Development of Facilities to Support the New NASA Constellation Space Exploration Program

NASA is currently challenged with the development of a new family of spaceflight vehicles which need to fly as soon as possible after the Space Shuttle is retired in 2010. Consequently, it is faced with converting or constructing facilities across multiple NASA centers enabling support to a new family of space flight vehicles. Testing, verification and manufacturing facilities need to be constructed or modified on critical path schedules supporting new hardware certifications and processing. Ground Operations facilities need to be customized to the new family of vehicles. NASA is planning to return to the Moon in 2018 to begin building a permanent lunar base. Lunar hardware will require engineering development and testing facilities which simulate the dusty lunar vacuum environment. Testing technologies related to newly developed materials will need facilities which allow the development and certification of thermal protection systems and heat shields. New flight vehicles are significantly larger than Apollo Program vehicles and further drive facility sizing decisions. The range and complexity of these facility requirements requires intensive planning and project management efforts. This article will outline the extent of these facility needs, the best practices used to develop the projects, and lessons learned thus far from these efforts.