NASA's chief gave a lukewarm assessment on Wednesday of the International Space Station's research capabilities and said he might divert money from that project to help build a vehicle to replace the space shuttle.
"The station is limited in its research potential," NASA Administrator Michael Griffin told a Senate panel on space and science.
In his first month at NASA's helm, Griffin has stated repeatedly that the space agency's top priority is to return the shuttle to flight, complete construction of the space station and develop a Crew Exploration Vehicle, or CEV, to replace the shuttle fleet after its 2010 retirement.
Rarely enthusiastic about the station, Griffin has said NASA will complete construction to satisfy commitments the United States has made to the project's international partners — the space agencies of Russia, Europe, Canada and Japan.
But he said he would consider moving some funds from the station's scientific research to the development of the new space vehicle.
"We need to get the CEV online sooner rather than later," Griffin said. "One of the few areas of freedom that I have as administrator is the ... pot of research and technology money that can be, if you will, bought by the yard ... And if I am to accelerate the development of the CEV a good chunk of that money must be used to do so."
He said he would provide senators with a list of space station research that could continue and other projects that "we would plan to delay or defer in order to accelerate CEV."
Asked to name the top priorities for research on the orbiting outpost, Griffin said it was a good place to test hardware and conduct some scientific experiments but noted that those functions could be done effectively on Earth.
"If we didn't have a space station, we might do otherwise, but having one we will look for opportunities to use it," he said.
Griffin has pledged to speed up the timetable to replace the aging shuttles, which have not flown since the Feb. 1, 2003, mid-air break-up of shuttle Columbia that killed seven crew members.
Shuttle Discovery is set for launch in July.
