Servicing ISS

Extending the lifetime of ISS beyond its current termination scheduled for 2015 would require cargo flights after 2015, and Europe and Japan are beginning to look at ways to pay for additional flights of the cargo ships they have developed.

The Augustine committee probably reflected the views of many in the space community when it argued ISS should be extended at least through 2020. Taking twenty years to complete the station and using it in its full capability for only four years makes very little sense, yet that is the current U. S. plan.

Europe and Japan both might run into budget constraints as the governments involved try to navigate the current economic downturn. As has happened in the U. S. for decades, when governments want to show they're being fiscally prudent, space budgets seem to be among the first to be slashed. If Europe and Japan fail to get funding, supplying ISS would fall to Russia, and perhaps to U. S. commercial carriers just now developing the necessary craft.