Troy Meink, principal deputy director of the National Reconnaissance Office, said the agency expects to see a decline in the cost of launch services to be procured under the third phase of the U.S. Space Force’s National Security Space Launch, or NSSL, program, Breaking Defense reported Monday.
“We are confident that the launch costs will continue to come down under the NSSL Phase 3 acquisition and are working closely with the Space Force on that,” Meink said.
According to Meink, the decline in launch costs would enable NRO to diversify its on-orbit force structure to include both small and large spacecraft using multiple orbital domains, allowing the agency to “provide greater revision rates, increased coverage and more timely information.”
“This significant reduction in cost to entry for launch not only opened the market for a new commercial space companies, but it has made new architecture approaches affordable to the government that were not a decade ago,” Meink said.
In October 2023, Space Force released solicitations for the two lanes of the NSSL Phase 3 contract, which is expected to be awarded in fiscal 2025.
Lane 1 covers lower-risk launch missions to commercial orbits and Lane 2 focuses on heavy-lift launch services.