10 Space Station Projects in the Works

After more than 20 years, the International Space Station (ISS) will be retired in 2030. What will take its place? China already has a space station in orbit, and you've probably heard of NASA's Lunar Gateway, a space station that will orbit the moon as part of the Artemis missions. But there are plans for many other space stations in the pipeline, some with launch dates coming up relatively soon. Four of them are big, public projects from NASA, Russia's Roscosmos, India's ISR, and China's CNSA. There are also quite a few space station projects from private companies that are dedicating billions of dollars to getting their branch offices in space. These private companies include Vast, Axiom Space, Gravitics, Blue Origin, Sierra Space, Voyager Space, and Airbus. My guess is that Airbus is the only one you've heard of. Some of these projects are collaborations between companies or between companies and public agencies, while others are working on grants from NASA. Russia and China are collaborating on a project for both a lunar space station and a moon base. Read about ten of these upcoming space station projects at Freethink. -via Big Think

(Image credit: NASA/Alberto Bertolin)