Plan to deorbit ISS is depressing, wasteful
Space station a testament to human ingenuity, cooperation
NASA and its international partners intend to deorbit the International Space Station sometime around 2030. The ISS, the greatest engineering achievement in human history, would become a magnificent fireball streaking across the skies over the North Pacific. Much of it would burn up in the upper atmosphere, and the remains would splash into the sea.
We believe the deorbit plan is depressing, wasteful, environmentally undesirable, and most importantly, dishonoring of all those who built this magnificent structure, which is a testament to human ingenuity and international cooperation.
The ISS arguably has been the first long-term home of human beings beyond Earth and the venue of many scientific and technological achievements. Important research has taken place on the space laboratory in biomedicine, space manufacturing and space agriculture, among other fields of study.
First proposed by President Ronald Reagan as “Space Station Freedom,” the project was saved from congressional cancellation by President Bill Clinton in 1993. By engaging the former Soviet space program, the ISS became the most visible example of what nations, despite disagreements on Earth, can achieve together.
The ISS was the catalyst for developing the commercial launch industry that is revolutionizing the space sector. President George W. Bush first proposed commercializing cargo resupply to the ISS after the Columbia disaster spelled the end of the space shuttle.
That program directly funded the development of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, the most successful launch vehicle in history, shortening launch schedules, increasing reliability, and driving down costs. A NASA investment of less than $400 million returned billions of dollars in benefit, enjoyed by nearly every player in the space sector, including U.S. government launch customers such as the Department of Defense and National Reconnaissance Office.
The Obama administration followed on with the Commercial Crew program, which returned Americans to space on American rockets, under President Donald Trump. In supporting the development of a commercial space transportation system, NASA plays a role similar to subsidies for early air mail, which nurtured the development of the air cargo and travel industries in the
1930s.
In the last three years, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon has flown more people than China’s space program has in its 20 years of human spaceflight! Boeing is prepared to fly its commercial capsule, Starliner, early next year.
NASA is now developing a new generation of privately funded space stations, known as Commercial LEO Destinations, for low-earth orbit. They will replace the venerable ISS when it ends its service life.
Disposing of the ISS would not be free. NASA previously planned to spend about $300 million, purchasing three Russian Progress vehicles to guide ISS safely into its watery grave. Now the agency plans to develop an American deorbiting system, which has the added value of possibly developing a commercial “space tug” with many other applications in orbit. The deorbit budget has escalated to $1 billion and will surely go higher.
If NASA must spend a billion dollars, a far better idea is to push the ISS up. Former NASA officials and industry experts we’ve consulted concur that boosting the station can be done and that it wouldn’t cost substantially more than deorbiting.
ISS could be moved into a parking orbit several hundred miles above the congestion of satellites and space debris that clutters low Earth orbit. That relatively small volume close to our planet is filled with over 9,000 satellites and nearly 35,000 trackable pieces of space debris.
In contrast, medium Earth orbit is 200 times more voluminous, generally debris free and contains fewer than 200 satellites! The ISS could be safely stored in this vast, empty space. And it would even remain visible to those of us on Earth, to serve as a source of inspiration and wonder.
Indeed, a preserved ISS could become a tourist destination. While entering the space artifact would not be advisable, future space tourists and someday kids on space field trips will fly nearby while a guide explains its remarkable history and recounts its achievements. Axiom currently partners with SpaceX to send space tourists to the ISS. Flying by a retired station in medium Earth orbit could be a special destination someday. Jared Isaacman’s upcoming Polaris Dawn mission is set to reach an apogee of more than 700 km.
Our nation has long preserved historic ships, even huge carriers and battleships such as the Midway and Missouri. Tourists visit the Discovery, the Atlantis, the Endeavor and even the test shuttle Enterprise daily. The Kennedy Space Center’s Visitor Complex has an entire “rocket garden” and Space Center Houston has a “rocket park.”
We urge Congress to allocate the funding required to let the International Space Station serve as a monument for human achievement rather than allow it to become a burnt-out debris field on the floor of the Pacific Ocean.
Dr. Greg Autry is the director of the Thunderbird Initiative for Space Leadership at Arizona State University and a former NASA official. Mark Whittington writes frequently about space policy. He has published a political study of space exploration entitled “Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?” as well as “The Moon, Mars and Beyond” and “Why is America Going Back to the Moon?”