The next White House budget request for NASA will potentially cover plans to cut support for operations onboard the International Space Station in the mid-2020s, Space News reported Friday.
A draft budget document for NASA’s 2019 budget proposal will eliminate direct federal government support to the space station by 2025 as part of plans to implement the Space Policy Directive 1 executive order which directs the space agency to launch a lunar exploration mission.
The report noted plans to eliminate the ISS support might open new opportunities to enter commercial space ventures and transition to commercial provision of low Earth orbit requirements.
A law entitled “NASA Transition Authorization Act of 2017,” which was signed in March, requires the space agency to create an ISS transition approach wherein NASA can serve as a customer of a non-governmental human space flight enterprise.