Citing financial difficulties, NASA Ames has backed away from a plan that would have had the space agency pay over $15 million to re-skin Hangar One at Moffett Field.

Instead, NASA is asking the Navy to re-skin the historic landmark, just as preservationists had asked be done -- and the Navy refused to do -- last year. In return, NASA is offering to take on responsibility for toxic cleanup on several portions of the Superfund site, freeing the Navy of obligations that could extend for decades.

"We realize there are going to have to be some concessions," said NASA Ames deputy director Lewis Braxton, who broke the news to the Moffett Restoration Advisory Board on Thursday night. Braxton said negotiations between NASA and the Navy are ongoing.

NASA has realized that the cost of re-skinning the Hangar is actually higher than $15 million, Braxton said, and cash-strapped NASA can't come up with the money all at once. And because of the economy, private businesses that might want to lease the Hangar from NASA won't commit to the high up-front cost of re-skinning either.

John Hill, the Navy's interim RAB co-chair, said that a Hangar One re-skinning project would be competing for dollars against other expensive Navy restorations around the state, notably Hunters Point in San Francisco, which is often a money "vacuum."

After the meeting, Braxton said NASA has been unable to get federal stimulus funding for Hangar One.

Braxton said NASA was still enthusiastic about using the Hangar for an airship or some kind of "green aviation," but did not give details. In January, he said NASA was talking to the Department of Defense about stationing an airship at Hangar One, causing many to speculate that he was talking about a high altitude Army airship being built by Lockheed Martin for missile defense and surveillance.

Later in the evening, the Restoration Advisory Board passed a resolution asking the Navy to have a restoration plan in place before removing the toxic siding. Under the Navy's last adopted plan, the bare skeletal structure would be left open to the elements.

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State budget cuts could slow Moffett cleanup