What else is JWST doing to finish on time and within budget?
The Project is minimizing costs and mitigating risk with a “tiered integration and testing program” like other complex space missions. By testing at individual instrument level, integrated-instruments level, instrument-package plus optics level, and finally at full observatory level, anomalies can be caught earlier in mission development, when mitigation strategies are simpler and costs are lower. Substantial hardware is already in fabrication (e.g., the near-infrared camera, mid-infrared instrument, and fine guidance sensor have passed their Critical Design Reviews and are building engineering test units; the mirror segments are well along). In other words, the JWST project is much more front-loaded with technology-development costs than space missions that use more conventional technologies: ~49% of the total project cost was spent in Phase A/B. The price tag for these strategies comes early in the project, as the community saw in 2005-2006. The benefits will come later, when the Pro
