What will be done with NASA’s unused assets?

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Rep. John Mica’s panel met at the Kennedy Space Center on Monday.

What will be done with NASA’s unused assets?

Private industry could make use of a pair of old trailers built to carry space shuttle fuel tanks. The trailers are sitting unused at the moment, but it’s the buildings and hangars that can be converted to private use.

For example, Boeing is using an old space shuttle hangar to build and process a new space ship that may carry astronauts to the space station before the end of the decade.

There are 47 launch pads at Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center, but only three of them are in use.

Only 8,000 people work at the Kennedy Space Center, when 18,000 people used to work in the area.

Mica’s oversight panel is looking for ways to speed up the conversion from public to private.

“We’re trying to do everything we can to turn the properties around — the assets that are sitting idle, the property, buildings and facilities, and get a return for the taxpayers,” Mica said.

Leaders of the Kennedy Space Center and the Cape testified that the conversion is not easy, and that they have requirements and responsibilities to other agencies that slow the process.

Private launch companies such as SpaceX are looking for non-government facilities and launch pads, perhaps in other states, where they can work more efficiently.

If the government doesn’t make the conversion easier, then more jobs and more business are going to be lost.