SAN DIEGO — Ambitious plans for an internationally developed space solar power (SSP) system to provide energy on a global scale by the middle of the century have been unveiled by space pioneer, humanitarian and former Indian President Abdul Kalam.

NASA may be overreaching in its more than $200 million cleanup plans for the Santa Susana Field Laboratory 30 mi. northwest of Los Angeles, which for decades was used by the Department of Energy, the U.S. Air Force and the space agency for nuclear energy research and rocket testing, according to NASA Inspector General Paul Martin. The cleanup is projected to drive NASA’s otherwise little-noticed Environmental Compliance and Restoration budget line from $45 million in 2012 to $75.5 million annually through 2018.

STEM CELLS: The Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (Casis) is seeking proposals for using International Space Station facilities to study how microgravity affects the growth, division and differentiation of non-embryonic mammalian stem cells. Casis says it will provide grants, coordinate flight opportunities and locate potential partners for winning proposals. The non-profit organization, set up by Congress to operate the public U.S.

Large aerospace and defense (A&D) companies are getting out in front of government budget cuts by cutting costs, shedding excess capacity and trimming their workforces, and the payoff has been higher profit margins, according to the new results from Aviation Week’s Top-Performing Companies study.

HOUSTON — The European Space Agency’s (ESA) unpiloted Automated Transfer Vehicle-4 (ATV-4) the Albert Einstein, is expected to have no difficulty berthing with the International Space Station (ISS) in mid-June, but the station’s mission management team has approved a response strategy just in case Russia’s Progress 51 cargo capsule imparted damage as it docked with an undeployed navigation antenna early April 26.

The U.S. Air Force and launch provider United Launch Alliance (ULA) have once again scrubbed the launch of the fifth Wideband Global Satcom (WGS-5) spacecraft, this time due to an issue with a helium pressurization line that is part of the Delta IV rocket’s ground support equipment. Launch from Cape Canaveral AFS, Fla., which had been targeted for a 30-min. window opening at 8:27 p.m. EDT May 23, has now been pushed back 24 hr. to the same window on May 24. Weather forecasts predict an 80% chance of favorable conditions for liftoff, according to ULA.

DEEP SPACE COMMS: Maintenance, operations and engineering services for NASA’s Deep Space Network of spacecraft communications links will be provided for at least five years by ITT Exelis under a contract awarded by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. If the McLean, Va.-based company meets the requirements for incentive provisions, the contract can extend to a maximum of 10 years with a total value of $435 million.

The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is activating an in-orbit Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) spare as experts try to rescue a primary spacecraft that has failed to deliver basic weather data for a second time in less than a year, according to officials in the satellite community.