The Wall Street Journal is reporting that House and Senate leaders have agreed to authorize $2.5 billion to keep the U.S. space shuttle fleet flying through 2011, if such an extension is necessary to complete currently planned missions to the international space station. Currently shuttle funding ends in December 2010 and some in NASA fear that any shuttle extension will divert funds from the work on the Constellation program to replace the shuttles with a pair of expendable rockets.
These rockets, the Ares 1 designed to launch crew in the Orion crew capsule and the larger Ares V designed to support lunar or Mars missions are the subject on a new review ordered by the White House. With their chief backer, NASA Administrator Michael Griffin not retained by the Obama Administration, alternatives to these rockets such as the DIRECT design may now be considered.