Case Study 18: From Polar-orbiting Environmental Satellites, GAO-13-676, September 11, 2013

The National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) program was planned to be a state-of-the-art, environment-monitoring satellite system that would replace two existing polar-orbiting environmental satellite systems. Managed jointly by the Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the U.S. Air Force, and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the program was considered critical to the nation’s ability to maintain the continuity of data required for weather forecasting and global climate monitoring through 2026.

However, in the 8 years after the development contract was awarded in 2002, the NPOESS cost estimate had more than doubled—to about $15 billion—launch dates had been delayed by over 5 years, significant functionality had been removed from the program, and the program’s tri-agency management structure had proven to be ineffective. Importantly, delays in launching the satellites put the program’s mission at risk. To address these challenges, a task force led by the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) reviewed the management and governance of the NPOESS program. In February 2010, OSTP’s Director announced a decision to disband the NPOESS acquisition and, instead, have NOAA and DOD undertake separate acquisitions, with NOAA responsible for satellites in the afternoon orbit and DOD responsible for satellites in the early morning orbit. After that decision, NOAA began developing plans for the Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS). In October 2011, the JPSS program successfully launched the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (S-NPP) demonstration satellite, the first in a series of satellites to be launched as part of NOAA’s JPSS program.

Given the interest of the Congress in the progress NOAA had made on the JPSS program, our objectives were to evaluate (1) NOAA’s progress in meeting program objectives of sustaining the continuity of the polar-orbiting satellite system through the S-NPP and JPSS satellites, (2) the quality of the JPSS program schedule, and (3) NOAA’s plans to address potential gaps in polar satellite data.

We found that the JPSS program office did not yet have a complete integrated master schedule and weaknesses existed in component schedules. Specifically, the program established an integrated master schedule in June 2013 and was reporting a 70 percent confidence level in the JPSS-1 launch date. However, about one-third of the program schedule was missing information needed to establish the sequence in which activities occur. In addition, selected component schedules supporting the JPSS-1 satellite had weaknesses, including schedule constraints that had not been justified.