NASA awards $415 million for Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin, 2 other space stations

Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin, aerospace company NanoRacks and defense contractor Northrop Grumman won contracts for their development worth $130 million, $160 million and $125.6 million, respectively. orbital post,

A fourth company, Axiom Space, was previously awarded a $140 million contract.

The US space agency is increasingly turning to private industry to develop hardware to reduce costs and focus on its ambitious goals, which include building habitats on the Moon and preparing for a crewed mission to Mars. Is.

“We are partnering with US companies to develop space destinations where people can go, live and work, enable NASA “To continue to create paths in space for the benefit of humanity while promoting commercial activity in space,” NASA chief Bill Nelson said in a statement.

Blue Origin is partnering with Sierra Space to develop the orbital reef, which can house up to 10 people, by the latter part of the decade. It is described as “a mixed-use business park in space” that will support microgravity research and construction.

NanoRacks’ space station, which is being developed with Voyager Space and Lockheed Martin, is called “Starlab.”

Nanoracks is targeting a launch for 2027 and envisions a biology laboratory, plant habitat laboratory, physical science and materials research laboratory, and an open workspace area.

Northrop Grumman, which has already developed a spacecraft called Cygnus that provides cargo delivery to the ISS, plans to build its station module by module, including in areas of science, tourism and industrial experimentation.

It has been 21 years since the first long-term residents arrived on the ISS in particular, a symbol of international cooperation between the United States and Russia.

It is currently considered safe until 2028, and Nelson, the new administrator, has said that he expects it to last until 2030, by which time NASA wants to advance and replace the commercial sector.

This story has been published without modification in text from a wire agency feed. Only the title has been changed.