Pre-Solicitation Conference Set For Wednesday At Marshall In Huntsville

NASA released a draft request for proposals, or RFP, for Phase I of its Ares V heavy lifter rocket that will be part of the next-generation U.S. spaceship system.

The rocket will haul heavy payloads to space in a program that envisions a manned mission to the moon by 2020, and someday a manned voyage to Mars, perhaps in the 2030s.

Phase I will define operational concepts, develop requirements, and refine design concepts for the Ares V.

This document is a draft of the final version of the RFP for Phase I, which NASA expects to release next month.

By responding to this draft RFP, potential offerors can provide input on the requirements, small business goals and contract structure. The industry input received will be combined with NASA expertise for potential inclusion in the final version of the RFP for Phase I, which will ask for bids on five Ares V work packages.

A pre-solicitation conference is scheduled for Wednesday at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. The conference is designed for information sharing about the Ares V Phase I for potential offerors.

For a copy of the draft RFP for Phase I, designated NNM09274026R, and more information about the conference, please go to

http://prod.nais.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/eps/sol.cgi?acqid=131145#Draft%20Document on the Web.

NASA earlier awarded the contract for the Orion capsule, called a crew exploration vehicle, to Lockheed Martin Corp. [LMT].

And the smaller Ares I rocket award was divided up, by segments of the rocket, going to The Boeing Co. [BA], Alliant Techsystems Inc. [ATK], and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, a unit of United Technologies Corp. [UTX].

The Ares V will be just one of the major contracts that NASA will award next year.