Russian gov’t okays extension of U.S cooperative space treaty to ’30
The Russian government yesterday officially approved an extension to 2030 of the cooperative space treaty with the United States that was initially signed in 1992.
According to the TASS article at the link, the U.S. government has already approved this extension. The original agreement was for U.S. flights to the Russian space station Mir. It has been renewed four times since to cover the deal to build and use ISS.
This could very well be the last extension of this deal. By 2030 private commercial American stations should be operational, and the age of some of the oldest sections of ISS will likely need replacement. At that point the U.S. will probably decide to retire its half of ISS.
What the Russians will do is uncertain. The government doesn’t have the cash to build its own station. Nor has that government allowed a private commercial space industry to thrive and thus be financially able to build private commercial stations. Russia may separate its part of ISS and attempt to keep it aloft, but some of their modules are the oldest, and have shown signs of that age.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
The Russian government yesterday officially approved an extension to 2030 of the cooperative space treaty with the United States that was initially signed in 1992.
According to the TASS article at the link, the U.S. government has already approved this extension. The original agreement was for U.S. flights to the Russian space station Mir. It has been renewed four times since to cover the deal to build and use ISS.
This could very well be the last extension of this deal. By 2030 private commercial American stations should be operational, and the age of some of the oldest sections of ISS will likely need replacement. At that point the U.S. will probably decide to retire its half of ISS.
What the Russians will do is uncertain. The government doesn’t have the cash to build its own station. Nor has that government allowed a private commercial space industry to thrive and thus be financially able to build private commercial stations. Russia may separate its part of ISS and attempt to keep it aloft, but some of their modules are the oldest, and have shown signs of that age.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
I hope that the virus of “internationalism”, so beloved by Bidenoids, does not infect our Mars projects. We gain little from Anglo-Euro or Japanese cooperation, but it is at least well-intentioned and basically in synch with our values. Sino-Russian cooperation is worse than useless and subversive. Let them work to get to Mars, not hitch a ride on our technology. America has a duty to make sure the cancer of criminal communism withers… if not us, who will do it?
This could very well be the last extension of this deal. By 2030 private commercial American stations should be operational, and the age of some of the oldest sections of ISS will likely need replacement. At that point the U.S. will probably decide to retire its half of ISS.
NASA and Boeing have certified ISS with some upgrades out to 2028. The recently completed battery upgrades and the recently started solar array upgrades are a part of that. In addition, they have identified a few more modest upgrades that will enable the ISS to fly until 2035. I would not be surprised to see those happen.
However, to extend the ISS beyond 2035 will require much more extensive and expensive upgrades. I expect the transition to private space stations to be complete by that time.
Way past time for a new US space station like the Von Braun Station or Gateway station. Hell, even a US Death Star!
The importance of transitioning to commercial space stations is that under government operation we have seen very little commercial benefit. So far, manned space has been largely for exploration and experimentation, but we earthlings could benefit greatly from space-based manufacturing, which in 60 years of manned space has not yet happened. The most commercial benefit that we have received from space operations is communications. Up to now, and for the foreseeable future, weather monitoring is the purview of government satellites.
Commercializing space exploration opens opportunities for finding efficiencies that government exploration does not look for. For any commercial space station to work out, it would have to cost much, much less than the ISS did to construct, and it would have to cost much less to operate. It is surprising how little we get back for the price we pay for government exploration and operation in space. Commercial operators would have incentive to find ways to extend their space stations without such extensive and expensive upgrades.
Commercial operators would have incentive to explore the things that are most useful to us on Earth in order to make a return on their investment, and that means we are likely to get a maximum amount of benefit without costing the government much at all.