The gold-covered primary mirrors of the James Webb Space Telescope, revealed in the clean room at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. (Chris Gunn/NASA)Not for the first time, NASA will postpone the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope by at least a year, to May 2020, the agency announced Tuesday. The delay may increase the cost of the mission — the bigger and more powerful successor to the Hubble Space Telescope — beyond the $8 billion funding cap established by law. The massive space telescope, which has already cost $7.3 billion to develop, was a top priority in the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine's 2000 Decadal Survey. An artist's rendering of the James Webb Space Telescope.

Source: Washington Post March 27, 2018 22:03 UTC