![]() ![]() The view of the Earth at night from the ISS in 2016. “We're trying to get that started now so that we have something in place when ISS does eventually have to retire.” “These complex space systems and stations take a really long time to develop,” she says. “It will have an end date.”Īnd whenever that end comes, NASA cannot wait around until then to begin the process of replacing it. “We know this thing can’t last forever,” Snopkowski says. The ISS has been flying for more than 20 years and may stay operational into 2030 if Congress agrees to NASA’s request to fund the station beyond the currently approved 2024.īut the station is beginning to show the inevitable wear and tear of decades spent in a dangerous environment, with leaks, near collisions, and parts failures adding up over time. “We want to be able to have these high-level requirements for industry so that they can come up with their best innovative solutions to meet our needs,” Snopkowski tells Inverse. The agency is prepared to award up to four contracts worth a total of $400 million for the first phase of the program at that time. NASA hopes to publish the service requirements commercial space stations must meet by sometime in the spring of 2022. In July, the space agency solicited industry proposals for what it’s calling “commercial LEO destinations,” privately owned and operated space stations to take the place of the ISS, NASA Program Executive for the Commercial LEO Development Program Misty Snopkowski says. Since November 2000, it has played a constant host to more than 200 astronauts and cosmonauts conducting experiments on everything from X-rays to the effects of extended weightlessness on the human body.īut all good things must come to an end, and as recent air leaks and congressional debates over funding have made clear, the ISS won’t live forever, so NASA is already looking to what might come next in low Earth orbit. The International Space Station is a marvel. ![]()
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