Sat, May 15, 2010
Two U.S. House Armed Services Subcommittees Vote To Preserve
Alternate JSF Powerplant
The U.S. House Armed Services
Seapower and Air-Land Forces subcommittees each marked up the
National Defense Authorization Bill for Fiscal Year 2011 (H.R.
5136) on Thursday. Both subcommittees voted to authorize $485
million in continued funding of the GE/Rolls-Royce F136 engine for
the JSF.
“The committee has believed that competition in the F-35
engine program helps ensure against the operational risk of up to
95 percent of the entire U.S. tactical fighter fleet being grounded
due to an engine problem,” said Air-Land Subcommittee
Chairman Adam Smith (D-WA) at Thursday's markup.
GE said in a news release that Congress has funded the engine
for 14 years in order to preserve competition on the largest
weapons procurement program in history. Competing engines have been
an integral component of the JSF program from its inception, and
competitive behavior is proven to control costs: Government
Accountability Office estimates have predicted that competition
between the two F-35 engine makers could lead to long-term savings
of up to 20 percent for the $100 billion engine program.
“Competition has been demonstrated to help limit cost
growth in acquisition programs, including as the first alternate
engine program did for the F-15, F-16 and F-14. And competition has
also been demonstrated to motivate contractor responsiveness,
technical innovation, and improve engine maintainability,
reliability, and durability,” said Smith.
GE says the F136 development program is more than 70 percent
complete and scheduled for flight testing next year.
“Today, the competitive environment created by having
dual-sourced engines for the Joint Strike Fighter is estimated to
save $1 billion during the next five years, and $20 billion over
the life of the program," said David Joyce, president and CEO of GE
Aviation. “We are gratified that members of the subcommittees
strongly recognize that competition is the best cost control
mechanism for the largest defense program in U.S.
history.”
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