Nasa plans to open ISS for commercial and private ventures

Seeing an Aurora From the Space Station, NASA 2019

Announced officially on June 7th, 2019, NASA stated that they would be “opening the International Space Station (ISS) for commercial business so U.S. industry innovation and ingenuity can accelerate a thriving commercial economy in low earth orbit”. Their main goal being “landing the first woman and next man on the Moon by 2024” with another of their objectives states that American companies will play a key part in “establishing a sustainable presence” on the Moon.

According to NASA it has already worked with 11 different companies to install 14 “commercial facilities” in order to “broaden the scope of commercial activity on the space station”. The part that a majority will find most interesting, NASA is intending to allow private astronaut missions of up to 30 days. Meaning anyone who has the bread and is willing to drop a minimum of around $35,000 PER NIGHT.

This may be linked to the American Government’s latest proposal to reallocate it’s space budget to be more focused on further space travel, compared to spending on the ISS or Earth based research. Essentially these efforts are to make the ISS a self sustaining economy that can afford to not only keep itself running, but further develop and progress. I’m interested in how the privatization of the largest space project will play out as well as how commercial ventures on the Moon will be implemented. As of now one cannot own a part of the moon, but if you were to harvest something you are the legal owner. Which essentially means that while not necessarily owning territory it still is worth developing on the Moon. Expect more laws and processes to come, but for now space travel will still be only done in my dreams