The International Space Station (ISS) has a few more years left in orbit, but the future of the orbiting laboratory looks somewhat shaky as NASA is forced to tighten its purse strings.
The Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS), which runs the ISS National Laboratory, is canceling an upcoming conference on space station research, SpaceNews reports. The ISS Research and Development Conference was scheduled to take place in late July in Seattle, but this week CASIS announced that after consulting with NASA, “current regulatory and budgetary conditions do not support holding” the annual conference this year.
The announcement comes just over a month after the release of the current administration’s so-called “lean budget,” which included funding for NASA through 2026. The budget proposes to cut the agency’s funding by $6 billion, which is 24% less than NASA’s current 2025 budget of $24.8 billion. The budget also proposes to reduce the number of ISS crew ahead of its planned retirement in 2030, when it will be replaced by several commercial space stations.
Funding for the ISS could be cut by a quarter, from $1.24 billion to $920 million, according to the proposed budget for 2026. “Crew and cargo flights to the station will be significantly reduced,” the budget proposal says. “The reduced research capabilities of the station will be focused on efforts critical to the lunar and Mars exploration programs.”
During a briefing held in late May, Dana Weigel, NASA’s ISS program manager, said that the space agency had already faced resource issues related to the space station before the 2026 budget was proposed. “The station is facing cumulative multi-year budget cuts,” Weigel was quoted as saying by SpaceNews. “This is a challenge that I have faced and that we are coping with today. It has left us with some budgetary and resource issues that have led to a reduction in the amount of cargo.”
The cargo includes supplies for the crew members on board. For more than two decades, the space agency has maintained a crew of at least four NASA astronauts aboard the ISS, as well as international crew members from Russia, Japan, Canada and other countries. Previously, NASA conducted four or five cargo missions a year, but the agency has planned only three landings for 2025. “We are evaluating the potential to go to three crews,” Weigel said during the briefing. “This is something we are working on and trying to evaluate today.” NASA is also considering extending the duration of missions to the ISS from six to eight months, Ars Technica reported earlier.
Meanwhile, five commercial space stations, including Orbital Reef, Axiom Station, and Starlab, are under development but not yet ready to receive astronauts in low Earth orbit. The ISS provides a permanent presence of orbital science above the Earth’s surface, which leaves a large gap that needs to be filled.
