NASA Signs
Commercial Space Transportation Agreements
(18 June 2007) Through three new Space
Act agreements, NASA is expanding co-operation with companies interested in
commercialising access to space.
The companies are developing
capabilities to transport goods and people to low Earth orbit.
NASA
signed nonreimbursable Space Act agreements, which do not provide any
government funding to the companies, with SpaceDev of Poway, Calif., Spacehab
of Houston, and Constellation Services International (CSI) of Laguna Woods,
Calif. The pacts establish milestones and objective criteria by which the
companies can gauge their progress in developing orbital cargo transportation
capabilities.
Under the agreements, NASA will share information that
will help the companies understand projected requirements for International
Space Station crew and cargo transportation launch vehicles, as well as
spacecraft and NASA human rating criteria.
SpaceDev, Spacehab and CSI
will work to develop and demonstrate the vehicles, systems and operations
needed to transport cargo to and from a low Earth orbit destination. SpaceDev
also will include crew transport in its development program. NASA will
acknowledge the companies' milestone accomplishments.
"This is a
significant development," said Scott Horowitz, NASA associate administrator for
Exploration Systems. "First there were two, and now there are a total of five
private companies co-operating with NASA by dedicating entirely private funding
to help establish a robust commercial space transportation
industry."
"We're pleased to welcome these entrepreneurs to the growing
list of companies willing to invest their own resources as NASA encourages
development of a whole new sector of the commercial space industry," said Alan
Lindenmoyer, manager of the Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office at the
Johnson Space Center in Houston.
The program's overarching goals are to
stimulate commercial enterprises in space, facilitate U.S. private industry
development of reliable, cost-effective access to low Earth orbit and create a
market environment in which commercial space transportation services are
available to government and private customers. By stimulating the growth of
commercial space enterprise, NASA plans to free itself to focus on long-range
exploration to the moon and Mars.
Last year, NASA signed funded
agreements with Space Exploration Technologies of El Segundo, Calif., and
Rocketplane Kistler of Oklahoma City under the program's competition for
Commercial Orbital Transportation Services demonstrations. In January 2007,
NASA signed unfunded agreements with Transformational Space Corp. (t/Space) of
Reston, Va., and PlanetSpace, Inc., of Chicago, which are similar to the three
signed today.
After industry has demonstrated safe and reliable
capabilities, NASA plans to enter the next phase of the Commercial Crew and
Cargo Program and may purchase transportation services from commercial
providers to supply the International Space Station.
(source:
NASA)