SpaceX wins $843 million contract with NASA to deorbit the International Space Station in 2030

NASA has selected SpaceX to develop a spacecraft that will deorbit the International Space Station in 2030, a contract worth up to $843 million. The agency announced on Wednesday.

The International Space Station is nearing the end of its operational life, and with plans for new commercially owned space stations on the rise, the station that started it all should be safely scrapped at the end of the decade.

Few details have been released so far about the American Deorbit rover, as NASA calls it. However, NASA explained that the vehicle will be different from SpaceX’s Dragon capsule, which transports cargo and crew to the station, and other vehicles that provide services to the agency. Unlike these vehicles, which are manufactured and operated by SpaceX, NASA will take ownership of the American Deorbit vehicle after its development and will operate it throughout its mission.

Both the vehicle and the International Space Station will disintegrate destructively upon reentry into the atmosphere, and one of the big tasks ahead for SpaceX is to ensure the station returns in a way that does not endanger any inhabited areas.

The launch contract for the American Deorbit vehicle will be announced separately.

NASA and its partners were evaluating the use of the Russian Roscosmos Progress spacecraft for the deorbiting mission, but studies indicated that a new spacecraft would be needed for the deorbiting maneuver. Safe stopping of the station is a shared responsibility between the five space agencies that work on the ISS — NASA, the Canadian Space Agency, the European Space Agency, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and the government space corporation Roscosmos — but it is unclear whether this contract amount is being paid. By all countries.

TechCrunch has reached out to NASA for more details and we will update this post if we hear back.