WASHINGTON — Orbital Sciences Corp. beat out
several other finalists to win a NASA Space Act Agreement award worth $171
million to build and demonstrate a launch system capable of delivering cargo to
the international space station.
NASA made
the award under its $500 million Commercial Orbital Transportation Services
(COTS) program, which is aimed at stimulating privately owned alternatives to
the space shuttle and other government systems for ferrying crew and cargo to
the space station.
The U.S. space agency intends to hold an open competition in the years ahead for actual space station
cargo-delivery contracts, but Orbital
of Dulles, Va., is one of two companies receiving financial help from NASA to
develop their proposed systems. The other is Space
Exploration Technologies of El Segundo, Calif.
The $171
million NASA awarded Orbital Feb. 19 became available last fall after the
agency ended its COTS agreement with Rocketplane Kistler when the latter was
unable to raise the $500 million in private financing it needed to finish its
K-1 reusable rocket. Rocketplane Kistler of Oklahoma City and Space Exploration
Technologies were the original COTS awardees.
NASA
currently depends on the space shuttle and Russian Progress spacecraft to
deliver supplies to the space station. After the space shuttle retires in 2010,
the space station will be dependent on European, Japanese and Russian
spacecraft for logistics until NASA's Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle or a U.S. commercial alternative enters service.
With Orion
not scheduled to make its debut until March 2015 and no guarantee that the U.S.
private sector will succeed in fielding a commercial alternative, NASA
Administrator Mike
Griffin asked Congress Feb. 13 for legislation this year to permit the
agency to place a new order with Russia later this year for additional Progress
unmanned supply ships and Soyuz crew capsules.
NASA
already has agreed to buy roughly $700 million worth of such services from Russia through 2011, when a temporary congressional waiver of the Iran-North Korea-Syria
Non-proliferation Act is due to expire. The law prevents NASA from buying space
station-related goods and services from Russia as long as that country's
aerospace sector continues to help Iran acquire missiles and other advanced
weapons.
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