NASA relies on the scientific community to help shape America’s long-term space, biological, and Earth science priorities. Each decade, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) gathers input and consensus from subject matter experts to generate independent assessments known as decadal surveys. These surveys establish strategic priorities and recommendations for the next 10 years across NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) divisions: Astrophysics, Biological and Physical Sciences, Earth Science, Heliophysics, and Planetary Science. Today, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) released a report examining the Agency’s input into and oversight of its efforts related to the decadal survey process and its outcomes.
Congress, NASEM, and NASA deeply value the decadal surveys. However, the OIG determined that the process, combined with the Agency’s hands-off approach, limits pathways for communication, engagement, and feedback. This, in turn, restricts opportunities for more tailored, realistic, and actionable surveys.
OIG auditors found that SMD division officials have unaddressed concerns regarding several areas, including NASEM’s inflexible processes and timelines. For example, NASEM often takes 2 years to complete the survey process but gives the Agency less than 10 days to review the lengthy prepublication reports. Division officials also noted NASEM’s unrealistic budget expectations and unactionable recommendations. For instance, the latest Biological and Physical Sciences decadal survey included recommendations for two research campaigns that would cost $100 million to $400 million each year for a decade—far exceeding the division’s fiscal year 2023 budget of $85 million. In another case, an SMD division received 4 recommendations in their 2010s survey, followed by 26 recommendations in their 2020s survey that were far more complex and difficult to implement with existing staff and budget.
In addition, outside of NASEM’s 5-year midterm assessments, the OIG found that NASA does not track how the SMD divisions are implementing decadal survey recommendations. The Agency is also not fully accounting for costs associated with the survey process, including mission concept study expenditures and the time spent working on decadal survey tasks.
Lastly, NASA does not have consistent internal processes for supporting decadal survey development. Specifically, SMD lacks formal guidance, routine lessons learned, and sufficient resources to standardize common procedures and share best practices across the directorate.
The OIG made eight recommendations to streamline the decadal survey process and ensure it continues to drive NASA’s advances in science, technology, aeronautics, and space exploration.
