ASCEND Act

This legislation requires the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to establish a formal program for acquiring and disseminating commercial Earth remote sensing data and imagery. This program, to be housed within NASA's Earth Science Division, aims to satisfy the agency's scientific, operational, and educational requirements, while also supporting other federal agencies and researchers. It builds upon the success of NASA's Commercial SmallSat Data Acquisition Pilot Program, which demonstrated the value of commercial data for Earth science research. The bill mandates that the terms of data acquisition must not prevent the publication of commercial data for scientific purposes or the dissemination of information derived from it. It authorizes NASA to procure data and establish flexible end-use license terms to ensure the widest possible use of the acquired data, including by non-NASA-funded users. Furthermore, the program prioritizes procuring data from United States vendors whenever practicable and requires annual reports to Congress detailing agreements, vendors, license terms, and the scientific advancements enabled by the data.