There’s a lot of funding fallout streaming out of discussions by space scientists at this week’s Planetary Science Subcommittee meeting held at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.

Tight budgets may well mean slipping an outer planet flagship mission to Jupiter or Saturn beyond 2016 to perhaps 2020. Some good news is that such a mission may get a financial boost from $2.1 billion to $3 billion.

Then there’s the ongoing saga of the budget-busting Mars Science Laboratory - powerpointed to be still on track for a September 2009 launch - but not out of the woods as yet.

There’s been roughly a $190 million cost overrun on Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) over two fiscal years. The current cost-to-complete estimate is now pegged at $1.9 billion in rounded-off dollars. Meanwhile, the folks at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory are in hyper-drive piecing together the mega-rover. They are in double-shifts to achieve assemble, test and launch operations milestones - but also face supplier delivery delays.

One space scientist told me that the planetary science budget is “very uncertain” until (a) new administration, (b) MSL with lots of luck blasts off on time next September - and hopefully not needing any more money and (c) the Mars program gets its act together and comes up with a realistic plan - a plan that is now characterized by my contact as in “serious disarray”.

Also, NASA remains keen on looking at a Mars Sample Return mission. However, the cost for that effort is deemed ultra-high, even with international cooperation. To make that project happen, say in a 2018-2020 time frame, it will require skipping opportunities at Mars, even with significant international partnership.

It’s all money, money, money.

Good luck to Ed Weiler, NASA’s top space science guru, in locating that printing press to create fresh money - it must be behind some door at space agency headquarters, no?