A four year, $63.6 billion Federal Aviation Administration authorization bill agreed to by a conference committee of House and Senate lawmakers would require creation of a Chief NextGen Officer. The bill would also authorize the agency to spend nearly $16 billion annually on the air traffic control modernization effort.

Already being dubbed the "NextGen czar," the officer will report to the FAA administrator, should Congress approve the bill and the president sign it. The bill is likely to gain approval on both fronts and could pass Congress as early as Feb. 3. The bill would end a series of short-term authorizations the agency has operated under since 2008. During a month-long period in mid-2011, the agency underwent a partial shutdown after Congress failed to approve another temporary extension.

The authorization bill also affirms the agency's decision to require ADS-B Out avionics on board most airplanes by 2020, and doesn't make the deadline 2015 as previous authorization had required. Language from an earlier version of the authorization bill making ADS-B In mandatory also is not included in the final, conference version. ADS-B is the backbone of NextGen, which seeks to largely replace radars with Global Positioning System-derived data for tracking aircraft positions.  

The bill also requires the Transportation secretary to accelerate the integrating of unmanned aerial vehicles into national airspace by producing a plan within 270 days of the bill's passage into law. The plan would be incorporated into the NextGen implementation plan.

UPDATED Feb. 2, 3:00 p.m.: NextGen authorization figures added to story.

For more:
- download the FAA authorization conference bill (.pdf)
- download the conference committee's joint explanatory statement (.pdf)

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