NPOESS Weather Satellites

Name: NPOESS Weather Satellites acquisition cost growth
Creator: Aous Abdo
License: https://opensource.org/licenses/MIT

NPOESS · DoD · Northrop Grumman · cancelled

+115% $6.5B (2000) → $13.9B (2009)

NPOESS Weather Satellites: cost trajectory from $6.5B in 2000 to $13.9B in 2009, +115% growth.

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Baseline

$6.5B (2000)

Current estimate

$13.9B (2009)

Cost growth

+115%

Units

6 → 4

Quantity change

−33%

Unit-cost change

+222%

IOC

2000s (planned) → Dissolved 2010

Schedule slip

—

Cost basis

Confidence

medium · reconciled

A tri-agency (DoD/NOAA/NASA) program that roughly doubled ($6.5B → $13.95B life-cycle) and breached Nunn-McCurdy before being DISSOLVED in 2010 — split into JPSS + DWSS, which inherited the mission (not a clean kill). Satellites cut 6 → 4.

Documented events

2010Dissolved → JPSS/DWSS

Source: GAO-09-772T (confirmed): "costs have grown to $13.95B" — life-cycle, 4 satellites through 2026; GAO-10-558 later ~$15B. Nunn-McCurdy breach 2005–06.

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Drift — an independent project by Aous Abdo, built from public GAO, CRS and DoD sources. Cost growth has many causes; a larger number is not by itself evidence of mismanagement. How this is built · Explore the data →