<i>Then how do they intend to make up the power shortfall? The launch window isn't really negotiable, so are they planning a power-sharing concept? That should be doable, actually, though it would limit what can be done during the Pluto flyby.</i><br /><br />As Brian Berger points out in an upcoming Space News feature (summary can be found
here; full story is expected on Monday), which a New Horizons (NH) team member told me was a "simplistic" characterization, the power issue is, admittedly, twofold since NH addresses NASA's high-level requirement to explore Pluto/Charon <i>and</i> the Kuiper Belt. Note that both targets have equal priority.<br /><br />Even with the DOE shutdown of plutonium processing, the NH team feels the power situation is manageable for the Pluto/Charon encounter; however, the power situation for the Kuiper Belt portion of the mission is in some doubt, though I'm told NH team members are "cautiously optimistic." And there's always the possibility that the recently proposed New Horizons 2 concept, which would employ building an NH clone to fly by Uranus and on to the Kuiper Belt and for which Senator Mikulski successfully secured concept study funding, could recover any lost science on the latter. We'll see.<br /><br />Having said that, a person on the NH team told me last night that:<br /><br /> "Until we have our spacecraft fully together this winter, we do not know the power demand at [Pluto/Charon] encounter to better than perhaps 10%, <i>i.e</i>., plus or minus 15 to 20 watts-- somewhere between 170 W and 190 W. In the meantime, we are also working on a couple of new power saving measures that [are] not too late to employ.<br /><br />"Until next spring, we will not know exactly the final amount of power that DOE can supply. At present they cannot say to better than 180 W, but it could be much better, <i>i.e</i>., more like 190 W to 195 W."<br /><br />Specifically, and contrar