight. I look forward to hearing from
    each of you.

        Ms. Johnson. At this point I would like to yield the
    remaining part of my time to Ms. Edwards, the Ranking Member of
    the Space Subcommittee, for her comments.
        Ms. Edwards. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and thank you,
    Mr. Chairman.
        I just wanted to note for the record, Madam Chairwoman,
    that this hearing is part one of the Committee's examination of
    activities related to near-Earth objects. Subcommittee Chairman
    Palazzo and I will hold a hearing of part two in early April,
    and so this will be a continuation. And I wanted to note for
    the record, Madam Chairwoman, that just a month ago after the
    events that made the news, my colleague, Rush Holt, who is a
    physicist here in Congress and former Assistant Director of the
    Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, and I coauthored an op-ed
    that appeared in the Washington Post on February 15 trying to
    put into plain language what the challenges are, the research
    challenges, what the threats are so that the American people
    have some understanding that as both the ranking member and the
    chairman have noted is not new for this Committee but poses
    challenges for the American people, especially when it comes to
    resources.
        I think it is very fitting that this Committee is
    considering U.S. government agency roles and responsibilities
    in near-Earth object detection, tracking and mitigation, not
    only because of the recent events, but because we have been at
    the forefront in setting the U.S. policy on near-Earth objects
    for the past two decades, and it was this Committee that
    formulated the provisions in 2008, NASA authorization and
    subsequent policy direction that called for the Office of
    Science and Technology Policy to develop policies on emergency
    response and to recommend a lead agency for protecting the
    United States, and this depended on NASA, who we always seem to
    call for 911 assistance in all space matters is in stark
    contrast to the across-the-board cuts that NASA programs now
    face under law.
        And so Mr. Chairman, I am struck by how this complex
    planetary protection issue is and how much farther we need to
    go, and I am looking forward to today's testimony, and with
    that I yield.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Edwards follows:]
             Prepared Statement of Representative Donna F. Edwards

        Thank you, Ranking Member Johnson.
        It should be noted that this hearing is Part 1 of the Committee's
    examination of activities related to near-Earth objects (NEOs).
    Subcommittee Chairman Palazzo and I will hold Part 2 in early April.
        It is fitting that this Committee is considering U.S. government
    agency roles and responsibilities in NEO detection, tracking, and
    mitigation, not only because of the recent events, but because this
    Committee has been at the forefront in setting the U.S. policy on NEOs
    for the past two decades.
        The Committee's focus, beginning in the 1990s, has led to NASA's
    establishment of a system for detection and tracking of large NEOs,
    such as the 2012 DA14 asteroid. And it was this Committee that
    formulated the provisions in the 2008 NASA Authorization that called
    for the Office of Science and Technology Policy to develop policies on
    emergency response and to recommend a lead agency (or agencies) for
    protecting the United States from a NEO that is expected to collide
    with Earth and, if necessary, for implementing a deflection campaign,
    in consultation with international bodies.
        As we will hear today from Dr. Holdren, NASA has a key role.
        That should not come as a surprise. NASA's combined scientific,
    technical, and engineering capability is absolutely essential to
    informing critical decisions on mitigation of a potentially hazardous
    object. This dependence on NASA, who we always seem to call for 911
    assistance in all space matters, is in stark contrast to the across-
    the-board sequester cuts to NASA's programs that are now law.
        Mr. Chairman, I am struck with how complex this planetary
    protection issue is and how much farther we need to go. That is why
    Congress needs to ensure continued investment in and attention to
    efforts that will address the potential threats of near-Earth objects.
        I look forward to hearing from our distinguished group of panelists
    on the priorities for Congress going forward.

        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Johnson. Thanks, Ms.
    Edwards.
        Without objection, other Members' opening statements will
    be made a part of the record.
        Our first witness is the Hon. John P. Holdren. Dr. Holdren
    serves as the Director of the Office of Science and Technology
    Policy, the Assistant to the President for Science and
    Technology, and Co-Chair of the President's Council of Advisors
    on Science and Technology. Prior to his current appointment, he
    was a professor in both the Kennedy School of Government and
    the Department of Earth Science at Harvard. Dr. Holdren
    graduated from M.I.T. with degrees in aerospace engineering and
    theoretical plasma physics.
        General William L. Shelton is the Commander of the United
    States Air Force Space Command. Prior to assuming his current
    position, General Shelton was the Assistance Vice Chief of
    Staff and the Director of the Air Staff at the Pentagon. He
    currently organizes, equips, trains and maintains mission-ready
    space and cyberspace forces and capabilities for the North
    American Aerospace Defense Command and U.S. Strategic Command.
    General Shelton graduated from the U.S. Air Force Academy with
    a bachelor's degree in astronautical engineering. He also holds
    a master's degree in this field from the U.S. Air Force
    Institute of Technology.
        Our final witness is the Hon. Charles F. Bolden, Jr., the
    Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space
    Administration. Administrator Bolden served as a pilot in the
    Marine Corps, eventually earning the rank of General. In the
    course of his military career, he participated in several
    international campaigns. He also tested a variety of ground-
    attack aircraft until his selection as an astronaut candidate
    in 1980. Administrator Bolden held a number of positions at
    NASA. He was able to participate in and support several space
    shuttle flights, and he traveled to orbit four times aboard the
    Space Shuttle, twice as a mission commander. For his many
    achievements, Administrator Bolden was inducted into the U.S.
    Astronaut Hall of Fame in May of 2006. He earned a bachelor's
    degree in electrical science from the U.S. Naval Academy and a
    master's degree in systems management from the University of
    Southern California.
        We welcome you all. Thank you for being here. And Director
    Holdren, if you will begin?

            TESTIMONY OF THE HON. JOHN P. HOLDREN, DIRECTOR,

                OFFICE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY POLICY,

                   EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT

        Dr. Holdren. Chairman Smith, Ranking Member Johnson,
    Members of the Committee, I am pleased to be here today to
    discuss U.S. activities to detect, to track, to characterize
    near-Earth objects, or NEOs, and to develop the capability to
    deflect any of dangerous size that are discovered to be on a
    collision course with the Earth. This is, of course, a
    particularly timely topic for reasons that all of you mentioned
    in your opening statements.
        Near-Earth objects are defined as those whose orbits bring
    them within about 31 million miles of the Earth, a third of the
    distance to the sun, some of them traveling close enough to
    make an eventual collision a possibility. Those with maximum
    physical dimension of more than a meter are generally referred
    to as either asteroids or comets, while smaller objects are
    referred to as meteoroids. All are called meteors upon fiery
    transit of the Earth's atmosphere, and the pieces that strike
    the surface are called meteorites.
        Dozens of asteroids a meter or more in size enter the
    Earth's atmosphere each year, of which only one on the average
    is as big as 4 meters. Asteroids of these sizes burn up
    harmlessly high in the atmosphere. Damage on Earth's surface is
    likely only when the kinetic energy of the object is in the
    range of a few hundreds of kilotons of TNT equivalent or above.
    That corresponds at typical closing velocities to a stony
    asteroid about 15 meters in equivalent diameter.
        The 17-meter asteroid that blew up over Russia on February
    15 released about 440 kilotons of energy. Asteroids with that
    much energy strike the Earth only every 100 years or so. Larger
    events like the 1908 asteroid explosion over Siberia, which
    released about 15 megatons of energy and leveled trees over an
    area of more than 850 square miles, are believed to be once-in-
    a-thousand-years events. If an asteroid explosion of that size
    were to occur over an urban area, it could cause hundreds of
    thousands of casualties, but the probability of this occurring
    is much smaller than the one-in-a-thousand-years probability I
    just mentioned for one hitting the Earth at all, and that is
    because land covers only 30 percent of the area of the Earth
    and urbanized areas cover only two to three percent of the land
    area.
        As a result, the odds of a near-Earth object strike causing
    massive casualties and destruction of infrastructure are very
    small, but the potential consequences of such an event are so
    large that it makes sense to take the risk seriously. Both the
    Congress and recent Administrations have done so.
        In 1998, Congress tasked NASA with locating within 10 years
    at least 90 percent of all NEOs with a diameter of 1 kilometer
    or greater, those with the potential to threaten civilization,
    and in 2005, Congress directed NASA to detect, track, catalog
    and characterize 90 percent of all NEOs with a diameter of 140
    meters or greater by 2020. The 1-kilometer goal was achieved in
    2011. The task of detecting 90 percent of NEOs larger than 140
    meters is much more challenging but work on it is proceeding
    apace.
        More recent legislation directed the Office of Science and
    Technology Policy to develop a policy for notifying relevant
    authorities of an impending threat, to recommend a Federal
    entity responsible for protecting the Nation from an expected
    NEO collision, and to implement a policy of threat
    notification. In an October 2010 letter to this Committee, I
    reported on our progress on those tasks.
        The budget for NASA's Near-Earth Object Observation program
    has actually increased about fivefold since 2009 from a little
    less than $4 million to $20.5 million in Fiscal Year 2012.
    Beyond detection and tracking of potentially threatening
    objects, moreover, the Administration is committed to exploring
    and developing the capabilities necessary to protect the Earth
    in general and the United States in particular from NEO
    threats. NASA coordinates this work with the Departments of
    Defense, State and Homeland Security including the latter's
    Federal Emergency Management Agency.
        I thank the Committee for its continued support and its
    interest in this issue, and I will be pleased to take any
    questions that the Members may have.
        [The prepared statement of Dr. Holdren follows:]

        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0552.004

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        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Dr. Holdren.
        General Shelton.

                 TESTIMONY OF GEN. WILLIAM L. SHELTON,

                COMMANDER, U.S. AIR FORCE SPACE COMMAND

        General Shelton. Mr. Chairman, Representative Johnson and
    distinguished Members of the Committee, it is an honor to
    appear before you today. It is also a privilege to appear with
    my colleagues and teammates in the space community.
        Space situational awareness underpins our entire spectrum
    of space activities, and Air Force Space Command is proud of
    our crucial role in monitoring activity in the space domain.
    Specifically, we provide capabilities employed ultimately by
    United States Strategic Command to detect, track, identify and
    characterize human-made objects in Earth orbit. Our sensors
    also are capable of detecting natural phenomena like bolides.
        However, the Nation's current capability to track asteroids
    is dependent upon NASA and other organizations such as the
    Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Lincoln Laboratory. For
    example, during the recent asteroid 2012 DA14 event, the Joint
    Space Operations Center at Vandenberg Air Force Base in
    California used tracking data from NASA's Near Earth Object
    Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory to perform
    collision avoidance screenings to ensure the safety of our
    satellites. We remain committed to working closely with our
    partners to ensure comprehensive space situational awareness
    for the Nation.
        I thank you for the opportunity to appear before you, and I
    look forward to your questions.
        [The prepared statement of General Shelton follows:]

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        Chairman Smith. Thank you, General Shelton.
        Administrator Bolden.

             TESTIMONY OF THE HON. CHARLES F. BOLDEN, JR.,

                  ADMINISTRATOR, NATIONAL AERONAUTICS

                        AND SPACE ADMINISTRATION

        General Bolden. Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee,
    thank you for the opportunity also to appear today to discuss
    the topic of near-Earth objects, and before I formally begin,
    Mr. Chairman, I would like to congratulate you on your
    appointment as the new Chairman of the House Science, Space,
    and Technology Committee, and I look forward to working with
    you in that capacity.
        I would also like to thank you, Mr. Chairman, and
    Congresswoman Edwards and Congressman Holt, who is not here,
    for the recent op-eds that you wrote that called more attention
    to this for the American public, which I think is really
    important.
        The events of February 15, 2013, were a stark reminder of
    why NASA has for years devoted a great deal of attention to
    near-Earth objects and why this hearing is so timely and
    important. The events of February 15 also highlight the wisdom
    of Congress, the Administration and NASA in enabling a human
    exploration of an asteroid.
        The predicted close approach of a small asteroid called
    2012 DA14 and the unpredicted entry and explosion of a very
    small asteroid about 15 miles above Russia that Dr. Holdren
    talked about earlier have focused a great deal of public
    attention on the necessity of tracking asteroids and other
    near-Earth objects and protecting our planet from them,
    something this Committee and NASA have been working on for over
    15 years. Again, NASA has been focused on tracking asteroids
    and protecting our home planet from them well before these
    recent events. In fact, NASA's focus in this area is evident
    from our fivefold increase in near-Earth object budgets since
    2010, and literally dozens of people are involved with some
    aspect of our NEO research across NASA and its field centers.
        In addition to the resources NASA puts into understanding
    asteroids, the agency partners with university astronomers,
    space science institutes and other agencies across the country
    that are working to track and better understand these near-
    Earth objects, often with grants, interagency transfers and
    other contracts from NASA.
        The new public attention is not hard to understand. The
    coincidence of having these two very rare events happening on
    the same day along with the unfortunate injuries of over 1,000
    people on the ground in Russia made this a very big news event.
    However, we should remember that the probability of any sizable
    NEO impacting the Earth any time in the next 100 years is
    extremely remote.
        To put these two recent events in context, very small
    objects enter the Earth's atmosphere all the time. Current
    estimates are that on average, about 80 tons of material in the
    form of dust grains and small meteoroids enter the Earth's
    atmosphere every single day, objects the size of a basketball
    arrive once a day, and objects as large as a car arrive about
    once per week. Our Earth's atmosphere protects us from these
    small objects, so nearly all are destroyed before hitting the
    ground and pose no threat to life here on Earth. However, the
    potential consequences of a significant impact are potentially
    very great indeed. Consistent with NASA's role as established
    by Congress and prescribed in the President's National Space
    Policy, NASA has taken a leadership role to pursue capabilities
    to detect, track and characterize near-Earth objects to reduce
    the risk of harm to humans from an unexpected impact on our
    planet.
        NASA is also developing new vehicles and capabilities
    including Orion and the Multipurpose Crew Vehicle and the Space
    Launch System, which will enable human exploration of the solar
    system beyond low-Earth orbit. As the President stated in his
    April 15, 2010, speech at the Kennedy Space Center, NASA's
    intention is to ``send astronauts to an asteroid for the first
    time in history'' and NASA is working to accomplish this
    mission by 2025. In fact, NASA leads the world in the detection
    and characterization of NEOs and is responsible for the
    discovery of about 98 percent of all known NEOs.
        Now, here I will take a risk. There should be a chart
    coming up very soon. It is. Thank you. As shown in this
    graphic, the cumulative discovery of near-Earth asteroids
    started picking up dramatically in 1998 with the start of
    NASA's Spaceguard Search program, and the number of known near-
    Earth asteroids has grown from a few hundred to nearly 10,000
    in just 15 years, and I think it is not insignificant that it
    goes almost asymptotic when you look at 2005 when the Congress,
    NASA and the Administration really picked up the emphasis on
    that.
        NASA continues to make progress toward the goals set for us
    by the Congress. To date, over 9,600 near-Earth asteroids of
    all sizes have been found. Larger asteroids pose a greater
    threat to the planet as a whole, and the percentage of
    asteroids we have identified tracks this relationship. We found
    95 percent of the largest NEOs over 1 kilometer in size. Our
    current estimate is that we have also found about 60 percent of
    the NEOs that are between 300 meters and 1 kilometer. As the
    graphic shows, we still have some work to do to find NEOs in
    the 140-meter class, and the next graphic please. You can see
    here the total discovered per size and you can see where we are
    lacking as the sizes go down.
        Our remote ground-based observations of comets and
    asteroids have been augmented by close-up reconnaissance data
    from our science missions. From 1997 to 2001, NASA's near-Earth
    asteroid rendezvous flyby flew by two main asteroid belts
    before orbiting and landing on the near-Earth asteroid 433
    Eros. Last August, our Dawn spacecraft departed the asteroid
    Vesta and is now on its way to a 2015 rendezvous with Ceres,
    the solar system's largest asteroid. Launching in 2016, NASA's
    OSIRIS-REx mission will return a sample of up to 2.2 pounds
    from an asteroid to Earth in 2023.
        Of course, NASA is working to accomplish an astronaut visit
    to an asteroid by 2025. This mission and the vital precursor
    activities that will be necessary to ensure its success should
    result in additional insight into the nature and composition of
    NEOs and will increase our capability to approach and interact
    with asteroids.
        NASA has a long history of observing comets and asteroids
    but as their importance as potentially hazardous objects has
    become apparent, NASA has significantly increased its program
    of detection, reconnaissance and characterization. We have
    gained a nearly complete understanding of the population of
    NEOs over 1 kilometer in size, and we are making marked
    progress in protecting our planet from smaller but still
    dangerous objects. While we emphasize that the risks form
    impacts are remote, we remain absolutely committed to
    fulfilling our responsibility to find and track near-Earth
    objects. We will continue to scan the skies and update the
    Congress and the world on what we find.
        Again, thank you very much for the opportunity to testify
    today, and I look forward to responding to any questions you
    may have.
        [The prepared statement of General Bolden follows:]

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        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Administrator Bolden.
        I recognize myself for questions, and let me address the
    first one to Dr. Holdren and then perhaps, Administrator
    Bolden, to you as well. There seems to be general agreement
    based upon your testimonies that we are able to detect 90 to 95
    percent of the near-Earth objects that are larger than 1
    kilometer somewhere around 60 percent of the objects that are
    over 300 meters, so my question is this. I haven't heard yet
    nor have I seen yet what percentage of the near-Earth objects,
    the incoming asteroids that are 100 meters, what percentage of
    those objects are we able to detect, 100 meters being, I think,
    Dr. Holdren, you described in your written testimony as the
    size of a city destroyer. So what percentage of the 100-meter
    near-Earth objects can we detect, and do you have a figure for
    that?
        Dr. Holdren. I believe at this point that number would be a
    little under 10 percent. The number for 140 meters and above is
    10 percent. The 100 would be a little under 10 percent.
        Chairman Smith. Administrator Bolden, do you agree with
    that?
        General Bolden. Yes, sir, that was on that second chart I
    showed where it looks like the less than 10 percent for----
        Chairman Smith. Okay. How many objects are we talking about
    that we are not able to detect that might be the city
    destroyers?
        General Bolden. Numbers of objects?
        Chairman Smith. Yes.
        General Bolden. Mr. Chairman, I don't know that answer, and
    that is one thing I cannot take for the record because----
        Chairman Smith. What was the 10 percent?
        Dr. Holdren. I can answer that question, Mr. Chairman.
        Chairman Smith. Okay, Dr. Holdren.
        Dr. Holdren. The estimates of how many objects exist, near-
    Earth objects in the range of 140 meters or above are between
    13,000 and 20,000 objects. So that is the number of which we
    have detected 10 percent. That is the much more challenging
    goal, which the Congress put before us to identify 90 percent
    of those by 2020.
        Chairman Smith. Roughly 2,000 objects that are city
    destroyers, we are not detecting. Is that roughly right?
        Dr. Holdren. No, more, because the number we are detecting
    is 10 percent of 13,000 to 20,000 so----
        Chairman Smith. I was going in----
        Dr. Holdren. So you were going the other way.
    Unfortunately, the number undetected----
        Chairman Smith. I was going 1,300 to 2,000, and I was going
    to the larger figure. That is why I said 2,000.
        General Bolden. So the number of undetected potential city
    killers is very large. It is in the range of 10,000 or more.
        Chairman Smith. Ten thousand or more. Okay. Not reassuring,
    but what is reassuring, we hope, is the unlikelihood that one
    of those city destroyers would actually hit a city. As you
    pointed out, two to three percent of the earth's area is urban
    area.
        Administrator, what programs, what improvements, what
    developments can we expect in the next, say, 2 years or 5 years
    to be able to better detect these thousands of near-Earth
    objects that might be life threatening?
        General Bolden. Mr. Chairman, we continue our work, our
    collaboration with our international partners. That is very
    important. As Dr. Holdren mentioned earlier, he didn't specify
    but it was a Spanish astronomer, amateur astronomer actually,
    or I think----
        Chairman Smith. Do you expect improvements in Earth-based--
    I mean telescopes, for example, that will enable us to better
    detect these?
        General Bolden. What we are really looking at is not
    improvements but increase in the numbers of space-borne assets.
    We really need to have space-borne assets that are able to
    look. We are cooperating right now with a Space Act Agreement
    with a private company called B612 that will be engaged in the
    identification and characterization of asteroids, and my hope
    is that there will be more.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. And what percentage of these
    thousands would we be able to detect in the next few years that
    we are not detecting now? Any idea?
        General Bolden. If you talk about the 140-meter class, our
    estimate right now is at the present budget levels--that is
    present budget levels, not the going-down budget levels--it
    will be 2030 before we are able to reach the 90 percent level
    as prescribed by Congress to detect and characterize those 90
    percent of the 140-meter class.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Thank you for the answer, though,
    again, that is not particularly reassuring. Maybe we can help
    you out with the budget. Don't know.
        General Shelton, last question for you. Was the Department
    of Defense aware of the meteor that exploded over Russia?
        General Shelton. Mr. Chairman, not until we were tipped off
    by NASA.
        Chairman Smith. And that was after the fact, or how far
    before the fact?
        General Shelton. No, it was--I want to say it was two or
    three days preceding----
        Chairman Smith. Two or three days before it exploded over
    Russia? Okay.
        General Shelton. I am sorry. You said the explosion. I was
    talking about DA14.
        Chairman Smith. No, I am talking about the meteor that
    exploded over Russia.
        General Shelton. We had no insight in that at all.
        Chairman Smith. Even with satellites, even with everything
    else?
        General Shelton. We were aware of the event when it
    occurred.
        Chairman Smith. And not before?
        General Shelton. Not before.
        Chairman Smith. I just have to ask you, how then are we
    going to be aware of, say, incoming missiles if we couldn't
    detect the meteor exploding over Russia?
        General Shelton. Now, we did detect it. We were aware of
    the event.
        Chairman Smith. But at the time of the event, not before?
        General Shelton. Yes, sir, and we would have to take that
    into a different forum to talk in more detail.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Thank you, and that concludes my
    questions. The Ranking Member, Ms. Johnson, is recognized for
    hers.
        Ms. Johnson. Thank you very much.
        Dr. Holdren, in October 2010, the Congressional response to
    the direction in the 2008 NASA Authorization Act described
    roles and responsibilities for NASA, FEMA, DOD and State but is
    silent who has the overall responsibility, and I was wondering
    who in this Administration is the--who has the single
    responsibility to oversee the other activities of other
    agencies?
        Dr. Holdren. Well, NASA is responsible, has the overarching
    responsibility for detection and notification. NASA notifies
    FEMA, they notify the Department of Defense. On the question of
    mitigation, who would have the responsibility if an asteroid
    were discovered to be on a collision course, that would depend
    on the size of the asteroid and the amount of notice we had.
    For some deflection missions, you would want NASA to be in
    charge. For other kinds of deflection missions, you would want
    DOD to be in charge. So it does not make sense from the
    standpoint of the mitigation mission to specify in advance
    which agency would do it, but the notification--identification
    and notification responsibilities are unambiguous.
        Ms. Johnson. So when there is mitigation, do all of you
    come together or who takes the lead? What determines who takes
    the lead?
        Dr. Holdren. In that event, we would certainly all come
    together, and we are in fact exercising those kinds of
    communications. There is actually an exercise coming up in the
    middle of next month when we will exercise those interactions,
    communications and the exercise of responsibilities. There is a
    workshop actually coming up at the beginning of next month in
    which those interagency interactions will be further discussed
    and delineated.
        Ms. Johnson. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Johnson. The gentleman from
    California, Mr. Rohrabacher, is recognized for his questions.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
        We are talking about space debris and near-Earth objects
    that are--it seems to me that these two issues are not just
    American issues, and we are talking about the cost all this,
    what are we talking about in terms of over a 20-year period,
    the costs of actually coming up with a deflection and the cost
    of actually making the determination of what is heading in our
    direction? Dr. Holdren, or do any of you have estimates of
    cost?
        General Bolden. Mr. Rohrabacher, I can give you an estimate
    right now. We do it incrementally so we believe we have to
    detect and characterize first and then we have to concern
    ourselves, as Dr, Holdren says, with who is going to do the
    mitigating action or the deflection action. We have two
    concepts. One is about three-quarters of a billion dollars for
    an infrared-based sensor that is placed in space, something
    that orbits Venus or at least is in geosynchronous orbit. B612,
    that I mentioned, their estimate for their effort is about a
    half a billion dollars, about $500 million dollars. So we are
    roughly in that range.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Is that just for that one sensor that we
    are talking about?
        General Bolden. That is just for--to try to put something
    in space that will help us to identify and characterize. I
    think all three of us agree, ground-based systems are great,
    Arecibo and others, but if you really want to find and detect
    asteroids, near-Earth objects early enough that we can do
    something, then you want that vehicle----
        Mr. Rohrabacher. And the cost is?
        General Bolden. I gave you an example of two. I will take
    it for the record to get back to you. I think what you are
    asking for is a lifecycle cost for a program to mitigate.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Right.
        General Bolden. I don't think any of us have--we have not
    developed that.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Well, it is in the billions of dollars,
    correct?
        General Bolden. Oh, yes, sir.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Okay.
        General Bolden. You know, if one detection device is almost
    a billion----
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Now, let me suggest that perhaps the
    billion dollars, and that would provide protection for not just
    the United States but for the world.
        General Bolden. Sir, anything we are talking about--this is
    not--as you pointed out, this is not an American issue.
    Anything that we do protects the planet. Anything that our
    international partners do protects the planet, and that is why
    you hear me talk all the time about the critical importance of
    international collaboration.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. That is what I want to ask you about on
    this. What steps have we taken to bring countries together that
    could contribute those billions of dollars as well as our own?
        General Bolden. Well, the U.N. Organization for Peaceful
    Cooperation of Space, U.N. COPUOS, has a very active ongoing
    activity and trying to help bring nations together and looking
    at detecting and tracking NEOs. We are a participant in that.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. There is not just one organization that is
    aimed specifically or--when was the last meeting of groups of
    people who represent countries that might want to get involved
    and contribute and have an overall part?
        Dr. Holdren. Congressman Rohrabacher, I can take that one.
    There was a meeting in Vienna in mid-February of this year just
    a month ago under the auspices of the U.N. Committee on
    Peaceful Uses of Outer Space. It was agreed there to stand up
    an international asteroid warning network and to stand up as
    well an international body that would deal with the mitigation
    question. There is already underway something called AIDA, the
    Asteroid Impact and Deflection Assessment, which is a joint
    effort of the European Space Agency and NASA, and I should add
    that the detection network that we already have is highly
    international in character. As Administrator Bolden mentioned,
    it was actually a Spanish observer who first discovered the
    asteroid that made the near miss on February 15. The Minor
    Planet Center, which is in substantial part funded by NASA and
    hosted by the Harvard-Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, is
    actually under the overall auspices of the International
    Astronomical Union, so it is all very international.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. I would suggest that number one, the cost
    of deflection of course, we are talking about the cost of
    detection, in one situation, the cost of having a deflection
    system is even more. I would suggest that this is one area of
    leadership that the United States could really take a role in
    and it would be good for all and it would create an
    international spirit of what we want to create. I would suggest
    especially including Russia in on this, and they may be able to
    make some major contributions, save us some money and actually
    make it a more effective system.
        And with that said, I would like to include all countries
    except China. Thank you.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Rohrabacher. The gentlewoman
    from Maryland, Ms. Edwards, is recognized.
        Ms. Edwards. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        I want to ask Dr. Holdren, the National Science Foundation
    has indicated a next major new start as the Large Synoptic
    Survey Telescope, the LSST, which is intended to detect and
    catalog potentially hazardous objects, and what I would like to
    know is, one, what the technological contribution would be if
    the LSST were to make the overall detection and cataloging
    effort possible, and General Bolden, you talked about the
    prospect of land-based systems versus systems that we would put
    outside in our solar system, but the cost, to me, it seems
    would be rather significantly different. And then I would like
    to have some understanding of whether there might be some cost
    sharing that NASA might consider with improvements to the LSST
    to try to optimize it for NASA's use, and get a sense as well
    of whether the challenges that we are facing and not meeting
    the 2025 deadline that--guideline that we have highlighted from
    the Committee. Are those technological challenges principally?
    Are they funding challenges? Is it some combination of
    cooperation challenges? I would like to better understand that,
    especially in this fiscal environment.
        Dr. Holdren. Well, let me just make a start and then I will
    turn it over to Administrator Bolden. The Large Synoptic Survey
    Telescope would be an important addition to our capabilities
    but it is important to understand that all these capabilities
    work in tandem, that is, they share information. Some of the
    telescopes are better at detection. Others are better at
    characterizing the orbit or determining the reflectivity and
    the likely composition of the object, and so one always has to
    think of this as a network. We have telescopes in Arizona, we
    have telescopes in Italy, we have telescopes in the Czech
    Republic, and they are all linked together and they are all
    part of a network that provides the overall capability we have
    to detect these objects. The LSST alone when it comes fully to
    fruition would still not be able to enable us to identify and
    characterize 90-plus percent of the objects in less than about
    a dozen years. But in combination, the LSST and an orbiting
    infrared telescope of the kind Administrator Bolden was talking
    about could lower that time to something in the range of 6 to 8
    years.
        General Bolden. Congresswoman, the only thing I will add,
    you know, we flew an infrared imaging satellite called WISE,
    and then we repurposed it while on orbit to look for asteroids,
    and we discovered hundreds in the deep field of the solar
    system, the universe, actually. It is that type of instrument
    that I talk about. That is what B612 wants to do. We are
    looking at ways to cost-share. The nucleus organization that
    Congressman Rohrabacher mentioned involving Russia, the 5-
    member organizations of what we call the International Space
    Station team, and that is 15-plus European nations, Russia,
    Japan, Canada and the United States, although our primary
    responsibility is operating the International Space Station,
    when the heads of agency get together, we talk about
    everything, and one of the big things we talk about is the
    threat of near-Earth asteroids.
        At risk of getting in trouble because Congressman
    Rohrabacher and I have a healthy agreement to disagree, and I
    will say this, it will be the decision of this Congress as to
    whether or not we ever cooperate or participate with China. It
    is the elephant in the room. I don't talk about it because my
    public affairs and communications people tell me not to talk
    about it, but I don't deal with China by direction of this
    Congress. We are the only agency of the Federal Government that
    does not have bilateral communications with China. This is an
    issue for the world. This is not an issue for the United
    States, so although Congressman Rohrabacher and I----
        Ms. Edwards. Well, I will let Congressman Rohrabacher take
    his time talking about China, and I am sure we could have a
    whole hearing on it. Before we go, though, I wanted General
    Bolden to--you know, the whole identified mission that the
    President has set out to go to an asteroid, it seems rather
    lackluster, and so I have always had questions about whether
    ought to be a goal or we ought to think about, you know, sort
    of the tradeoff, Mars, instead. Thank you.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Edwards. The gentleman from
    Texas, Mr. Hall, chairman emeritus, is recognized for his
    questions.
        Mr. Hall. Mr. Chairman, of course I thank you for holding
    this very important hearing, and I thank the witnesses for
    their very valuable testimony.
        I had the privilege of serving on this Committee since
    1981, and this topic has been the subject of periodic review
    and legislative direction, as the witnesses noted, in the 1990s
    during consideration of a NASA authorization bill. This matter
    came up, and it was really a discussion about asteroids. We had
    really a hearing on asteroids, as Mr. Rohrabacher remembers,
    and it was reported at that time that one had just passed the
    Earth that no one knew anything about but it missed us by 15
    minutes. I hated to ask, was that just as good as it missing us
    by 1 minute or 30 seconds or what, but just the enormity of the
    damage that they could do to us. I offered an amendment at that
    time to set a goal of finding and cataloging within 10 years
    this population of comets and asteroids in an effort to be
    coordinated with the Department of Defense and space agencies
    of other countries. Other countries were invited to that
    hearing, but also told that we ought to have a world group
    because as Charlie said, it is a world problem. They were
    interested in attending but they weren't interested in
    contributing anything to it, so none of them showed up for the
    hearing.
        But as our witnesses stated, from 1998 until 2011, more
    than 90 percent of near-Earth objects with a diameter of 1
    kilometer or greater have been located. So today we know more
    about these but we also have more work to do, especially those
    that are smaller that could still have a devastating impact if
    they hit the Earth.
        So Dr. Shelton, let me ask you this. What capabilities do
    we need that we don't currently possess to detect and track
    asteroids that might pose a threat to the Earth?
        General Shelton. Sir, if you are talking about Department
    of Defense capabilities----
        Mr. Hall. What do we have to do? What should we do?
        General Shelton. Well, if you are talking about Department
    of Defense capabilities, we are focused on things in Earth
    orbit. Our sensors, and we have got a variety of them, are not
    focused on beyond the Earth.
        Mr. Hall. Well, once an object has been identified, what
    are our means of tracking it and how much time would we have to
    prepare if there were a threat to Earth?
        Dr. Holdren. Maybe I can take that, Congressman Hall. First
    of all, how much notice we have depends on the size of the
    object. The bigger it is, the further away we can see it and
    the more time we have. So there are some objects that we know
    are coming years in advance. There are other objects that are
    still big enough to cause damage that we only know about weeks
    in advance or days in advance. Obviously, we need to improve
    the capability to give us a large amount of notice, enough
    notice to mount a deflection mission if we see one on a
    collision course. Some of the capabilities we have been talking
    about, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, the orbiting
    telescope that the B612 Foundation is working with NASA to
    develop, all those capabilities will increase the warning time
    with respect to asteroids big enough to do serious damage. And
    again, the deflection options that would then be open to us
    would depend on the size of the object and the amount of notice
    we had. They would include----
        Mr. Hall. Well, excuse me. The one that hit Russia, there
    is no question about that, and that is about all we know about
    it, why didn't we know that was coming or on its way?
        Dr. Holdren. It came out of the sun, Congressman Hall. It
    came from a direction where our telescopes could not look. We
    cannot look into the sun.
        Mr. Hall. Well, if we can't make that determination as to
    where it is going to come from, we ought to be able to do
    something no matter where it comes from if it is going to hit
    the Earth.
        Dr. Holdren. That is one of the reasons that an orbiting
    telescope----
        Mr. Hall. That is why we are having this hearing today to
    ask you three men who know a heck of a lot more than we know
    about it to tell us.
        Dr. Holdren. Well, I would say, Congressman Hall, that the
    most important single thing we could do to improve our capacity
    to see any asteroid of potentially damaging size coming would
    be an orbiting infrared telescope of the sort that the B612
    Foundation is working on.
        Mr. Hall. I thank you. I asked the question, if we saw one
    come toward Omaha, what could they do about it, and they said
    they could use a laser, and I went on and asked a second
    question. I said, well, could the laser hit it right in the
    middle because I didn't want to cause any more trouble than I
    had with Mr. Rohrabacher. I wasn't going to suggest that half
    of it hit Los Angeles and the other half hit New York. I
    suggested that half of it might go to the Pacific Ocean and the
    other half go to the Atlantic Ocean. They really didn't have an
    answer for that, and I doubt if you have.
        Dr. Holdren. Well, first of all, it would not be practical
    to have a laser powerful enough to split it in half. What you
    can do in principle if you have a very powerful laser is to
    cause jets of material heated by the laser to fly off of the
    asteroid and that is essentially the equivalent of a jet engine
    pushing the asteroid off course. There are other approaches to
    deflecting an asteroid. Those include hitting it with a very
    heavy impacter. They include approaching it, as we have already
    approached with robotic probes a number of asteroids and
    pushing it or towing it.
        Mr. Hall. I thank you, and I will write you a letter for
    some more, and thank you. I yield back my time.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Hall. Those were interesting
    answers, Dr. Holdren. I appreciate that.
        The gentlewoman from Oregon, Ms. Bonamici.
        Ms. Bonamici. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank
    you all for your interesting testimony.
        It has been well established in this testimony that the
    probability of an occurrence of a sizable NEO colliding with
    the Earth is quite small. I believe, General Bolden, you said
    extremely remote in your testimony. But it is also clear that
    the consequences could be enormous. For example, a strike,
    depending on the size of an asteroid, could bring a cloud of
    dust rivaling the most powerful volcanic explosion, or
    depending on where it hits could cause an enormous tsunami that
    would flood and destroy coastal regions. And I know you are all
    striving as we are to find the appropriate balance for
    investment without being unnecessarily alarmist.
        In the district--back to where it hits. In the district I
    represent in Oregon, there is a significant threat of a
    tsunami, especially from earthquakes. That is very real.
    Response preparedness is already a priority issue for my
    constituents. In fact, when I was in the legislature, we passed
    a bill that required the State to plan for the impacts of a
    9.0-magnitude earthquake and a resulting tsunami, which
    scientists had determined would occur, will occur at some point
    in the future, so it is not planning for if, it is planning for
    when. And the State just released its resilience plan, which
    was partially funded through a FEMA grant, in February. The
    plan acknowledges the importance of preparing communities and
    infrastructure for a catastrophic event but it also places
    significant focus on the ability to respond once the event has
    occurred.
        And of course, this type of challenge has implications in
    the context of today's conversation. How much do we plan for
    detection, how much do we plan for response? Of course, we
    should be investing in the science that will help us detect and
    prevent the impacts of NEOs but we also need to consider how we
    will respond if it not possible to alter the orbits and stop
    these NEOs from colliding.
        Dr. Holdren, your 2010 report indicates that depending on
    the projected damage and location, FEMA could help provide
    Federal assistance and coordinate local emergency services
    personnel into integrated disaster response task forces. So
    could you talk a little bit more, please about how FEMA is
    approaching this role? How will they take into account
    different demographic and geographic characteristics in any
    given area? Thank you.
        Dr. Holdren. Wow, that is a really challenging question.
    You know, as we know, FEMA has a wide range of capabilities for
    responding to a wide variety of different kinds of emergencies
    and disasters. We are in the process, as I mentioned, of
    conducting exercises of various kinds in which FEMA is a
    participant, and thinking about and trying to work out the
    details of response strategies, depending on the nature of the
    impact, but as your question points out, those impacts could be
    very different. If a large asteroid strikes the ocean, as you
    point out, the impacts would largely come through the tsunami
    phenomenon, which is of course a phenomenon with which FEMA
    must also reckon since tsunamis can be caused in other ways. If
    a strike occurred over an urban region with sufficient force,
    the damage would resemble in some ways the damage from a
    massive earthquake, which is another event with which FEMA is
    familiar and prepared to respond. But these are going to be big
    challenges. I would not minimize the difficulty of responding
    adequately if a substantial asteroid strike should occur in the
    size range that we need to be particularly worried about.
        Ms. Bonamici. And so what efforts are being made to engage
    the existing emergency response infrastructure?
        Dr. Holdren. Well, as I say, we are actually exercising
    those with tabletop exercises and with larger-scale exercises
    in which the various agencies go through a simulated event of
    this kind, and those kinds of exercises are really the best way
    we have when combined with analytical tools to figure out how
    to bring our capabilities effectively to bear.
        Ms. Bonamici. Thank you very much.
        And either General Bolden or General Shelton, do you have
    any comments about finding that balance between preparing for
    detection and preparing for how we respond?
        General Bolden. Congresswoman, I would just echo what you
    said. You hit the right word, and that is balance. You know, we
    could come out of this hearing and decide that we want to
    really pour money into NEO detection and characterization, and
    that would not be the right thing to do because there has to be
    a balance. My recommendation would be the President's budget
    from 2013, I think was pretty good. We have a plan that Dr.
    Holdren talked about but it depends on the passage of that
    budget. Going into 2014, we will come back again and try to
    give you what we see as a funding level to support a plan that
    Dr. Holdren addresses. So that is where we have to cooperate,
    Congress and the Administration, in striking that proper
    balance.
        Ms. Bonamici. Thank you very much. My time is expired. I
    yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Bonamici. The gentleman from
    Alabama, Mr. Brooks, is recognized.
        Mr. Brooks. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Reading from Dr. Holdren's testimony, it says ``Depending
    on its composition and velocity, an asteroid of 140 meters in
    diameter could have an impact energy in the range of 50 to 500
    megatons of TNT equivalent and would be capable of causing
    destruction over a large region,'' emphasis there 50 to 500
    megatons, and I have got other notes here that suggest that the
    Hiroshima atomic bomb was roughly 13 kilotons, so much, much,
    much, much smaller. If you could, could you please describe
    with greater detail what you mean by a ``large region''?
        Dr. Holdren. The size you are talking about, 140 meters,
    and you have got the numbers exactly right, could devastate the
    better part of a continent.
        Mr. Brooks. We are talking about a very large region.
        Dr. Holdren. The fortunate--the only fortunate thing is
    that the estimated frequency with which objects of that size
    strike the Earth is about one in 20,000 years, or a probability
    of one in 20,000 each year. Nonetheless, this falls directly in
    the category that we were talking about, low probability, very
    high consequence, therefore we need to take the risk seriously
    and we need to make the kinds of investments that would enable
    us to deflect an asteroid of that size were one to be
    discovered on a collision course.
        Mr. Brooks. And you also used the word ``destruction'' in
    the context of this continent-sized area. Would human life be
    able to withstand that kind of impact and the way in which you
    use the word ``destruction''?
        Dr. Holdren. Well, clearly, if an asteroid of that size
    struck on land, there would be very large loss of life. If it
    struck in the ocean, it would produce, in all likelihood, a
    very large tsunami, which would be associated with large loss
    of life. If you say would humans survive on the Earth, the
    likelihood is yes. But there are concerns about the amount of
    dust and smoke that could be lofted into the atmosphere by such
    an impact.
        Mr. Brooks. Do you have a judgment as to whether humans
    would survive on the continent impacted, if you limit it just
    to the impact continent?
        Dr. Holdren. No, I believe the answer is yes. Is aid a
    substantial part of a continent. A bigger one, bigger still
    than 140 meters, could be a continent destroyer, and a bigger
    one still could be a civilization destroyer. You know, the one
    that hit 65 million years ago near what is now the Yucatan
    Peninsula is thought to have led to the extinction of the
    dinosaurs and most else that lived on Earth at the time.
        Mr. Brooks. And if I read your written testimony correctly,
    that was roughly 10 kilometers estimated size?
        Dr. Holdren. Yes.
        Mr. Brooks. Moving on, looking at the notes that I have
    been given by the HASC Committee, it suggests that we have
    identified so far thousands of objects in space, near-Earth
    objects in space, that are 300 to 500 meters in diameter,
    roughly 1,100, 1,200 that are roughly 500 to 1,000 meters in
    diameter, and roughly 900 that are a kilometer or more in
    diameter. So what I would like to know is, how much advance
    warning would the Earth's population need if, say, one of these
    kilometer or larger size objects for us to be able to do
    something to prevent that object from hitting the Earth and
    causing the kind of massive devastating that you have
    described?
        Dr. Holdren. Today, we would probably need years to mount
    such a mission. Over time, as we develop our capabilities to
    deal with this kind of threat, the lead time could be smaller.
        Mr. Brooks. Let me focus in on that. How many years would
    we need? Let us say we found out today that there is an object
    of this size that is going to hit the Earth. How many years
    would we need today if we were to do whatever is necessary to
    try to put ourselves in a position to save the planet?
        Dr. Holdren. I think I will refer that question to General
    Bolden.
        General Bolden. Well, if we did it according to the
    President's budget presently, 2025 is the time that we think we
    will be able to send a human to an asteroid acting with some
    robotic means. That is on----
        Mr. Brooks. Let me interject for a moment. Let us assume
    that we know one is going to hit the planet, in which case I
    assume that we are going to accelerate things as quickly as we
    can. What is the fastest we can get it done where we could
    protect ourselves upon discovery of a 1-kilometer or larger
    object going to hit the Earth?
        General Bolden. Congressman, I will take it for the record
    and get back to you, but now you are talking about an intense
    effort, which, I mean, that significantly shortens the time.
        Mr. Brooks. Well, we would be intense.
        General Bolden. We have the systems and the technology
    available now to do that. You are talking about just pouring
    unlimited funds into it, and conceivably you could do it in 4
    or 5 years. I don't know. But let me get back to you. Don't
    quote me on a number yet. But, I will work with General Shelton
    and his captain and, seriously, we will get you an answer.
        Mr. Brooks. Well, thank you for being here and testifying
    before us. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the time that you have
    allotted, and whatever time that is, I would love to help you
    shortening it.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Brooks. The gentleman from
    California, Mr. Swalwell, is recognized for his questions.
        Mr. Swalwell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you,
    Ranking Member Johnson.
        General Bolden, I represent Livermore, California, which
    has two of the NNSA labs, Lawrence Livermore and Sandia, and I
    imagine that when you talk about systems and technology, and if
    we were to require a weapon to deflect something that was
    incoming, a near-Earth object that was incoming, that some of
    that technology will have to be or has been designed at one of
    those laboratories.
        General Bolden. So if that a question----
        Mr. Swalwell. Yes.
        General Bolden. If that were the decision, but again, I
    would go back to what Dr. Holdren said earlier. I would not
    consider a weapon to deflect or to save Earth against this type
    of threat. I would consider the development of appropriate
    technologies that could enable us to--we are talking about
    earliest detection, you are talking about deflecting. I mean,
    it is a tiny amount if you catch it far enough out.
        Mr. Swalwell. Let us assume that it is late-stage
    detection. I imagine our choices get limited, right?
        General Bolden. Yes, sir. That is not my bailiwick anymore.
    I don't do bombs and rockets.
        Mr. Swalwell. Well, General Shelton, those two laboratories
    in my district, I imagine they would play a critical role if we
    had a late-stage detection of one of these near-Earth objects.
        General Shelton. Yes, sir, I would think so. I mean, there
    are only a limited number of ways to generate the amount of
    energy required and probably nuclear energy is what we are
    talking about here.
        Mr. Swalwell. Is there a way to guarantee that one of these
    near-Earth objects does not hit on a Friday? Because right now
    in my district, all of the Federal employees at those
    laboratories are furloughed on Fridays. And I know in
    Congresswoman Edwards' district, some of those NASA employees
    that are trying to detect these incoming objects, I think they
    are going to be furloughed on Fridays too. So----
        General Bolden. No, sir.
        Mr. Swalwell. No way to----
        General Bolden. We are not planning to furlough employees.
    I just wanted to clarify that. So they will be there on Friday.
        Mr. Swalwell. Okay.
        General Bolden. But in seriousness, I have to go back again
    to say several things. One, these are remote occurrences. Two,
    the plan that the President has put forward I think will
    adequately address our technical capability to be able to
    deflect an asteroid in due time. If we find that we are
    tracking literally thousands of asteroids today. If the
    civilization destroyer that Dr. Holdren talks about, I mean, if
    we can't discover that early enough, then there is something
    wrong with our systems.
        Mr. Swalwell. Sure. So in our district, it is a fact: there
    are furloughs at our nuclear laboratories, and you are not
    concerned at all that sequestration affects our readiness to
    protect----
        General Bolden. Sir, that wasn't the question you asked.
        Mr. Swalwell. So my question is----
        General Bolden. I am very concerned with the effects of
    sequestration but that wasn't the question, and so yes, I am
    very concerned about the effects of sequestration on all of our
    ability to do what it is you ask us to do. You are talking
    about impacting our ability to keep our facilities operating
    safely. You are talking about just the mental strain on our
    employees not knowing whether they are going to be able to come
    to work tomorrow. I try to assure them every time I can that I
    am not planning to furlough anybody, but they know better than
    I do that the Congress could take some action and all of a
    sudden the Administrator doesn't have a clue what he is talking
    about because now I have got to lay people off. My intention is
    not to do that. If your question is, is there a bad effect of
    sequestration, yes, sir.
        Mr. Swalwell. That is my question.
        General Bolden. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Swalwell. How about for General Shelton?
        General Shelton. I will tell you, sir, just about my every
    waking moment these days is based on this topic. I just pulled
    the trigger on $508 million of reductions in just my major
    command alone from now until the end of the fiscal year, a 20
    percent cut in pay to my civilians. There are resources that
    are used for missile warning and missile defense that we won't
    be able to operate at full capability. There are things that we
    use for space surveillance that we won't be able to operate at
    full capability.
        Mr. Swalwell. And General, do you think that makes us more
    or less prepared to handle a near-Earth objects?
        General Shelton. That is not what we do. That is NASA's
    responsibility. We contribute serendipitously at times but we
    are focused on things in Earth orbit.
        Mr. Swalwell. So if you had to focus on something in Earth
    orbit, would it make you more or less prepared having to have
    these across-the-board cuts?
        General Shelton. We are clearly less capable under
    sequestration.
        Mr. Swalwell. Great. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back
    the balance of my time.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Swalwell. The gentleman from
    Florida, Mr. Posey, is recognized for his questions.
        Mr. Posey. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank all
    three of you for your very detailed written testimony. You use
    a lot of facts that I frequently refer to that clearly indicate
    it is not a matter of if but when civilization will be
    threatened by an impact. Until the recent Russian impact, quite
    a few people thought those of us who were even aware of this or
    dared mention it were on the kooky side, and so one good thing
    about that is maybe a little bit of a wake-up call to reality
    for some people.
        Dr. Holdren, your testimony referred to the first-ever
    exercise, deflection exercise. I wonder if you could just share
    a little bit with us about how that went.
        Dr. Holdren. I am not--the first-ever deflection exercise
    was a kinetic impact on an asteroid of medium size, which while
    interesting from the standpoint of the deflection it generated
    did not reflect the magnitude of the capability you would need
    for a late-notice deflection of an asteroid of threatening
    size. It was an interesting demonstration.
        One of the things I would like to reinforce is that the
    President's proposal to land U.S. astronauts on an asteroid by
    2025 will in fact exercise a number of the capabilities that
    would be necessary to have in our toolbox should an asteroid of
    threatening size be detected on a collision course. I would
    disagree with something Congresswoman Edwards said, that this
    is a lackadaisical program. I think it is a crucial program,
    and I think it is going to lead to major advances in
    capabilities which are not just interesting to demonstrate at a
    small scale but not enough to deal with a real threat.
        Mr. Posey. Thank you. And I took her comment to mean she
    thought the approach to it might have been lackadaisical, not
    that it wasn't necessary, you know, for whatever----
        Ms. Edwards. For the record, I didn't say that word.
        Mr. Posey. Okay. Now, the Ranking Member asked about
    protocol, you know, who is in charge, and we got about three or
    four minutes of a chatter but we never got an answer about who
    is in charge, and so rather than asking for a response, I would
    just like to recommend that the next time that you all come
    before us you give us a protocol and say this is who is in
    charge here, here is in charge here and here is in charge here,
    and it is just a very clear matter of protocol who is in charge
    in various instances, you know, as being preordained and
    preestablished.. I know you are going to corroborate and, you
    know, get this stuff done if we have an impact, but a good
    segment of the population thinks it is just a matter of calling
    Bruce Willis in, you know, and notwithstanding we don't have a
    shuttle anymore, you know, it is impossible. But things that
    beg for an answer, you know, scary of course, that we only know
    about 10 percent of the huge threats and we virtually have no
    idea of the small threats like the one that went undetected,
    the recent impact in Russia. You know, what would we do if you
    detected even a small one like the one in Russia headed for New
    York City in three weeks? What would we do? Bend over and what?
        General Bolden. No, Congressman, I have to go back to what
    I said before. These are very rare events. From the information
    that we have on asteroids that we have discovered of all sizes,
    we don't know of one that will threaten the population of the
    United States in three weeks, and we are trying very diligently
    as I said before with the President's budget to put ourselves
    in a position where we advance the technologies so that three
    weeks will not be something that causes us to panic because we
    will be able to respond.
        We are where we are today because you all told us to do
    something, and between the Administration and the Congress, the
    bottom line is always the funding did not come, and I don't
    care whose fault it is or if it is anybody's fault. We all know
    what we are facing today and we are all sitting here today as
    the Congress and the Administration try to figure out
    sequestration, something that never should have happened.
    Nobody planned it to happen but we are facing it today. And so
    the answer to you is, if it is coming in three weeks, pray, if
    we find that out right now. And that is not bad policy.
        Mr. Posey. That is reality.
        General Bolden. I am a practicing Episcopalian and I love
    what the Pope is doing right now. I will tell you, things have
    happened. You have got to pray.
        Mr. Posey. The upside, I guess, is that there is more
    public awareness now of the importance of space to the survival
    of our species and it is not at some unknown point in the far-
    distant future that we can imagine.
        General Bolden. And sir, if I may, you said something that
    is so important. It would be very easy for this Congress and
    for the Administration to say--because we get the question all
    the time, why are we worried about exploring beyond low-Earth
    orbit, can't we just put that off for 5 or 10 years. The reason
    that I can't do anything in the next three weeks is because for
    decades we have put it off for the next 5 or 10 years. We don't
    have contractors who go away from doing their job and then 5
    years from now we call and say okay, we want to build a rocket.
    They will tell me, with whom; we don't do that anymore. All
    those guys went over and they are now selling pizza, and I am
    not being facetious when I say that. And I apologize. You cause
    me to lose my temper sometimes when I--this is really
    important.
        Mr. Posey. Yes, it is.
        General Bolden. And it has to be continuous. The President
    has a plan but that plan is incremental, and we can not like
    him, we can not agree with him, we can not do a lot of things.
    It is the best plan we have, and if we want to save the planet,
    because I think that is what we are talking about, then we have
    to get together, that side and that side, and decide how we are
    going to execute that plan as expeditiously as possible. That
    is all I can tell you.
        Mr. Posey. Thank you.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Posey. The gentleman from
    California, Mr. Takano.
        Mr. Takano. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        This use of the term ``civilization threatening'' or
    ``civilization destroying'' asteroids, remind me at what size
    would we say such an asteroid would be?
        Dr. Holdren. A 1-kilometer asteroid would be carrying
    energy in the range of tens of millions of megatons. That is as
    much or more energy as was in the combined arsenals of the
    United States and the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold
    War. An asteroid of that size, a kilometer or bigger, could
    plausibly end civilization. Nobody has the detailed models, the
    ability to calculate and detail, to tell you exactly what the
    threshold is, but when you are talking about tens of millions
    of megatons of explosive energy, you are putting civilization
    at risk.
        Mr. Takano. And I am hearing that we are relatively
    optimistic that we can develop systems at the right price
    points to be able to detect asteroids of this size with a
    sufficient amount of lead time to be able to do something about
    it.
        Dr. Holdren. That is the size range where we have already
    detected something in the range of 93, 94 percent of the
    asteroids of that size range that could come close to the
    Earth, and in that size range, we can be reasonably assured,
    especially as we make these additional investments going
    forward, of being able to detect them with quite a lot of
    notice.
        Mr. Takano. Let us scale it down to medium- to large-size
    city-destroying asteroids. What size would those be?
        Dr. Holdren. A city-destroying asteroid could be in the
    range of 50-meter diameter carrying an energy in the range of 5
    to 10 megatons.
        Mr. Takano. What sort of systems would we need to be able
    to detect that? You talked about more assets in our orbit,
    telescopes of that kind including those that could get around
    the issue of the sun.
        Dr. Holdren. We would want the infrared telescope in an
    orbit resembling that of Venus. It could be a Venus trailing
    orbit following the planet around, the planet Venus, which
    again is what the B612 Foundation is in fact working on. As
    Administrator Bolden mentioned, we actually had an experiment
    with an infrared telescope that was built for an orbiting
    telescope built for a different purpose. It is very good at
    finding asteroids.
        Mr. Takano. We spoke a lot about the cooperative nature of
    what would need to happen, nations coming together, but would
    there be also rivalrous kinds of impulses which might divide
    us? In fact if we were to detect objects of this size, would
    nations also be concerned about that impacting the ability to
    detect missiles, for example?
        Dr. Holdren. I think these are very different capabilities.
    As General Shelton mentioned, going into detail about our
    missile-detecting capabilities would require a different forum,
    but they are quite different in nature from the capabilities we
    would need to detect and track asteroids.
        Mr. Takano. Well, the chairman raised a question that I
    thought was rather interesting, did none of our current
    missile-detecting capabilities, did they fail to be able to
    detect the most recent asteroid, and you may not be able to
    answer that question.
        General Shelton. I can. We did detect it, and as I said, it
    was at the time. It wasn't predicted. It was detection at the
    time.
        Mr. Takano. So the missile detection capacities we have now
    I mean really are kind of--they are more in real time as
    opposed to time that we might be able to remediate the problem?
        General Shelton. Yes, sir, and focused on two things. The
    infrared signature coming out the back end of a missile, we see
    that, and as soon as it either breaks the ground, if there is
    weather overhead, as soon as it breaks the clouds, we will see
    that. We will be able to tell you what type of missile it is.
    We will be able to tell you where that missile is going. We
    will be able to tell you where it is going to impact. So very
    solid missile-warning capabilities. Those infrared sensors can
    be used for other things but they can't be used for predictive
    things out beyond Earth orbit.
        Mr. Takano. Mr. Chairman, I am out of time. Thank you so
    much.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Takano. The gentleman from
    Arizona, Mr. Schweikert, is recognized.
        Mr. Schweikert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Just because I want to get my head around and try to really
    understand some of the base-level approach here, and Doctor, I
    was going to ask you first, and forgive me if I am equating a
    statement to you that was in someone else's opening statement.
    A dangerous interaction, Earth and an object, was the statement
    one-out-of-a thousand-year event?
        Dr. Holdren. The one-in-a thousand-year event is the one of
    the magnitude that hit over the Tunguska, the asteroid impact
    over Siberia in 1908, and that was a 15-megaton class event.
    That is characteristic of one in a thousand years. The
    dimension of that asteroid was somewhere in the range of 50
    meters.
        Mr. Schweikert. Now, if I remember my old modeling classes,
    when you start getting into something with that far out in
    detail, you know, it is like the person that says it is a 500-
    year flood except we had three of them in the last 10 years,
    because you have such--your degree of confidence, your noise in
    that just becomes--it blows off the chart. So we always like to
    say one in a thousand but it is one in a thousand with, you
    know, a 20 percent lack of confidence. Does that sort of math
    also work for this?
        Dr. Holdren. Well, I would say certainly there is a lack of
    confidence of that size or greater but the real catch is that a
    one-in-a-thousand-year event can occur at any time. The fact
    that on average one only expects these to happen once in a
    thousand years doesn't mean that one won't happen next year.
        Mr. Schweikert. Often when we talk to certain non-
    statistical people, you try to explain that you can have the
    three 500-year floods in 10 years and then go 1,500 years
    without something.
        Okay. In the discovery of objects out there, how much are
    you finding is coming from the amateur astronomy community? I
    mean, if I remember correctly, you were telling me that--was it
    the gentleman--was it an amateur in Spain that saw the last
    one?
        Dr. Holdren. I am not sure it was an amateur.
        General Bolden. I don't know that it was--we can find out
    whether it was an amateur astronomer. We just know it was an
    astronomer in Spain that made the discovery on 2012 DA14.
        Mr. Schweikert. Is there--how formal or informal is that
    network out there of university amateurs, governmental
    astronomers, you know, scouring the skies, seeing things,
    reporting them? How does that mechanism work?
        Dr. Holdren. It is actually quite organized, quite formal
    and quite fast. That community of folks stay in constant
    communication.
        Let me take this opportunity to recommend a book, because
    it is not mine, a book by NASA's head of the near-Earth Object
    Identification program, Dr. Donald Yeomans. It just came out
    this year, 2013. It is called Near-Earth Objects: Finding Them
    Before They Find Us. Nice title. And he talks at great length
    about these networks, about the roles of amateurs, about the
    roles of professionals, who discovered what.
        Mr. Schweikert. You are beating me into where I was
    actually trying to go. Is there a way to take that network and
    incentivize it? I have a great interest in sort of distributive
    information, distributive networks, so lots of smart people all
    over the world with this their hobbies, and is there a way--
    should we be incentivizing that?
        Dr. Holdren. That is a great question, and we in OSTP are
    greatly in favor of crowdsourcing. We are greatly in favor of
    putting challenges out there, and in fact----
        Mr. Schweikert. You and I are about to become really good
    friends.
        Dr. Holdren. And these challenges we already know. We have
    used them across a domain of interesting problems, and I think
    there is no doubt we are going to have a challenge around
    asteroid detection.
        Mr. Schweikert. And it is not answerable in 20-some
    seconds, but part of that is, okay, we see something. How far
    in advance with current technology do you have to see something
    to analyze, determine, you know, threat assessment and then
    react to it?
        Dr. Holdren. The analysis and threat assessment is pretty
    fast because once you see it, you can train on it various other
    instruments--the radio telescopes, optical telescopes, and use
    the combination of information available from them once they
    know where to look in the sky to characterize its trajectory
    and determine whether or not it is a threat. The long-time
    scale, the long pole in the tent, is deploying the capability
    to deflect one that you discover is on a collision course, and
    that is the issue where currently we would have to say the time
    scale is in the range of years, and I think Administrator
    Bolden suggested that he would get back to the Committee on
    that, but I think his estimate, his initial estimate, is
    certainly reasonable. Even throwing a lot of resources at it,
    you would be talking 4 or 5 years to mount a deflection
    mission.
        Mr. Schweikert. Mr. Chairman, thank you for your patience.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Schweikert. The gentlewoman
    from Connecticut, Ms. Esty, is recognized.
        Ms. Esty. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
        I too share some of the interest in this sort of
    crowdsourcing, and would just flag, since we have already had
    some hearings on big data, to perhaps follow up at a later time
    to think about what opportunities there are in other areas. We
    are also looking at the data side and how we might be able to
    collaborate on this worldwide problem, and I think that is very
    important.
        For General Bolden, if you could talk a little bit about
    what NASA's procedure is for actually notifying our Federal
    agencies? You get notice of a NEO. What do you need to know?
    What triggers a notification warning and how does that actually
    work?
        General Bolden. Congresswoman, there are several
    organizations we notify. We notify the State Department, first
    of all, because they notify our international partners that
    there is an incident, and this is not just for asteroids. This
    would be for a satellite that has fallen back to Earth or
    something, and we have had to exercise that several times over
    the last two years. The first person I would notify would be
    Dr. Holdren as the President's science advisor, and going back
    in response to Mr. Posey's question, there is no question in my
    mind who is in charge, and I go to Dr. Holdren because he pulls
    the team together, whether it is DOD or NASA and everyone else,
    but I understand the thrust of the question. So we would notify
    other Federal agencies, FEMA, the State Department, and then go
    from there. And it is scenario dependent. It depends on what
    the characterization of the asteroid or the NEO happens to be.
    Sometimes it is just a matter of saying hey, we now have
    something else that has been added to the inventory, it is not
    an Earth-threatening orbit, and we do that.
        Ms. Esty. Could you talk about whether there is an
    organized international warning network, or should there be? Is
    this something that is again scenario dependent or is there an
    actual formal network?
        General Bolden. Dr. Holdren mentioned the recent meeting in
    conjunction with U.N. COPUOS that actually the chair was an
    American, a NASA scientist, and from that meeting came the
    initial decision that we would organize, and I can get you more
    information on what they propose, because like everything else,
    it is a proposal for an international collaborative effort to
    do this.
        Dr. Holdren. If I could just add one thing to that. The
    Minor Planet Center, which I mentioned before, which is located
    at the Harvard-Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, is a
    formal international entity to which everybody automatically
    feeds discoveries of new near-Earth objects. So there is
    already a formal network which functions to assemble all the
    information that is available from all these different
    telescopes around the world, and even the amateur astronomers
    know where to go with their findings. They go straight to the
    Minor Planet Center, and the Minor Planet Center then goes to
    the NASA operation at JPL, which is responsible for working out
    the trajectory in coordination with these other groups. But the
    thing that is new, the international asteroid warning network,
    which emerged from this February 15th meeting in Vienna, will
    ramp up this whole effort and will add, I think, additional
    layers of capability as countries come together to say given
    these current scattered assets, what more do we need and how do
    we get it.
        Ms. Esty. It seems to me that is very important for several
    reasons. Everybody is under budget constraints so that we
    should be more effectively deploying world resources in this
    range but also confidence building, which I worry about from a
    security point of view, that if other countries see this as
    threatening because we might use these technologies in some
    other way, it is going to be vitally important that we are
    sharing in a way that in fact respects the assets other
    countries have and we all get the benefit for worldwide
    resources. So if you have specific proposals as the outcome of
    the Vienna conference goes forward, I hope you will come back
    to us to help us bring those forward to leadership about new
    opportunities but in fact will be lifesaving, you know, planet-
    saving potentially but that will allow--will require greater
    collaboration. Thank you very much.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Esty. The gentleman from
    Texas, Mr. Weber, is recognized.
        Mr. Weber. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Dr. Holdren, you said that the asteroid that hit Siberia
    was 15 megatons. What was the name of that event?
        Dr. Holdren. That was Tunguska.
        Mr. Weber. Tunguska?
        Dr. Holdren. T-u-n-g-u-s-k-a.
        Mr. Weber. Okay. And then you said, I think, you all agreed
    there was 13,000 objects----
        Dr. Holdren. Thirteen to 20,000 140 meters and above, so
    the number would be somewhat larger for asteroids 100 meters
    and above.
        Mr. Weber. How close is the nearest one?
        Dr. Holdren. Well, it is not a question of how close it is
    now. The question is, how close will its orbit take it to the
    Earth in the near future. Right now, as Administrator Bolden
    has said, none of these asteroids hat we have found is on a
    collision course with the Earth.
        Mr. Weber. Okay. You also--well, I think it was you,
    General Bolden, that said the Russian meteor was hidden by the
    sun and it is the reason we didn't detect it because it came
    straight out of the sun?
        General Bolden. I wasn't, but that is correct. The folks in
    NASA when I asked the question of how did this happen, it came
    from out of the sun.
        Mr. Weber. But my question is, when something comes right
    out of the sun directly at us, at some point we are able to
    identify it, General Shelton, you said. How much time do we
    have? Is that 10 minutes, 2 hours? At what point does it become
    identifiable as it gets to the Earth's atmosphere?
        General Bolden. Well, one thing, Congressman, I do have to
    reemphasize, we talk about these three week scenarios, that is
    so unlikely, and even the occurrence in Russia, that was not a
    city-threatening--if you were in Russia, that was a significant
    event, but that is not of the size that is the city-
    threatening, the region-threatening, the other----
        Mr. Weber. But can you give me a time frame on how long we
    would have when one actually is in the----
        General Bolden. It is my belief that we can identify in
    sufficient advance those that are the big threats, but we need
    to do better.
        Mr. Weber. Okay. We had the Hubble telescope up for a long
    time. Now we have replaced that----
        General Bolden. It is still up.
        Mr. Weber. It is still up, and you and I had the discussion
    in my office, we have a better telescope up.
        General Bolden. We are a little ways away. In 2018 we will
    launch the James Webb Space Telescope, but they are not in the
    asteroid NEO identifying--they are looking at totally different
    things.
        Mr. Weber. Given the scenario of low funding and time being
    of the essence, could we make that change to where we could add
    on to that telescope so we get it up in space?
        General Bolden. No, sir. Very simply, no, sir.
        Mr. Weber. Can't do that?
        General Bolden. No, sir. We would not want to do that, to
    be quite honest. We have a plan right now, Dr. Holdren and I
    both have mentioned collaboration with private industry, with
    private organizations like B612. I don't want anybody to think
    that B612 is going to save the planet but they are doing what
    we need to do in terms of providing a means to identify----
        Mr. Weber. That was my question about that particular
    telescope. The ISS, if I remember correctly, orbits the Earth
    every 91 minutes?
        General Bolden. That is about right.
        Mr. Weber. How much of a role do they play in being able to
    identify and how much time do----
        General Bolden. Right now we don't utilize it at all, but
    as I talked about when I was in with you, we are learning every
    single day that ISS, although we thought it was not a platform
    that you would want to do Earth science, it is turning out to
    be a great platform, and we are learning more and more about
    it. We have a solar experiment that is going up, and there may
    be the capability to put something there, but that is not going
    to be the answer.
        Mr. Weber. Six hours, six days, six weeks?
        General Bolden. I would not even like to fool anybody that
    ISS and anything we can put on it is going to answer this
    question. The types of things that Dr. Holdren mentioned and I
    mentioned earlier are the way we need to go.
        Mr. Weber. All right. Two final questions and I have got to
    go. Who monitors this screen for all of these objects? Does it
    doing your iPhone when there is a threat coming? I mean,
    somebody has to got to be watching some instrument 24/7 to say
    oops, we picked one up. Who does that?
        Dr. Holdren. That happens at the Minor Planet Center, where
    all the information from all of these sensing instruments
    around the world goes.
        Mr. Weber. And then final question. So you explode an
    asteroid, how do we know that we get total disintegration and
    we don't have, instead of one big object coming at us, 20 very
    lethal objects?
        Dr. Holdren. You don't know that. That is one of the
    reasons that blowing one up close to the Earth is not a great
    option. Deflecting it farther from the Earth so that it doesn't
    hit us at all is a much better option.
        Mr. Weber. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
        Chairman Smith. Tank you, Mr. Weber. The gentleman from
    Texas, Mr. Veasey, is recognized.
        Mr. Veasey. Thank you. I forgot who it was earlier talked
    about an asteroid hitting an ocean and causing a tsunami. I
    guess depending on the size of the asteroid would be the
    correct answer to this question, but how far inland could a
    reasonably sized asteroid make water come in? Because that was
    really interesting to me.
        Dr. Holdren. There is a very interesting discussion of
    exactly that question in Dr. Yeomans' book, and the answer is,
    we really don't know because the dynamics of tsunamis caused by
    asteroid impacts are, number one, very complicated and not
    adequately investigated, and it depends on many factors
    including the slope of the ocean bottom close to the continent
    that is going to be most affected and it depends on a lot of
    other characteristics of the asteroid impact. So I think there
    is no simple answer to that question that we can give at this
    time.
        Mr. Veasey. What about asteroids hitting other, you know,
    planet systems, or what sort of research do you have on that?
        Dr. Holdren. Well, there are a lot of craters out there.
    There are craters on the moon from asteroid impacts that we can
    see very clearly.
        Mr. Veasey. Any recently that you--any recent craters on
    the moon?
        Dr. Holdren. I would have to get back to you on that. I am
    not sure what the most recent impact on the moon is, but I
    think none very recent, but again, in geologic time, ``recent''
    can be quite a stretch of time. But there is also lots of
    evidence of asteroids bashing into each other. If you look at
    the larger asteroids that are out there, they themselves are
    pitted with major craters that come from them bumping into each
    other.
        Mr. Veasey. Thank you.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Veasey. The gentleman from
    Utah, Mr. Stewart, is recognized.
        Mr. Stewart. Thank you, gentlemen, for your time. I know
    you and your careers and I have a great deal of respect for
    you, so thank for that. General Bolden, good to see you, sir.
    We spent some time at your place talking the other day, and I
    know that you are a former Marine pilot. As you know, I am a
    former Air Force pilot.
        My question is actually for General Shelton. As a senior
    Air Force officer with great wisdom and insight, is it your
    understanding, sir, as it is mine that Air Force pilots are the
    best pilots in the world?
        General Shelton. I am going to have to say yes on that,
    sir.
        Mr. Stewart. Thank you, sir. I am surprised no one has
    asked that question yet. I am glad I was able to.
        General Shelton. Actually, sir----
        General Bolden. That is fighter pilots of all services with
    the Air Force. I am an attack pilot.
        Mr. Stewart. You are a bigger man than I am because I have
    never landed on a carrier.
        Actually I have a couple of simple questions, then maybe a
    more detailed one. The first would be, you know, we spent a lot
    of time talking about detection avoidance, you know, and some
    of the uncertainties about that. I am curious about policy,
    public policy. If we were to determine that there was a threat
    and then even determined that it was actually potentially
    devastating, do we have a policy as to whether we would share
    that information with the public and how we would do that? And
    Dr. Holdren, I guess that is probably most appropriate for you.
        Dr. Holdren. My expectation would be that we would notify,
    but the first thing that would happen if information came in
    indicating that an asteroid had been detected to be on a
    collision course with the Earth and it was big enough to do
    serious damage, it would be exactly what happened after the
    Fukushima earthquake and tsunami affected Japan. Namely, there
    would be a gathering in the Situation Room within minutes in
    which we would have the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
    we would have the Secretary of State, we would have the head of
    FEMA, we would have the Secretary of Homeland Security, we
    would have the head of NASA, we would have General Shelton, and
    there would be an intense discussion of the whole range of
    actions that the government would take in order to deal with
    the threat, whatever it was, and in that meeting,
    unquestionably there would be a discussion of who to notify,
    how fast, in what form.
        Mr. Stewart. And I understand that. I am curious, and
    maybe--and I am not advocating one way or the other. I am just
    curious, have you determined the protocol for advising the
    public? Is that part of that matrix?
        Dr. Holdren. I don't know whether FEMA, which would have
    that responsibility, has developed a formal protocol. We could
    get back to you on that.
        Mr. Stewart. Okay. I wish you would. I would be curious to
    know that.
        And the second thing, and we have all talked about it,
    maybe I am just not that bright, I am not sure I get it, but,
    you know, the saying, we don't know what we don't know, and you
    said that we have discovered 94 percent of the asteroids over 1
    kilometer, for example, but if we don't know what is out there,
    how do we know that we have discovered 94 percent of them?
        Dr. Holdren. That is actually a very good question, and it
    turns out that there are subtle statistical techniques that
    rely on sampling of subpopulations and what fraction of them
    you have see before in order to determine what fraction of the
    overall population you have actually seen. That is actually
    described again in wonderfully clear detail in Dr. Yeomans'
    book. It was the best explanation of that that I have seen.
        Mr. Stewart. So you are interpolating there? You are
    drawing conclusions but you are fairly comfortable----
        Dr. Holdren. You are drawing conclusions based on sampling.
        Mr. Stewart. Right, but you are fairly comfortable with
    those figures?
        Dr. Holdren. Yes.
        Mr. Stewart. Okay. And then the last question in the minute
    or so I have left, you know, we talk about detection being, you
    know, the first line of defense, and our efforts, and you
    mentioned some of the others as well, but I mean, is the United
    States the lead on this? Clearly, we are, but are other nations
    contributing to this detection effort in a meaningful way or is
    it almost entirely our efforts that are meaningful here?
        Dr. Holdren. No, absolutely other nations are contributing
    in a meaningful way. There are important telescopes and data
    centers in Italy. That is a German-Italian collaboration. There
    is another one in Czechoslovakia. There are some--the LSST will
    be in Chile. There are some in Australia. And again, this
    domain is actually remarkable for the degree of international
    cooperation and interconnection compared to many others where
    we are not nearly as far along.
        Mr. Stewart. As it should be, of course, because we all got
    a dog in this fight. So those other entities, are they funded
    by the EU and other--they are not with American funding at all?
    Those are entirely independently funded efforts?
        Dr. Holdren. No, they are not entirely independently
    funded. For example, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope is
    being very substantially funded by NSF even though it is going
    to be in Chile, but of course, it will be an NSF facility in a
    sense. The Arecibo Radio Telescope in Puerto Rico is funded by
    NSF.
        Mr. Stewart. So even though these are located,
    geographically located around the world, they are primarily
    U.S. efforts?
        Dr. Holdren. I would have to get back to you on the
    international distribution of the funding. Certainly there is
    substantial funding from the European Space Agency. There is
    substantial funding from Germany, from Italy, from
    Czechoslovakia, from France, but I could not give you a
    percentage.
        Mr. Stewart. Again, if you would, I would appreciate that.
    Thank you. And Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Stewart. The gentleman from
    Florida, Mr. Grayson, is recognized.
        Mr. Grayson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Gentlemen, we could spend each year a million dollars on
    space threats, we could spend a billion dollars or we could
    spend a trillion dollars. I would like to hear from each one of
    you what we should spend. That is what we have to decide here.
    And specifically, I would like to hear either a number or
    formula, I think the Science Committee can deal with formulas,
    or some sort of list of the things that you think must be done
    without regard to what they cost. Let us start with you, Dr.
    Holdren.
        Dr. Holdren. The National Academy of Sciences just a couple
    of years ago came out with a report in which they actually
    addressed this question, and they looked at what you could do
    for $500 million a year, what you could do for $100 million a
    year, what you could do for 50. I would say on the basis of
    that, if we are just looking primarily at detection and
    characterization, that I think we would want to be spending
    upwards of $100 million a year. If we are looking, as I think
    we must as well, at mitigation, then you would have to include
    the costs of carrying out the President's goal of visiting an
    asteroid by 2025. Various estimates have been put forward of
    the cost of doing that, but it almost certainly would be in the
    range of $2 billion or more spread over the period between now
    and 2025.
        Mr. Grayson. Thank you. General Shelton?
        General Shelton. Yes, sir. In my case, we are talking about
    geosynchronous orbit into the surface of the planet, so that,
    just that part of space that we are responsible for, probably
    200 or 300 million a year-ish is what we are talking about,
    developing better sensors that are more sensitive to the space
    debris population that is growing, sensors that allow us to
    better catalog the activity that is there and characterize it
    as threats continue to grow in space both adversarial threats
    as well as environmental threats. We need to be able to
    characterize that much better than we have the capability to do
    today. So I would say that 200 to 300 million range is what we
    are talking about.
        Mr. Grayson. Good. Administrator Bolden?
        General Bolden. Sir, the only thing I will add, because Dr.
    Holdren pretty much answered it, I want to reemphasize, because
    we have identified 95 percent of those objects that are a
    kilometer and above and we have seen none that are on a
    collision trajectory with Earth, this is not an issue that we
    should worry about in the near term. However, as I said, the
    President has laid out a plan, and I would say that is a very
    good start. We have a lot of work to do but the funding that is
    presently laid out in the President's budget is sufficient to
    get us there incrementally. We just have to move that plan
    forward. So you can't stop. That is my point.
        Mr. Grayson. All right. Now, tell us what kind of costs we
    would be facing if we spent nothing. It can be a worst-case
    scenario or a not-so-bad-case scenario, but the likely costs we
    would face if we did nothing. Let us start with you, Dr.
    Holdren.
        Dr. Holdren. This is a very tough question because there
    are different ways to present these things. If you take the
    expected value of the damage in terms of loss of human life
    integrated over a very long period of time, it comes out that
    the estimated loss of life from asteroid impact is only about
    100 per year. That compares with a million per year for
    malaria, it compares with five million per year for tobacco. So
    it doesn't look like a very big threat. But of course, that is
    not really a meaningful way to present a risk of this character
    where you are talking about a low probability of a very big
    disaster, and in those sorts of situations, we tend to invest
    in insurance to reduce the likelihood of a disaster we would
    regard as intolerable. If you say how big is the disaster, if
    you are talking about a 10-kilometer asteroid of the sort that
    exterminated the dinosaurs, what is the value of all of
    civilization? It is a very big number but is it meaningful as a
    number which you then divide by the 65-million-year return
    time? I think we just can't get at it that way.
        Mr. Grayson. General Shelton, the costs of a worst-case
    scenario?
        General Shelton. Well, again, from a DOD perspective, we
    would not be able to characterize the traffic on orbit, we
    would not be able to avoid collisions on orbit, we would not be
    able to detect adversary activity on orbit, and our dependence
    on space, by the way, not only for our way of life but also for
    military operations is very high so we would sacrifice that.
        Mr. Grayson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Grayson, and let me thank
    our witnesses today for their testimony. This has been a
    particularly interesting hearing. No doubt there will be some
    follow-up questions that will be addressed to you all, but
    thank you for being here and thank you for your expertise as
    well.
        We stand adjourned.
        [Whereupon, at 11:58 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.]

                                   Appendix I

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                       Answers to Post-Hearing Questions

    Responses by The Honorable John P. Holdren

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    Responses by Gen. William L. Shelton

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    Responses by The Honorable Charles F. Bolden, Jr.

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                                  Appendix II

                                  ----------

                       Additional Material for the Record

      Submitted statement by Representative Steve Stockman, Committee on
                         Science, Space and Technology

        Mr. Chairman, thank you very much for focusing Congress' attention
    on taking effective action on the threats, and solutions to,
    potentially dangerous meteors and asteroids.
        The Chelyabinsk meteor, the flyby of asteroid 2012 DA14, and the
    1908 Siberian Tunguska event all offer the dramatic lesson that
    tracking and mitigating such objects must become a national priority.
        We know a large meteor or asteroid could destroy a city and kill
    millions of people. Unlike in 1908, we now have the ability--and
    therefore the responsibility--to take effective actions for identifying
    and avoiding a potentially catastrophic collision.
        Under current funding levels, NASA will not be able to meet the
    Congressional requirement to identify 90% of all objects 140 meters in
    diameter or larger by 2020. Altering the trajectory of an object in the
    Earth's path could not be accomplished within decades at current
    funding levels.
        Therefore these objectives must be met with additional and
    sufficient funds rather than reducing or cancelling funding for
    existing NASA programs. `Robbing Peter to pay Paul' would only result
    in half-hearted efforts which would fail to address the threat from
    asteroids while at the same time crippling our existing space program.
    A poorly-funded program will yield poor results.
        I am a tireless budget-slasher; however, science, space; and yes,
    planetary defense are among the few government programs essential to
    our future.
        Advances in technology for planetary defense may provide spinoffs
    for propulsion to take Americans to Mars and beyond; for cleaning up
    space debris which threatens satellites and the International Space
    Station; as well as for more everyday-life applications.
        This is of course a worldwide threat, and other nations should
    participate in developing solutions. However as with all smart space
    partnerships, it is in our distinct national interest that the United
    States lead the effort. This will assure that the majority of the
    technology developed will directly benefit the U.S. economy, and will
    give the U.S. the ability to block the transfer of our most advanced
    technology to our potential adversaries. The same technology to track
    and alter the course of asteroids could have military applications.
        The threat from asteroids and meteors is real. America must take
    the lead to develop practical and effective solutions, reap the
    technological benefits--lest a decade or two from now we regret our
    inaction.
        Letter submitted by Dr. Dante Lauretta, Department of Planetary
                    Sciences, Lunar and Planetary Laboratory

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0552.059

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0552.060

     Additional responses submitted by The Honorable Charles F. Bolden, Jr.

    Material requested for the record by Rep. Rohrabacher during the

    March 19, 2013, NEO hearing.

        To prepare for the unlikely event where the Earth would be
    threatened by a collision with a near-Earth object (NEO), we believe an
    enhanced program would include a steady effort of ground-based
    observation and monitoring of the detected hazards as they are found
    (lifecycle cost estimate of up to $600M over 20 years). Further
    enhancements could include space-based surveys to provide more timely
    detection of the hazardous population, and technology demonstration
    missions to test deflection techniques. The costs of these further
    enhancements are difficult to precisely estimate, but might be on the
    order of $2.5 - $3B.

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.061

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.062

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.063

                              THREATS FROM SPACE:
                       A REVIEW OF PRIVATE SECTOR EFFORTS
                        TO TRACK AND MITIGATE ASTEROIDS
                              AND METEORS, PART II

                                  ----------

                           WEDNESDAY, APRIL 10, 2013

                      House of Representatives,
                   Committee on Science, Space, and Technology,
                                                       Washington, D.C.

        The Committee met, pursuant to call, at 2:00 p.m., in Room
    2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Lamar Smith
    [Chairman of the Committee] presiding.

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.001

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.002

    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.003

        Chairman Smith. The Committee on Science, Space, and
    Technology will come to order.
        Welcome to today's hearing, which is titled ``Threats from
    Space, Part II: A Review of Private Sector Efforts to Track and
    Mitigate Asteroids and Meteors.'' I will recognize myself for
    an opening statement and then the Ranking Member.
        A few weeks ago, our Committee held a hearing to review
    U.S. Government efforts to track incoming asteroids and
    meteors. Today, we will follow up by focusing on
    nongovernmental efforts.
        The substantial public interest in this issue indicates the
    broad fascination with the subject. As witnesses said in our
    previous hearing, the events of February 15, when an asteroid
    passed close by the Earth and a meteor struck Russia, were
    unique in their occurring on the same day. And I am going to
    hold up a piece of the asteroid that exploded above Russia on
    February 15. Maybe I ought to take it out of the bag here. Let
    me--and I am assuming this is not toxic. Is that right? But
    there it is, a nice size bit of meteorite there, a gift from
    the Russians. It was given to us by the Principal Investigator
    of NASA's Asteroid Sample Return Mission, which is slated to
    launch in 2016.
        In our first hearing, testimony about the government's
    efforts was not reassuring. Most troubling to me was the fact
    that of the up to 20,000 asteroids that could be labeled as
    city destroyers, we have identified only 10 percent. And we are
    unlikely to have the means to detect 90 percent until 2030.
        Detecting asteroids should not be the primary mission of
    NASA. No doubt the private sector will play an important role
    as well. We must better recognize what the private sector can
    do to aid our efforts to protect the world.
        Today's hearing will help us understand the level of risk,
    as well as what capabilities we have and those we will need.
    The President's FY 2014 budget proposal brings necessary
    attention to this issue in general, but a consensus will have
    to be reached within Congress before progress can actually be
    made.
        This won't be an effort for one agency, one company, or one
    country. And in these fiscally challenging times, we can't
    afford duplication or the inefficient use of our resources. The
    more we discuss and understand the challenges we face, the
    easier it will be to facilitate possible solutions.
        Now, I will recognize the Ranking Member, the gentlewoman
    from Texas, Ms. Johnson, for her comments.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Smith follows:]

      Prepared Statement of Lamar S. Smith, Chairman, House Committee on
                         Science, Space, and Technology

            Good afternoon. A few weeks ago, our Committee held a hearing
            to review U.S. Government efforts to track incoming asteroids
            and meteors. Today, we will follow up by focusing on
            nongovernmental efforts.
        The substantial public interest in this issue indicates the broad
    fascination with this subject. As witnesses said in our previous
    hearing, the events of February 15, when an asteroid passed close by
    the Earth and a meteor struck Russia, were unique in their occurring on
    the same day.
        This is a piece of the asteroid that exploded above Russia on
    Feburary 15th. It was given to me by the Principal Investigator of
    NASA's asteroid sample return mission, which is slated to launch in
    2016.
        In our first hearing, testimony about the government's efforts was
    not reassuring. Most troubling to me was the fact that of the up to
    20,000 asteroids that could be labeled as ``city destroyers,'' we have
    identified only 10%. And we are unlikely to have the means to detect
    90% until 2030.
        Detecting asteroids should not be the primary mission of NASA. No
    doubt, the private sector will play an important role as well. We must
    better recognize what the private sector can do to aid our efforts to
    protect the world.
        Today's hearing will help us understand the level of risk, as well
    as what capabilities we have and those we will need. The President's FY
    14 budget proposal brings necessary attention to this issue in general,
    but a consensus will have to be reached within Congress before progress
    can be made.
        This won't be an effort of one agency, one company, or one country.
    And in these fiscally challenging times, we can't afford duplication or
    the inefficient use of our resources. The more we discuss and
    understand the challenges we face, the easier it will be to facilitate
    possible solutions.

        Ms. Johnson. Good afternoon. I want to join the Chairman in
    welcoming our witnesses to today's hearing. You each have deep
    experience and expertise directly related to the hearing topic,
    and I look forward to your testimony.
        As the Chairman has indicated, this hearing is the second
    that the Committee has held in the opening months of the 113th
    Congress on the topic of asteroids.
        Last month's meteor over Russia and the close passage of a
    near-Earth asteroid both stimulated public interest in the
    potential threat posed by asteroids and comets. And this second
    hearing is certainly a reflection of that interest.
        I will not attempt to repeat the sentiments I expressed at
    our first hearing on this topic and instead will confine myself
    to a few brief comments.
        First, it is clear that from last month's hearing there is
    still a lot of work to be done to track and characterize
    asteroids that could potentially impact the Earth and that even
    relatively small asteroids could do significant damage if they
    hit in a heavily populated area. So I hope that our witnesses
    today will help us better understand what will be needed to
    complete the existing survey, as well as perhaps extend it to a
    smaller size asteroid.
        Second, I want to be one to better understand both the
    strengths and limits of NASA relying on private organizations
    such as the B612 for detection of potential Earth-impacting
    asteroids. My problem is not with the efforts of such
    organizations to address what they see as an important problem.
    Instead, my concern is that we have reached a point where our
    government has to hope that nongovernmental organizations will
    somehow do what the government should be doing but it
    apparently is unwilling to pay for it. However, if the
    protection of the planet is not an appropriate role for the
    Federal Government, I am not sure what is. And finally, before
    I close, I will note that the President's just-released budget
    request proposes to invest in a number of asteroid-related
    initiatives. We will need to closely examine the President's
    proposals in the coming weeks to fully understand what is being
    proposed. So I am not going to comment on them in any depth
    today. Instead, I will simply say that I deeply hope that
    whatever new initiatives are being proposed will be
    accomplished accompanied by adequate funding of their own
    rather than being funded by cannibalizing other important NASA
    programs. Robbing Peter to pay Paul will not give us
    sustainable and effective NASA programs. And I hope we will all
    resist the temptation to do so as we try to address the
    challenges posed by near-Earth asteroids.Thank you and I yield
    back.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Johnson follows:]

           Prepared Statement of Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson

        Good afternoon. I want to join the Chairman in welcoming our
    witnesses to today's hearing. You each have deep experience and
    expertise directly related to the hearing topic, and I look forward to
    your testimony.
        As the Chairman has indicated, this hearing is the second that the
    Committee has held in the opening months of the 113th Congress on the
    topic of asteroids. Last month's meteor over Russia and the close
    passage of a near-Earth asteroid have both stimulated public interest
    in the potential threat posed by asteroids and comets, and this second
    hearing is certainly a reflection of that interest.
        I will not attempt to repeat the sentiments I expressed at our
    first hearing on this topic and instead wil confine myself to a few
    brief comments. First, it is clear from last month's hearing that there
    is still a lot of work to be done to track and characterize asteroids
    that could potentially impact the Earth. And that even relatively small
    asteroids could do significant damage if they hit a heavily populated
    area. So I hope that our witnesses today will help us better understand
    what will be needed to complete the existing survey as well as perhaps
    extend it to smaller-sized asteroids.
        Second, I want to better understand both the strengths and limits
    of NASA relying on private organizations such as B612 for detection of
    potential Earth-impacting asteroids. My problem is not with the efforts
    of such organizations to address what they see as an important problem.
    Instead, my concern is that we have reached a point where our
    government has to hope that nongovernmental organization will somehow
    do what the government should be doing but is apparently unwilling to
    pay for. However, if the protection of the planet is not an appropriate
    role for the Federal Government, I'm not sure what is.
        Finally, before I close, I will note that the President's just-
    released budget request proposes to invest in a number of asteroid-
    related initiatives. We will need to closely examine the President's
    proposals in the coming weeks to fully understand what is being
    proposed, so I'm not going to comment on them in any depth today.
    Instead, I will simply say that I deeply hope that whatever new
    initiatives are being proposed will be accompanied by adequate funding
    of their own rather than be funded by cannibalizing other important
    NASA programs. Robbing Peter to pay Paul will not give us sustainable
    and effective NASA programs, and I hope we will all resist the
    temptation to do so as we try to address the challenge posed by near-
    Earth asteroids.

        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Johnson. Other Members'
    statements will be made a part of the record. And I will
    introduce our witnesses now.
        Our first witness is Dr. Ed Lu. Dr. Lu is the CEO of the
    B612 Foundation, which aims to build, launch, and operate the
    Sentinel Space Telescope to help find and track threatening
    asteroids. He is a former NASA astronaut who flew three space
    missions and spent six months aboard the International Space
    Station. From 2007 to 2010, he led the Advanced Projects Group
    at Google. His teams developed imaging technology for Google
    Earth Maps, Google Street View, and energy information
    products, including Google Power Meter. He is also the co-
    inventor of the gravity tractor, a spacecraft able to
    controllably alter the orbit of an asteroid. And he has
    published scientific articles on high-energy astrophysics,
    solar physics, plasma physics, cosmology, and statistical
    physics. He holds a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering
    from Cornell and a Ph.D. in astrophysics from Stanford
    University.
        Our second witness is Dr. Donald Yeomans. Dr. Yeomans is a
    Senior Research Scientist, Supervisor for the Solar System
    Dynamics Group, and Manager of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program
    Office at Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
    His research focuses on the physical and dynamical modeling of
    comets and asteroids. He was a Radio Science Team Chief for the
    Near-Earth Asteroid Rendezvous Mission. He has received 15 NASA
    Achievement Awards and asteroid 2956 was named 2956 Yeomans in
    honor of his professional achievements. Dr. Yeomans received
    his Bachelor of Arts degree from Middlebury College and his
    Ph.D. in astronomy from the University of Maryland.
        Our final witness is Dr. Michael A'Hearn. Dr. A'Hearn is a
    Professor in the Astronomy Department at the University of
    Maryland. He is the Principal Investigator for the Deep Impact
    Mission and NASA's Discovery Impact Mission in NASA's Discovery
    Program and for the Small Bodies Node of NASA's Planetary Data
    System. His research emphasizes the study of comets and
    asteroids. Dr. A'Hearn received a Bachelor of Science degree in
    physics from Boston College and a Ph.D. in astronomy from the
    University of Wisconsin, Madison.
        Now, we welcome you all. Thank you for being here. And Dr.
    Lu, we will begin with you.

                        STATEMENT OF DR. ED LU,

                   CHAIRMAN AND CEO, B612 FOUNDATION

        Dr. Lu. Thank you, Members of the Committee, and thank you,
    Chairman Smith, especially for your leadership on this issue.
        So my name is Ed Lu, and I am CEO of the B612 Foundation. I
    want to thank you for the opportunity to testify before the
    Committee to describe the B612 Foundation and its Sentinel
    Space Telescope project and the importance of that project.
        The B612 Foundation is a Silicon Valley-based nonprofit
    that is building, launching, and operating the Sentinel Space
    Telescope, which will find and track threatening asteroids. So
    NASA, at the direction of Congress, has found and tracked 95
    percent of the large asteroids, those larger than a kilometer,
    that would likely end civilization were they to hit. So they
    have done a great job on that. And none of these civilization-
    enders is known--thus far discovered--is known to be on an
    impact course anytime in this upcoming century. So that is the
    good news.
        But NASA has not even come close to finding and tracking
    the one million smaller asteroids that might only just wipe out
    a city or perhaps collapse a rural economy if they hit in the
    wrong place. I would like to clarify something, and so I
    thought this image might be of help. I just show here a
    football stadium, which I understand now is Heinz Field in
    Pittsburgh, and we show a couple of asteroids there, but just
    for scale.
        A 140-meter asteroid is not shown here, but it would
    roughly fit inside that stadium. And that is the size--when
    they hit, that would release about 100 megatons of energy,
    which is roughly five times all the munitions used in World War
    II. Okay. So that is much larger than a city killer. That is a
    regional killer. Okay. And NASA discovered and observed,
    tracked less than 10 percent of the asteroids in that size
    range, sort of the stadium-sized ones.
        A 40-meter asteroid, which is the larger of these two, is
    what you would really call a city killer. The last one to hit
    was in 1908 in Tunguska, and that had an impact energy about
    three to five megatons of energy. It destroyed about 1,000
    square miles of Siberian forest. And we have observed and
    tracked well less than one percent of the million or so
    asteroids of that size. So if you ask how many city killers out
    there have we found and have tracked? Less than one percent is
    the answer. And there is about a 30 percent chance that there
    will be another impact of a city killer sometime this century,
    somewhere on the surface of the Earth. Just for reference, the
    smaller one shown there is about the size of the one that
    struck Chelyabinsk last month.
        So we simply don't know when the next catastrophic asteroid
    impact is going to be, because we simply haven't yet tracked
    the great majority of asteroids. Again, less than one percent
    of these city killers have been tracked. Yet we have the
    technology to deflect asteroids, and Dr. A'Hearn will probably
    talk a little bit about Deep Impact. It is--you--which is an
    experiment to actually hit an asteroid with a small spacecraft,
    and that is all you really need to do in most cases if you find
    the asteroids well in advance and--because you can't deflect an
    asteroid that you haven't yet tracked. Our technology is
    useless against something we haven't found.
        So that is why our number one priority from the standpoint
    of planetary defense is to find and track asteroids as soon as
    practical. You can't deflect an asteroid you haven't yet found,
    or for that matter, you can't capture it, you can't visit it,
    you can't mine it, you can't explore it until you have found
    it.
        So finding and tracking the roughly one million or so city
    killer asteroids in a reasonable time frame requires a system
    that can find tens to hundreds of thousands of them per year,
    right? If you are going to get to a million, you need to find
    them at a very high rate. Anything less than that, from a
    planetary defense standpoint, is just playing around the edges.
        So this task of finding those smaller asteroids cannot be
    done even by large ground-based telescopes, optical telescopes,
    and it especially cannot be done by small telescopes. So--and
    that is because asteroids are not only small but they are dark.
    Their color is often as dark as charcoal, and that makes them
    really dim. So these smaller asteroids are only spotted
    currently when they come very, very close to the Earth. So,
    because most of the large asteroids have been found,
    unfortunately, that means that amateur astronomers and people
    with smaller telescopes can no longer substantially contribute
    to this particular effort, nor will small space-based optical
    telescopes such as have been proposed by some commercial
    companies, they will not make a dent in this problem.
        But the fact that asteroids are dark can be used to our
    advantage, because when they are small and dark, they absorb
    light from the sun and they are warmed. And that means they are
    brighter than the background sky if you observe them in
    infrared. And when you observe them in infrared, you can see
    them at much greater distances than you can with optical
    telescopes.
        So as described in the National Academies report
    ``Defending Planet Earth,'' if you want to find a substantial
    fraction of city killer asteroids, you need a space-based
    infrared telescope. So that is what the B612 Foundation is
    doing. Our Sentinel Space Telescope is going to launch in 2018.
    It will orbit the sun about 30 million miles closer to the sun
    than the Earth in a solar orbit that is similar to the orbit of
    Venus, and that means Sentinel will not have a blind spot
    because--like Earth-based telescopes, which can only look at
    night looking away from the sun. Sentinel will always look away
    from the sun, looking outwards at Earth's orbit.
        So it will find and track as many asteroids as have been
    discovered by all other telescopes combined just in the first
    month of operation. Over six and a half years it will find over
    half a million asteroids, including more than 90 percent of the
    sort of stadium-sized ones, the regional killers, and the
    majority of those that are just city killers, the larger of
    these two asteroids. These asteroids will be tracked accurately
    enough to know if any of them is going to be on a course to hit
    Earth this century.
        So to carry out this mission, the B612 Foundation has
    assembled perhaps the finest technical team I have had the
    privilege of working with in my nearly two decades of
    involvement in aerospace, including 12 years as a NASA
    astronaut. The fact that we were able to recruit such a team
    is, I think, a testament to the inspiring and urgent nature of
    this mission. As we tell these people, who wouldn't want to
    have a chance to save the world? And that is really what I
    think drew them to the mission.
        So our major partner in transmitting our data back, as well
    as allowing some NASA experts to sit on some of our technical
    review panels, including, for instance, Dr. Yeomans here. The
    data generated by Sentinel will not only protect the people of
    planet Earth but will form the basis of future exploration and
    scientific missions.
        So a unique aspect of B612 is that we are carrying out this
    mission as a nonprofit. We do not receive any government
    financial support, and we are relying upon donations from
    individuals and foundations. These donors understand the
    importance of cataloging the environment we inhabit and the
    solar system, and they as individuals are making Sentinel
    happen because they know that our future may depend upon it.
        So make no mistake, raising this amount of money
    philanthropically with no expectation of financial return from
    our donors is challenging. But being a nonprofit has forced us
    to be very focused, and I believe it has made us resourceful.
    Our progress has been swift and we are approaching now the
    second of our eight milestones leading up to launch.
        The B612 Foundation is managing this project in an
    innovative Silicon Valley fashion with the rigor of a NASA
    project. So we are able to carry out this mission at what we
    believe to be about 60 percent of the cost as if it had been
    procured via federal procurement.
        So I should point out that the core technologies that
    Sentinel uses that allow us to detect dark objects via their
    infrared admissions would be useful to a number of federal
    agencies, including NASA, and there may be an opportunity to
    expand our existing public-private partnership with NASA in a
    manner that leverages our private donations, accelerates our
    technical progress and, in the end, provides the data that
    could protect us all.
        So we can protect the Earth from asteroid impacts, but we
    can't do it if we don't know where those asteroids are. And
    that is why the Sentinel telescope is so important.
        Chairman Smith. Okay, Dr.----
        Dr. Lu. I can't think of a more inspiring mission. Thank
    you.
        [The prepared statement of Dr. Lu follows:]

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        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.012

        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.013

        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.014

        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T0555.015

        Chairman Smith. You are at nine minutes and we need to move
    on. Are you--can you conclude?
        Dr. Lu. That was my conclusion.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Good timing.
        Dr. Yeomans.

              STATEMENT OF DR. DONALD K. YEOMANS, MANAGER,

                   NEAR-EARTH OBJECTS PROGRAM OFFICE,

                       JET PROPULSION LABORATORY

        Dr. Yeomans. Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee,
    thank you for the opportunity to discuss some issues related to
    near-Earth objects, and thank you all for your continuing
    interest in this topic.
        As noted by the Chairman, back on February 15, Friday, we
    had a 40 meter-sized object that passed within 17,200 miles of
    the Earth's surface and passed 5,000 miles within the
    geosynchronous ring of communication satellites that were
    announcing its arrival. Sixteen hours earlier on the same day,
    we had an impact over Chelyabinsk, Russia, of an 18 meter-sized
    object coming in at 42,000 miles per hour weighing 11,000 tons.
    And although I have been upstaged by Chairman Smith, I also
    have a piece of the rock that you may want to look at after the
    hearing.
        My point is that the close approach was a 1-in-40 year
    event for an object of this size getting that close. The impact
    of the smaller object over Chelyabinsk is a 1-in-100 year
    event, so very unlikely events do happen sometimes on the same
    day within 16 hours. Asteroid impacts with the Earth are
    extremely unlikely, but they could cause global problems. But
    if we discover them early enough, we have the technology to
    deflect them.
        Significant progress has been made to discover and
    understand the physical characteristics of near-Earth
    asteroids, largely as a result of NASA-supported efforts. For
    example, as pointed out, over 90 percent of those near-Earth
    asteroids larger than a kilometer have been found, and we have
    integrated their motions for 100 years into the future, and
    none of them represent a threat. About 25 percent of 140 meter-
    sized objects have already been found, and likewise, they do
    not represent a threat.
        So the goal is to find and track 90 percent of the 140 and
    larger sized objects, and in so doing, we will reduce the
    threat of all objects of all sizes to a 99 percent level.
        A thousand new near-Earth asteroids are discovered each
    year, almost all of them as a result of NASA-supported surveys.
    Twenty-seven thousand new asteroid observations per day are
    added to the archives at the Minor Planet Center in Cambridge,
    Massachusetts, and there is an increasing pace with which
    observations of near-Earth asteroid physical characteristics
    are being taken, including optical measurements, near infrared
    measurements, and radar measurements.
        The vast majority of near-Earth asteroid discoveries are
    currently being made by the Catalina Sky Survey near Tucson,
    Arizona, the Pan-STARRS Survey in Hawaii, and the Linear
    Program near Socorro, New Mexico. And these surveys are
    continuously improving their discovery efficiencies, and the
    next generation of near-Earth asteroid survey telescopes and
    cameras are under development.
        However, as pointed out by Ed, still undiscovered are 50 to
    100 of the largest near-Earth asteroids and several thousand
    near-Earth asteroids larger than 140 meters. In fact, there was
    a two-kilometer--a new two-kilometer-sized asteroid that was
    announced today, so we still have a handful of large ones to
    find and several thousand of the smaller ones that are 140
    meters and larger.
        A dramatic increase in the near-Earth asteroid discovery
    efficiencies is achievable using space-based infrared
    telescopes, either in a Venus-like orbit, as pointed out by Ed,
    or located about a million miles on the sunward side of the
    Earth at the so-called L1 point. The goal is to find the large
    near-Earth asteroids early enough to mount a deflection mission
    if necessary. The easiest and fastest deflection technique
    involves impacting a spacecraft on the asteroid with a
    rendezvous spacecraft there to monitor the success and verify
    that the object was moved just enough so that in 10 or 20
    years, when it was predicted to hit the Earth, it would miss by
    a wide margin.
        What about the undiscovered millions of small near-Earth
    asteroids larger than 30 meters that are most likely to hit the
    Earth, the city killers, as Ed pointed out? Finding most of
    these near-Earth asteroids would be extremely challenging.
    Perhaps a cost-benefit study could establish the appropriate
    threat levels where it would make more sense to simply warn of
    an asteroid impact rather than finding it early enough to mount
    a deflection campaign.
        NASA is currently supporting a program called ATLAS at the
    University of Hawaii that is designed to find small objects a
    few days or a few weeks prior to impact. And the objective
    there, of course, is civil defense. If you find it several days
    in advance, you could evacuate if the object was threatening a
    populated area.
        So, in summary, with the current near-Earth asteroid threat
    identification process in place, and with considerable
    augmentations to NASA's Near-Earth Object Observation Program,
    we can determine which near-Earth objects represent potential
    future threats and do so with enough time to either deflect the
    larger objects or warn of the arrival of the smaller ones.
        Thank you for your attention.
        [The prepared statement of Dr. Yeomans follows:]

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        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Dr. Yeomans. I was also going to
    mention the book you wrote that just came out this year called
    ``Near-Earth Objects: Finding Them Before They Find Us.'' That
    is a nice subtitle. But I appreciate your writing about this
    subject, and who knows, maybe anticipating the publicity that
    subject would have this year as well. Thank you for your
    testimony.
        Dr. A'Hearn.

            STATEMENT OF DR. MICHAEL F. A'HEARN, VICE CHAIR,

             COMMITTEE TO REVIEW NEAR-EARTH OBJECT SURVEYS

                   AND HAZARD MITIGATION STRATEGIES,

                       NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL

        Dr. A'Hearn. Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, thank
    you for the invitation to appear today and to discuss a variety
    of aspects of the near-Earth object hazard. I will talk a
    little bit less about finding them than Don and Ed had done and
    more about what to do about it.
        Once we complete the George E. Brown survey down to 140
    meters, we have taken care of a large fraction of the risk
    where we can get long advanced warning, and therefore, have
    plenty of time to mount a mitigation campaign. As was just
    pointed out regarding the ATLAS survey, that is designed for
    late discoveries, and as we go to really small ones, late
    discoveries will be a different kind of issue, because then we
    don't have time to do mitigation other than an evacuation for
    30- to 50-meter city killer--and that is really more than a
    city. Tunguska was 2,000 square kilometers. You can, in
    principle, do evacuation, but if you get much larger than that,
    75 meters, 100 meters, evacuation is no longer practical, and
    you need to have a plan in place with tested technologies to
    try to do mitigation on relatively short notice, because these
    are likely to be shorter notice than the ones we have been
    discovering so far where we have been aiming for years of
    advanced warning and plenty of time to plan how to mitigate.
        The mitigation is a key part of the hazard issue, and when
    the National Research Council issued its report, it suggested
    programs at a variety of different levels depending on how much
    insurance you wanted to buy basically. And if you really want
    to include mitigation as part of that, it is up at the couple
    of hundred million dollars a year level in order to include
    mitigation.
        Now, it is interesting that most of what we--much of what
    we know about mitigation so far has come from research
    programs. They are the ones that provide the physical
    characteristics. Earth-based remote sensing tells us about the
    sizes of the different asteroids, tells us about their surface
    composition, but not necessarily their interior. For a few of
    them, such as binaries, we can get interior bulk densities. But
    missions to these objects--we just heard a mention earlier from
    the Chairman of the sample return mission that will be launched
    in 2016. That mission will tell us a great deal about the
    structure of an asteroid--the internal structure and what the
    materials are, and therefore, what kind of techniques will work
    efficiently for mitigation.
        The Deep Impact Mission, of which I was a principal
    investigator in 2005, carried out an impact on the nucleus of
    comet Tempel 1. It showed first that cometary nuclei are
    remarkably porous. That makes them harder to push around than,
    say, a solid iron asteroid. And the rocky asteroids, which are
    fragmented, are somewhere in between. It demonstrated new
    techniques for autonomous navigation to lead to an impact.
    Whether you are doing a kinetic impact or a standoff nuclear
    explosion, it demonstrated how difficult the attitude control
    is when you get close to some of these. Milligram pieces of
    dirt or rock were bouncing our third-of-a-ton spacecraft around
    by many degrees, causing serious pointing problems. That is an
    important thing you need to do if you are developing
    mitigation.
        So these research programs are important because they are
    the only ones that are now providing us information on physical
    characteristics. Unfortunately, the Discovery Program has been
    devastated. It was originally conceived as at least one new
    mission every two years. In the 1990s there were six missions.
    In the 2000s there were five, the last of which was in 2007.
    Then, there was a five-year gap until the one that was selected
    in 2012, namely InSight, the mission to Mars. And with NASA's
    current plans, the announcement of opportunity for the next one
    won't be until 2015, which means selection to fly in 2017. So
    we are down to two per decade instead of the five a decade the
    decadal survey recommended and which was the basis for the
    original program. Frequent opportunities to go to space are
    critical.
        Also, just as it is important to partner with the private
    sector, it is crucial to also partner internationally for
    mitigation because mitigation can be seen as threatening. And
    we need to develop real mechanisms. We have talked a lot with
    potential international partners. We need to be talking to
    people who aren't our partners such as the Chinese, people who
    might think something we did in space was a threat rather than
    trying to help, and that needs to be something that we need to
    look very carefully at in the near future.
        Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Dr. A'Hearn follows:]

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        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Dr. A'Hearn. I will recognize
    myself for questions.
        Dr. Lu, given the fact that we do have budget constraints
    and that funding is limited, what is the most--single most
    important thing we could do in this, say, next three- to five-
    year time period to detect these threatening asteroids?
        Dr. Lu. Well, if you are going to ask what is going to find
    the most number of these asteroids that--of anything that is
    currently planned, I think it is Sentinel pretty--by a pretty
    good margin. And if you were to ask, you know, to get to what
    Congressman Johnson mentioned, which is, you know, we are a
    private organization----
        Dr. Lu [continuing]. There are opportunities to accelerate
    our development. You know, we could, in principle, deepen our
    relationship with our currently existing public-private
    partnership if we wanted to accelerate that. We understand
    again that the technology that we are developing--the core
    technologies are useful for lots of other things that the
    Federal Government finds important, and so, you know, one of
    the possibilities is to accelerate the technology development.
        Another possibility is if this data is worthwhile to NASA,
    if it is important to NASA, perhaps we could work out something
    where this data is purchased from us, and that way NASA only
    pays for it if the data is good and they could work with us to
    make sure that the--as they already are, that the quality of
    the data is what they need.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Thank you, Dr. Lu.
        Dr. Yeomans, I am sure there is an answer to this that I
    should know, but we have always been told that in the case of
    near-Earth objects, the only alternative is to move them out of
    their orbit or deflect their trajectory so that there is no
    direct impact, and it doesn't do any good to explode those
    objects because then we just get a shower of near-Earth
    objects, many more but they are smaller. Is it--would it be
    possible to explode an incoming asteroid with such force that
    the pieces would be so small that they would burn up coming
    into the Earth's atmosphere? So is that a realistic alternative
    or not?
        Dr. Yeomans. Yes, it is actually. There has been some work
    done by Dave Dearborn at Lawrence Livermore Laboratories using
    computer simulations. If you insert an explosive charge and
    detonate it, you often get the fragments going off at such
    velocities and directions that what little does hit the Earth
    does so with very little damage.
        Chairman Smith. Why is so much, therefore--so much time, so
    much effort, so much focus on moving it out of its current
    trajectory? Why not more focus on what you just described?
        Dr. Yeomans. Well, it is actually considerably easier to
    run into it and slow it down a tiny little bit than to land on
    it and plant an explosive device and----
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Another practical answer as well.
        Dr. Yeomans. It is technologically easier.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Dr. A'Hearn, you mentioned about the
    time with--that would--we would have or not have if we detected
    an incoming object and had to deflect it. What would be the
    average time that we would have, say, of a city killer-sized
    asteroid? I guess it depends on whether you are using ground-
    based telescopes or space-based telescopes, but say in the next
    three to five years, how much time would we have if we
    developed the Sentinel program and were able to detect these
    objects?
        Dr. A'Hearn. I will defer questions on the sensitivity of
    Sentinel to Ed Lu----
        Dr. A'Hearn [continuing]. But in general, it is important
    to remember we have only ever detected one incoming object
    before it hit.
        Chairman Smith. We have a long way to go----
        Dr. A'Hearn. That was less than a day out.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Dr. Lu----
        Dr. A'Hearn. And that was very small.
        Chairman Smith. Do you have any ideas on how much----
        Dr. Lu. The goal for Sentinel is to find things decades
    before they hit so that you can deflect them rather than
    evacuate.
        Chairman Smith. We have plenty of time. At our first
    hearing, Dr. Holdren made the point, I think, that only two
    percent of the Earth's surface consists of urban areas and so
    that further diminishes the possibility of a city sustaining a
    direct hit. I am not sure that is much consolation to those who
    live in rural areas by the way, but at least it was interesting
    as far as the amount of damage that might occur.
        But thank you all. You have answered my questions.
        And the gentlewoman from Texas, the Ranking Member Ms.
    Johnson, is recognized for hers.
        Ms. Johnson. Thank you very much.
        Dr. Lu, I realize that details over NASA's proposal in its
    FY 2014 budget request to conduct a mission to an asteroid with
    humans and other asteroid-related activities are just trickling
    out. A story over the weekend reported concerns about the
    asteroid initiative from two sources. One worried that NASA's
    activities may interfere with the private-sector efforts.
    Another was critical of the absence of international
    collaboration. Based on what you have read or know of NASA's
    plans, are such concerns warranted?
        Dr. Lu. I don't think so. I believe that--you know, I, as
    much as anybody, want our human spaceflight program to have a
    clear, defined, and inspiring goal. However, I don't think--
    this mission should not be confused of one that is planetary
    defense. That is a very--it is a different mission----
        Ms. Johnson. Um-hum.
        Dr. Lu [continuing]. What that proposed mission is to do.
        Ms. Johnson. Dr. Yeomans, can you share details on NASA's
    asteroid detection effort or efforts that are scheduled to
    benefit from the increase for the coming fiscal year?
        Dr. Yeomans. Yes, it is my understanding that the asteroid
    retrieval mission is primarily a technology test of the solar
    electric propulsion system. It is also a rendezvous with a
    small asteroid with an attempt to bring it back into a lunar
    orbit. It has components for NASA's human exploration program.
    And, of course, the most challenging first part of this whole
    mission idea is to find a suitable target. So the plus-up that
    you mentioned in the budget will certainly provide a
    commensurate increase in the number of objects that are
    discovered and could be utilized for space resources,
    scientific investigations, planetary defense, as well as a
    target for this mission.
        Ms. Johnson. Dr. A'Hearn, did you have any comment?
        Dr. A'Hearn. No, I have no further comments.
        Ms. Johnson. Thank you. Now, in the first round of hearings
    that we had, there was mention of an orbiting telescope, which
    we don't have access to. Could either of you comment on the
    value of having an orbiting telescope?
        Dr. Lu. Well, the Sentinel is an orbiting telescope----
        Ms. Johnson. It is.
        Dr. Lu [continuing]. But it does not orbit the Earth. It
    orbits the sun. But it is a space telescope.
        Dr. Yeomans. There is also----
        Ms. Johnson. Yes.
        Dr. Yeomans. There is also a concept where you have a
    spacecraft a million miles sunward of the Earth also orbiting
    the sun, but it is closer to Earth and could be looking out
    toward near-Earth asteroids as well.
        Ms. Johnson. So in view of the seemingly increased interest
    for activity of the asteroids, how do you see an investment in
    an orbiting telescope that would orbit the sun or in a place it
    is not orbiting now? Do you see any value?
        Dr. Yeomans. Oh, yes. Yes, as Ed mentioned, the benefit of
    having a telescope in space is several-fold. First of all, you
    can use an infrared detection system, and these objects are
    much brighter in the infrared and much easier to find than in
    the optical region. You don't have problems with weather or day
    and night. You can observe these objects from a viewpoint that
    the Earth cannot, so you sometimes get an advanced warning in
    that respect. So it is a far more efficient system from space.
        Ms. Johnson. Any other comment?
        Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Johnson.
        The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Hall, the Chairman Emeritus
    is recognized for his questions.
        Mr. Hall. Mr. Chairman, thank you.
        I probably ought to just write a book on this, my
    questions, because I have so many. And this is your second
    hearing, is that right?
        Mr. Hall [continuing]. And I admire you for it. You are
    almost seeking something that is impossible from the numbers
    even than that I have heard here.
        Olin ``Tiger'' Teague, whose picture is right over there,
    ought to be known as the father of NASA. And you might even
    become the father of characterizing Earth objects and how close
    they are. But I think you are going to have to have some
    overseas hearings. We have had this second one and four more
    just like this probably won't yield any definite answers. But
    it is a very interesting matter, a very interesting item.
        But how could we ask--and maybe, Dr. Yeomans, on to the
    near objects program, like in the 2013 worldwide attention in
    the city of Chelyabinsk in Russia--injured a lot of people but
    didn't kill anyone is what I understand. And the others that I
    remember and that we have heard about, a lot of injuries, but
    what--they didn't know it was coming and didn't know what we--
    when we had that hearing--and I think I testified to this
    before--we found out in that hearing that one had passed Earth
    and just missed us by 15 minutes. And that could be a jillion
    miles away, but that is where they put it. It had missed Earth
    by 15 minutes, and nobody even knew it was coming until it had
    come and gone.
        So--and we made every effort to get in touch with nations
    like Japan, Spain, Italy, England, France to send somebody over
    here to testify with us because it has to be a world for us if
    we are going to really do anything about it. We can't pave the
    way like we spent 34 billion on global warming. My President
    spent 34 million on that and haven't done anything on it.
        But it looks like we are going to have to have world input
    to ever be anywhere near efficient on making the determination
    that all the people in the world that I want. But we couldn't
    get any interest at all. And I think this Chairman of this
    Committee that that would be a very good thing if you could
    have some hearings, maybe in England, be at the places and get
    their interest up because it is going to take their working
    with us to make anything happen.
        I guess the only question I would have is, Dr. Yeomans,
    whether you know of any private organizations that are involved
    in near-Earth object detection like Boeing or Lockheed or
    McDonnell Douglas or Texas Instruments? You know, I would like
    to get them into it but they can't do it themselves. So that is
    just something to think about. Do you have any suggestions on
    the private organizations and how they might work into it?
        Dr. Yeomans. Well, Ed----
        Mr. Hall. They said at one time a laser could affect them
    just a little bit but it didn't say how much.
        Dr. Yeomans. That is true. If you had a laser nearby, you
    could ablate the front side and introduce a thrust in the
    opposite direction. But in terms of the international
    cooperation, I couldn't agree more. In fact, the European Space
    Agency has been getting more and more interest in this near-
    Earth asteroid discussion. Recently, they are actually funding
    the so-called NEOShield program to look at various mitigation
    options, including kinetic impactors.
        There is an activity within U.N., COPUOS, the Committee on
    the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space, and NASA is involved with
    that working group to try and define an international warning
    system, with the response protocols that would be required in
    the event of an incoming object. Who would be in charge? Who--
    --
        Mr. Hall. Dr. Lu suggested NASA. The reason I thought about
    ``Tiger'' Teague, Olin Teague, and all the work he did in even
    getting it off the ground and supporting it with funds that we
    don't have today. And we can't go to Mars until people can go
    to the grocery store, so I don't know how we are going to talk
    about protecting the world if we don't have world support. And
    it would be a great thing for this Chairman if the government
    doesn't have the money to send them, he has personal wealth if
    he could maybe take four or five of us over there. And I think
    he is going to tell me my time is over. I yield back what time
    I do have.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Mr. Hall.
        The gentlewoman from Connecticut, Ms. Esty, is recognized
    for her questions.
        Ms. Esty. Thank you very much. I wanted to follow up a
    little bit on--we have had discussion previously about this
    international issue which, Doctor, you had mentioned. Can you
    explain to us what is currently done in terms of data sharing?
    And perhaps, Dr. Lu, if you could discuss if you have even
    contemplated now for your project, it not being a governmental
    project, being private nonprofit, what you would contemplate
    being that data-sharing aspect for your organization?
        Dr. Lu. Yeah, I--you know, our intention as a public
    nonprofit is to put the data out there so as many scientists
    can see the data and use the data and warn people if there is
    things in the data that show that something is going to hit the
    Earth. So that is our plan.
        But actually, if I could add one other thing. Don't get the
    impression that finding asteroids--while it is a lot of money--
    is something that requires enormous amounts of money. For
    instance, I mean our telescope, which will find and track a
    great majority of these asteroids, is less than the cost of--
    there is a road-widening project in the San Francisco Bay area
    in the town of Burlingame that is more expensive than our
    telescope. And that is why we went about this as a private
    fundraising effort. We are less expensive than a museum. There
    is a wing of an art museum in San Francisco that cost more than
    our project. And that is privately raised money. It is not
    enormous. I mean, it is a lot for individuals, but it can be
    done.
        Ms. Esty. If I can follow up, actually. That was very
    helpful, because I did want to ask a little bit more. What are
    the specifics? What are your plans if you--obviously, we know
    that in the past NASA has encountered cost overruns for a
    variety of reasons. What are your plans as an organization if
    you discover, say, in the development or in the research phase
    that something you anticipated will work does not quite work
    the way you expect it? Would you go back to funders? What does
    that do? How--and also, frankly, how close are you to raising
    the $450 million that you have budgeted? When will you start?
    Will you do it in tranches if you don't have it ready? What are
    your plans for ensuring that? Because we are hearing from
    everyone if you don't have the money set at the outset, you end
    up embedding cost overruns because it just takes longer.
        Dr. Lu. We are using existing technology to the extent we
    can, and we actually have a firm fixed price contract, which
    is--so in other words, the risk is borne by our contractor Ball
    Aerospace. And yes, we are raising the money in tranches. This
    year, our goal--fundraising goal is $20 million. And we are
    well on our way towards that for this year.
        Ms. Esty. So how much of the total do you have--would that
    have you at?
        Dr. Lu. Well, this really is our first full year since we
    have begun our fundraising. We announced on June 28 of last
    year. Our needs were quite small last year, in the single-digit
    millions. This year, they are accelerating, and next year they
    will accelerate even more, so our peak spending rate will be in
    the range of $100 million for a year or so, and then it will
    taper back down. But we can finance this over a much longer
    period.
        Ms. Esty. And just a question for all of you somewhat. If
    we have congressional mandates that, say, previously would have
    been directed to NASA as a governmental organization and
    Congress says we need to see this data because we need to make
    decisions, for the doctors who are not in the private entity,
    how would you contemplate we should--would structure that? And
    how would that operate?
        Dr. Yeomans. Well, I think it is important to point out
    that NASA does have a Space Act Agreement with the Sentinel
    group for providing navigation and tracking of their
    spacecraft. Once their data are taken, it would come through
    the NASA channels. It will go to the Minor Planet Center in
    Cambridge, Massachusetts, then it would come to our program
    office at JPL, and then we would interact with our Italian
    colleagues and we would post our results for the world. So it
    is quite a transparent data-sharing process even though it is
    privately funded, for the most part.
        Dr. A'Hearn. Yes, I was just going to comment that in my
    experience the data on finding and tracking near-Earth objects
    and on predicting the orbits of them all becomes very public
    very quickly. There has never been a problem getting the data.
    The only problems are what to do with it.
        Ms. Esty. Thank you all very much.
        Chairman Smith. Thank you, Ms. Esty.
        The gentleman from California, Mr. Rohrabacher, is
    recognized for his questions.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much. I will try to be as
    fast as I can here.
        First of all, I would like to note----
        Chairman Smith. And Mr. Rohrabacher, if you will suspend
    for a minute, I want to let the Members know that after this
    series of questions, we are going to recess for about 45
    minutes so we can go conduct three votes, and then we will
    resume the markup after the votes.
        And the gentleman continues to be recognized.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Great. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And number
    one, first of all, Mr. Chairman, I would like to agree with
    Chairman Hall and his recommendation that we work with you and
    Members of both sides of the aisle to try to find international
    cooperation on an effort that deserves to be not just the
    responsibility of the American taxpayers but people of the
    Earth united against this common threat.
        Let me note there are other groups like the Planetary
    Society, headed up by Bill Nye, who are very involved with this
    issue. And I have a statement that I would like--of Mr. Nye
    that I would like to put in the record at this point.
        Chairman Smith. Without objection, so ordered.
        [The information may be found in Appendix II.]
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much.
        Next, I would mention there are two recently formed
    companies that have as their goal mining asteroids: the
    Planetary Resources, Deep Space Industries. Both of these
    companies have impressive teams, and I would hope that at some
    future date we might be able to bring them to testify about
    their activities and the expertise that they are developing.
        Dr. Lu, I found your testimony to be very interesting. We
    have to assume that either road construction in San Francisco
    is incredibly expensive or that we have in some way brought
    down the cost of your efforts--space efforts. I find--and it
    was your testimony that B612 does not in any way receive any
    taxpayer funding?
        Dr. Lu. That is correct.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. Congratulations, Dr. Lu. I want to say
    that for the record, congratulations. And I understand that the
    Sentinel mission under the Foundation actually has been
    operating with fixed-term prices that you are dealing with
    your--with the companies that you have to deal business with.
    Is that correct?
        Dr. Lu. That is correct.
        Mr. Rohrabacher. So you have a fixed-price term. We have
    been told over--again and again, Mr. Chairman, that we can't
    have these fixed-price contracts. For example, with our polar
    weather satellites, oh, you can't have a fixed-price contract.
    Perhaps this private sector group here that doesn't receive any
    of our government money is showing us how we can keep some of
    the costs down.
        And let me just suggest that we need to get more private
    money, more international cooperation. This is a serious threat
    to the--not only to the well-being but even, perhaps, to the
    survival of humankind on this planet, and it deserves us to
    work together and to do so in a cost-effective way. And we
    can't do anything nowadays unless it is in a cost-effective
    way.
        I would like to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this
    hearing, and I just will leave it at that. And I appreciate
    your efforts and am totally supportive.
        Chairman Smith. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Rohrabacher. And I
    know this subject has been of long-time interest to you as
    well.
        As I say, we are going to recess for about 45 minutes, and
    then I hope Members who still have questions will return. And
    if you all can possibly stay, that would be great. I understand
    one witness may have to leave, and if that is the case, we
    understand that as well. So thank you all, and we will return
    and we will recess until about 45 minutes from now.
        [Recess.]
        Mr. Palazzo. [Presiding] I want to thank the witnesses for
    staying behind for this important Committee hearing.
        And at this time, I am going to recognize Ms. Bonamici for
    five minutes.
        Ms. Bonamici. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
        Thank you so much for your testimony and thank you for
    staying. Sorry we had to leave to vote.
        I wanted to talk a little bit about how we respond. And Dr.
    A'Hearn, in your prepared statement, you indicate the
    Academies' 2010 report provided options geared to how much
    money Congress wished to appropriate to buy insurance against
    an impact, and you described evacuation for small impactors is
    one approach to mitigation and noted the panel's recommendation
    that a research program be instituted to better understand
    mitigation approaches.
        I represent a district in Oregon that contains coastline,
    and my constituents on the coast are frequently talking about
    being prepared, emergency preparedness for tsunamis and
    earthquakes, and so these are certainly analogous situations.
        In our prior hearing, there was a discussion about
    evacuations in response to a meteor incident. So what would be
    the nature of the recommended research as it applies to
    evacuations? I know that when we are talking over in the Oregon
    coast now they don't have a lot of time from the time they find
    out about a tsunami to get upland. So what do you see as the
    most cost-effective insurance, and can you talk a little bit
    about preparing for a meteor impact, please?
        Dr. A'Hearn. I think the most important issue is that we
    don't have a really solid theory of how big a tsunami you will
    get from a given size impact. There are simulations that
    disagree by huge factors on how big a tsunami you will get at
    various places. So on that specific issue, I think that is the
    key thing that needs to be done. It depends on the size of the
    impact or, of course, depends on the velocity it comes in, the
    speed, and it depends on the density. You know, is it really
    solid or is it mostly porous? But for any given case even,
    there are disagreements in the theoretical literature on what
    the effect will be.
        So that is the biggest issue. Once you know how big the
    tsunami will be, then you will get a better feeling for how far
    you have to evacuate to get to high ground. And I am not
    familiar with how much time is needed in any specific area.
        Ms. Bonamici. Sure. That is dependent, I think, on the
    geography.
        And to all the panel members, how should the policy--how
    should we approach the policy and legal issues in addressing
    warning the public? My constituents at home are worried about
    finding a job and about too many kids in the classroom, so--and
    on the coast, they are worried about a tsunami and they went
    through, you know, after the earthquake in Japan, some
    emergency preparedness, but there is still a lot to do. So what
    is the best way for us as policymakers to approach this warning
    and preparedness, and how should we handle that on national and
    international levels? What is your advice?
        Dr. Yeomans. If I could respond. There is an ongoing effort
    within the United Nations' Committee on the Peaceful Uses of
    Outer Space to address these issues, and one of the key issues,
    as you noted, is how do we best warn the public, give them the
    facts without scaring them? So on the international level
    within this Committee, these discussions are ongoing. And that
    is one of the issues that is front and center. We don't have a
    process in place. I mean, we are scientists so we can say we
    are going to impact probably at such and such a time, but that
    is not necessarily the most effective communication with the
    public. So we have to bring in folks who are more experienced
    in communicating risks, not just scientists. I would suggest
    that perhaps once these discussions are completed in,
    hopefully, another year, then effective communications would
    come out of that.
        Ms. Bonamici. Dr. Lu, do you have any input on----
        Dr. Lu. Yeah, my opinion is that we should not find out
    what the impact of a large asteroid is in the ocean and--
    because we have the technology to prevent that.
        Ms. Bonamici. Um-hum.
        Dr. Lu. And we should go out there and find these
    asteroids, find out if any of them are going to hit us, and the
    deflect it. And I think we can do that.
        Ms. Bonamici. Thank you. And my time is about to expire.
    Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
        Mr. Palazzo. I now recognize Mr. Posey for five minutes.
        Mr. Posey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Somebody mentioned
    climate change study a little while ago. You know, asteroids
    took care of that at one time, and if it happens again, we will
    not have global warming. They can fix that forever.
        Out of curiosity for the three of you, the Administration
    is excited about privatizing space to the greatest extent
    possible. What do you think would be an appropriate number for
    an X prize type of arrangement for identifying and destroying
    an asteroid, just off the top of your head, all three of you,
    starting with Dr. Lu?
        Dr. Lu. Well, if you ask the question--I mean what would it
    take to find these asteroids first for the first part of the X
    prize. It is really a two-step process.
        Mr. Posey. Right.
        Dr. Lu. I would lay a number out that would be equivalent
    to whatever--you know, some fraction of what NASA would have
    spent if they did it themselves. And that number is probably in
    the range, according to the NRC report, $800 million to a
    billion. So pick some fraction of that. That is why we think we
    can do it for $450 million, and that is what our contract
    specifies. But if you put the prize somewhere around there,
    then NASA is guaranteed to save money if it succeeds.
        Mr. Posey. Yeah, and if it doesn't, the money is never
    spent.
        Dr. Lu. Exactly.
        Mr. Posey. Okay. How about--that is to find one. Does that
    include destroying it?
        Dr. Lu. No, but I think if you--once you find them,
    remember that you will now know if there is something that is
    going to hit that is a definite threat in the next century. And
    now you have got time to do it right. And also I think money is
    also no object if something is really barreling down on the
    Earth and you know the time, date, and place that thing is
    going to hit. I think we can come together and solve that
    issue.
        Mr. Posey. Okay. Thank you. Dr. Yeomans?
        Dr. Yeomans. I would add that NASA already has 15 years of
    experience in this area of identifying objects. They have three
    programs underway, ground-based optical detection. I would
    suggest perhaps a study that could be undertaken to see whether
    we could leverage those assets to improve what is already there
    by bringing online new technology and new telescopes along with
    studies to flesh out what is the most effective way of
    deflecting an object that is found on an Earth-threatening
    trajectory.
        My comment would be, we should leverage existing activities
    and facilities.
        Mr. Posey. Okay. Well, it is my understanding the Small
    Bodies Assessment Group at Lunar Planetary Institute was
    chartered for the specific purpose of evaluating those types of
    missions and the priorities of the scientific community for
    near-Earth objects. How has NASA collaborated or leveraged its
    information with this group in planning of the Asteroid Capture
    Mission?
        Dr. Yeomans. I am not intimately involved with the
    connection between the Small Bodies Assessment Group and this
    mission that you mentioned. So I am not aware of what has and
    what has not been communicated between those two.
        Mr. Posey. Okay. Are either of the others familiar with it,
    Dr. A'Hearn?
        Dr. A'Hearn. I know essentially nothing more about this
    mission than I have read in the newspapers and in Administrator
    Bolden's release this morning. I am not aware that the Small
    Bodies Assessment Group has been given any information on it.
    They may have been, but I am not aware of it, so I am not going
    to comment further.
        Mr. Posey. That was my feeling and that is why the
    question. Dr. Lu.
        Dr. Lu. I also am not aware of the connection between the
    two.
        Mr. Posey. Okay. You know, all of your written testimony
    mentioned obviously the asteroid mitigation, and I know we have
    to identify them before we can divert them or destroy them. We
    all knew that. But, you know, assuming that the development of
    a strategy and technology would take a considerable time, you
    know, obviously perhaps years, what steps do you think we
    should be taking in the meantime in case our search uncovers a
    threat, which we all know is not a matter of if but when?
        Dr. Lu. I think it would be prudent to do a deflection
    demonstration mission, pick an asteroid that you know is not
    anywhere near hitting the Earth and show that you can deflect
    it in a controlled manner so that it doesn't break up into
    pieces where you don't know where they are going and so on. I
    think that can be done.
        Mr. Posey. Okay.
        Dr. A'Hearn. I would agree that a demonstration deflection
    mission is an appropriate thing to do, and a deflection mission
    is ideally suited for the international collaboration that I
    think is needed in this area, because typically you need to
    send two spacecraft, one of which does the deflection and the
    other of which monitors the effectiveness of it. Depending on
    whether you are doing a gravity tractor or kinetic impactor
    or--we presumably would not do a nuclear one as a test and the
    ability to have international collaboration on coordinating two
    spacecraft is important to get the various countries trusting
    that we are not trying to divert something to land somewhere
    else.
        Mr. Posey. Interesting. I hadn't thought about that but I
    think you are correct. Dr. Yeomans, Mr. Chairman, can he
    finish?
        Dr. Yeomans. Can I add something? There is an interesting
    concept pertinent to your point whereby NASA would use the
    excess launch capability for the InSight spacecraft to Mars,
    have a co-launch of an impactor much like the Deep Impact
    mission, and that would go and collide with the asteroid that
    the Osiris Rex mission has already picked for their target. So
    the Osiris Rex mission is already resident, and you would have
    this impactor coming in, and you can measure the deflection. So
    it is a nice leveraging of an existing launch and an existing
    rendezvous spacecraft. So that would be one instructing
    deflection demonstration.
        Mr. Posey. Very good. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Palazzo. You are welcome. I now recognize Mr. Stewart
    for five minutes.
        Mr. Stewart. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Gentlemen, thanks for
    being here. It gives me faith in our future knowing that there
    are people a lot smarter than me who are working on some of
    these things.
        I am not going to ask in real detail. I would like to just
    kind of encapsulate what I think we have said but bring some
    clarity to it before with some very quick questions. But before
    we do, can I just divert for just a second with this, and that
    is, you know, the old formula E = MC2, and you have talked a
    lot about the mass of these meteorites, potential, you know,
    objects, but is velocity a consideration, too? In other words,
    are some of the smaller ones, are they traveling at such a
    speed that they would have an equally devastating outcome or
    are most of these objects kind of traveling at about the same
    speed out there?
        Dr. Lu. Most of them are--well, they are orbiting the sun,
    so the typical velocities that they hit is really independent
    of the size of the asteroid, and that is between 15 and, say,
    25 kilometers per second.
        Mr. Stewart. Okay.
        Dr. Lu. So 40,000 miles an hour or so.
        Mr. Stewart. So that is--I mean that is a fairly good
    range. Fifteen to 25 is, what, 40 percent or something like
    that? But their velocity doesn't really matter. It really is
    just the size and the weight of the object?
        Dr. Lu. Well, it is a combination of the destructive power,
    it is a combination of the speed and the mass. But from the
    standpoint of deflection, it doesn't much matter.
        Mr. Stewart. Okay. Yes, sir, Dr. A'Hearn.
        Dr. A'Hearn. I was going to just add to that. Indeed, 15 to
    25 kilometers per second is the right ballpark for the
    asteroids. It is one of the things you have to keep in mind,
    however, if you deal with the cometary impact hazard. Those
    come in at more like 30 to 70 kilometers per second. Now, they
    are very infrequent compared to the asteroids, but one of a
    given size will be much more damaging because of that high
    speed of entry compared to the asteroid.
        Mr. Stewart. Yeah, okay. And I appreciated your visual that
    you showed us at the beginning. It kind of gives us a sense of
    the scope there.
        I know there was a recent comet that was discovered in
    January that was looking like it was going to have a near miss
    with Mars, and it would have been a devastating event for--had
    that, you know, impacted the Earth, a dinosaur killing type
    event. And as I recall, it was two years is what the, you know,
    estimated impact time would be. Of course, we know it is going
    to miss it now. If that had been directed toward Earth in two
    years, is there realistically anything we could have done?
        Dr. Lu. It would be very difficult.
        Mr. Stewart. Probably not, is that true?
        Dr. Lu. Yeah.
        Mr. Stewart. So can you give me an idea? I know you are
    speculating, but I mean what--how much time do we need? Do we
    need 10 years. Do we need 20? Do we need eight? I mean, how
    long do we need before we could actually do something even if
    we detected an object that was going to impact the Earth?
        Dr. Lu. I think with 10 years you can do this in a
    controlled manner with backups and so on. Certainly, with 20
    years you could do that. It gets much more difficult the closer
    in it is, and that is, again, the importance of getting early
    warning, because the closer it is to you, the more you need to
    deflect it by to get it to miss.
        Mr. Stewart. Yeah
        Dr. Lu. So it gets much, much harder the earlier--the less
    warning you have.
        Mr. Stewart. Let's put that aside, that consideration of
    the energy to deflect it. In two years from now, could we--are
    we technologically capable of launching something that could
    intercept it? Dr. A'Hearn, you seem to be shaking your head
    ``no.''
        Dr. A'Hearn. No. If we had spacecraft plans on the books
    already, that would take a year--I mean a typical small mission
    like a Discovery class mission takes four years from approval
    to start to launch. Okay. Now, a really accelerated military
    program would be faster than that but that is a couple of years
    still.
        Mr. Stewart. Yeah.
        Dr. A'Hearn. And you would have to have something ready to
    launch, basically, if you wanted to do it on very short notice.
    Ten years, 20 years, then you have got time to plan it. Five
    years or less, it is really hard unless you have thought the
    problem through and design things, maybe have components built,
    maybe have a full system but----
        Mr. Stewart. Because what we need, we have nothing like
    this right now. We are not taking an existing weapons system or
    existing vehicle and modifying it. We are really starting from
    scratch to do this, true?
        Dr. A'Hearn. Well, you would try to use it from existing
    components. I mean you could--you would--if you were going to
    do a kinetic impact, you might scale up what was done for Deep
    Impact to larger launch vehicle, larger impactor, and things
    like that. So it is not quite starting from scratch, but it is
    starting from a pretty low point.
        Mr. Stewart. Yeah. Okay. And then last question--well, I
    tell you what, I am out of time. I would love to talk with you
    further, but I appreciate you--again you being here. Thank you.
        Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
        Mr. Palazzo. I want to thank the witnesses for their
    valuable testimony and the Members for their questions. The
    Members of the Committee may have additional questions for you,
    and we will ask you to respond to those in writing. The record
    will remain open for two weeks for additional comments and
    written questions from Members.
        The witnesses are excused, and this hearing is adjourned.
        [Whereupon, at 4:13 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]

                                   Appendix I

                                  ----------

                       Answers to Post-Hearing Questions

    Responses by Dr. Ed Lu

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    Responses by Dr. Donald K. Yeomans

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    Responses by Dr. Michael F. A'Hearn

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                                  Appendix II

                                  ----------

                       Additional Material for the Record

      Submitted statement by Representative Steve Stockman, Committee on
                         Science, Space and Technology

        Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity to address the
    Subcommittee on this most important topic.
        Our Nation--indeed, our world--faces threats in the future from
    asteroids too small to be detected by our present means but large
    enough to do unspeakable damage to our population centers. Witness the
    recent event in Russia, which has raised worldwide awareness of the
    potential threat. Clearly, it is important for us to increase the
    sophistication of our space sensors so we can detect them in advance.
    But once we spot them, we must ask: what can we do to protect the
    people?
        This Committee is to be commended for its recognition of this
    important issue, and I appreciate this opportunity to address a unique
    technology that could provide us with a potential arrow for our quiver
    of planetary defense. That unique capability is being developed by a
    small, high-technology American company named Ad Astra Rocket, located
    in Webster, Texas next to NASA's Johnson Space Flight Center.
        The company is perfecting the ``VASIMR'' plasma rocket engine, a
    game-changing electric propulsion system which originated at NASA under
    the leadership of its inventor, Dr. Franklin Chang Diaz, a former NASA
    astronaut. Incidentally, more than four years ago, during his U.S.
    Senate confirmation hearing testimony, NASA Administrator Charles
    Bolden described the 25-year efforts of Dr. Chang Diaz and his small
    team at NASA who kept this technology alive on only ``a small stipend''
    from NASA.
        Since it spun off from NASA in 2005, Ad Astra has continued VASIMR
    development--at a much faster pace and exclusively with private funds
    that brought the technology to a high state of maturity. At a power
    level of 200 kilowatts, their prototype is one of the most powerful
    plasma rockets operating in the world. It has been fired reliably more
    than 10,000 times in their vacuum chamber.
        I know this is not the only advanced rocket being studied today.
    Other technologies, such as hall thrusters and ion engines, are being
    developed by NASA. However, while NASA remains an American space
    technology powerhouse, the world has changed since the opening of the
    space age in the 1950s and 60s, and U.S. innovation in rocket
    technology is no longer confined to NASA. It exists as well in small
    entrepreneurial start-ups such as Ad Astra and others that help
    maintain our nation's technological edge razor sharp. The government
    must keep pace with this changing paradigm and resist becoming a de-
    facto competitor with the private sector. It must ensure that fair and
    open competition is promoted and supported at all levels. Judging from
    its recent performance results, the VASIMR technology certainly
    deserves the opportunity to show what it can do.
        Now one of those potential missions--and the major focus of our
    hearing today--is rocket technology to help us avoid a near Earth
    asteroid collision by deflecting it away from the Earth. In response to
    this, Ad Astra recently undertook a study on how this might be
    accomplished. Their concept involves a solar powered robotic craft,
    propelled by Ad Astra's high power VASIMR rockets that, upon arriving
    at the asteroid, uses the plasma exhaust of one of its two engines (the
    other is used to keep the craft in place) to gently push the object for
    days or weeks, depending on the asteroid's trajectory. A recent
    numerical simulation successfully demonstrated the deflection of a
    40,000 ton asteroid similar to the one that barely missed Earth last
    February and larger than the one that actually hit Russia. In their
    study, the team also assumed--as it actually happened--only one year
    advance warning to execute the mission. This was just an initial
    concept evaluation. The team is now further developing the full range
    of their mission capability. The rocket used is the 200kW VASIMR VF-
    200, the same model being tested in the laboratory today, and the same
    model the company wishes to test on the ISS in 2016.
        The technology has multiple applications which go far beyond
    asteroid deflection, and include more economical space station re-
    boost, satellite deployment, retrieval and mitigation of orbital
    debris. This propulsion technology also enables larger payloads and
    much faster robotic and ultimately human missions to Mars and other
    points in deep space.
        The Company's next step is to test the engine on the International
    Space Station in early 2016--a test which will validate the technology
    for commercial use. Ad Astra has signed an agreement with NASA to move
    forward on this test. As a National Laboratory, the U.S. portion of the
    ISS offers a unique test environment for this technology, and beyond
    accomplishing this important demonstration, Ad Astra's proposed
    electric power and propulsion test facility would actually enhance the
    ISS research infrastructure by providing an unprecedented power storage
    capability that would enable other high power experiments of great
    importance to developing a robust human space exploration framework.
        Ad Astra continues to commit its resources to achieving this
    critical milestone. In my opinion, this is a valuable technology for
    NASA to invest in, both for the planned 2016 validation test on ISS, as
    well as for asteroid deflection and space debris cleanup. With such
    investments, the VASIMR team is prepared to step forward and undertake
    a number of game-changing near-term missions for NASA and the
    commercial space sector. These will help maintain U.S. innovation and
    leadership in the new frontier of commercial space and ultimately help
    pave the way for a robust and economically sustainable exploration of
    the solar system.
        At a recent hearing before this Committee on asteroids, a number of
    experts were concerned that there were no good answers or solutions on
    the horizon for dealing with the threats from asteroids. Mr. Chairman,
    American ingenuity, such as the VASIMR electric propulsion technology,
    will lead the way as part of the solution to the threat from asteroids.
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
             Submitted statement by Representative Donna F. Edwards

        It was clear from the first hearing the Committee held on this
    issue a few weeks ago that the problem of near-Earth objects (NEO)
    impacting Earth and possibly causing great harm is worrisome but
    preventable--if we put our minds and resources into it.
        It is also clear that this Committee has been at the forefront of
    ensuring that NASA be tasked with detecting such NEOs.
        Unfortunately, it appears that at the present time, we still have a
    way to go.
        Just take what recently transpired in Hawaii.
        According to media reports, construction and staff jobs at the Pan-
    STARRS telescope system in Hawaii, which is used for near-Earth object
    observation, among other purposes, had to be rescued by an anonymous $3
    million donation after federal funding was cut.
        Imagine that, a capability critical to saving the world from
    potentially hazardous asteroids needed to be saved by a private donor.
        But wait, it doesn't stop there. Because of the recent sequester,
    NASA is suspending, effective immediately, all education and public
    outreach activities. In terms of scope, this includes all education and
    public outreach efforts conducted by programs and projects.
        Needless to say, it will be hard to increase public awareness of
    what NASA is doing in detecting NEOs under this suspension.
        At this hearing, we will hear how nongovernment entities are
    proposing to use their own funds to save the Earth by detecting,
    characterizing, and perhaps even deflecting asteroids.
        Some of these entities are driven by a noble cause, to save
    humanity, and are banking on philanthropists to finance their efforts.
        Others, who are planning to mine asteroids to extract ore and
    minerals, see their efforts as useful for detection and
    characterization, since one needs to know where these asteroids are and
    what their composition is likely to be before a mining mission is
    chosen.
        Now, don't get me wrong. I think it's great if the government
    doesn't have to foot the entire bill for proposed missions and
    technologies.
        But what happens when something does not work, or when donations or
    investor contributions do not materialize? Is it prudent for the world
    to solely bank on the success of these nongovernment efforts? What
    happens when a private initiative is no longer an option? Would the
    government need to step in?
        So there are a number of questions this Committee should be
    examining, and I look forward to hearing from our witnesses on their
    perspectives.
        Planetary Society Report submitted by Representative Rohrabacher

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