First private space stations will be orbiting the Earth later this year

For nearly three decades, the International Space Station has been the only destination in low Earth orbit, but that will change this year. Could this be the start of a prosperous economy in space?

The space station industry is starting to take off.

For decades, if we wanted to send an astronaut or an experiment into orbit, the International Space Station (ISS) was the only option. But now, as NASA and its partners prepare to de-orbit the ISS at the end of the decade, commercially owned stations are preparing to take over, says .

“Private space stations have been in development for several years, particularly in partnership with NASAand 2026 will really be the beginning of the launch of the first equipment”, he states Mary Guentherresponsible for space policy at the Progressive Policy Institute in Washington DC.

There have been privately developed modules coupled to the EEI previously, namely from the now defunct one, whose BEAM module is still coupled to the EEI, but never autonomous commercial space stations.

In the absence of the EEI, however, these stations will be called upon to fill the gap. “It’s time for NASA to go further and do things we’ve never done before, leaving the rest – in this case, low-Earth orbit space stations – to commercial capabilities,” says Guenther.

In the USA, two such ventures plan advance in 2026. The first is the start-up, which plans to launch its station on top of one of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rockets in May.

Haven-1 is much smaller and simpler than the EEIand will depend on the capsule Crew Dragon from SpaceX to supplement its life support systems, but if all goes well, It will be the first private space station ever.

Haven-1 is designed to house four crew at a timeboth for space tourism – it is equipped with a photo dome and Wi-Fi – and for relatively small microgravity experiences.

It is intended to serve as Test bench for the larger and more ambitious Haven-2which Vast executives said they view as a replacement for the EEI.

“I think everyone, including Vast, is working towards 2030,” he says Colin Smithsenior vice president at Vast. “The ERA at the end of 2030, so people are looking at their calendars and thinking ui, It’s 2025, we should do something“.

The other space station mission scheduled for 2026 comes from , which is also currently developing the spaceplane.

Sierra Space has announced plans to launch a prototype version of its expandable space station module, or Large Integrated Flexible Environment, in 2026. Eventually, this module is planned to be part of the Orbital Reef space station project, led by Blue Origin and Sierra Space.

There is no doubt that the era of the commercial space station will be different from that of the EEIeven if it is due to the much higher number of potential stakeholders in the industry.

“There is a probability that we will have several different space station models commercial, potentially serving different markets,” says Guenther. “I’ll be very excited to see how they will differentiate themselves from each other to attract business and how this competition between them will drive innovation.” And

Many hope that private space stations reduce the cost from operating in orbit in the same way that private launch providers have made getting to space more affordable.

“The ISS is the most expensive thing humanity has ever built. It’s been an absurd amount of money, and we’re not going to achieve a future with space commerce, space manufacturing, with people living and working in space, if it costs $150 billion to house seven people,” says Colin Smith.

“Our goal is to have millions of people living and working in spacelong term, and everything else is defining the intermediate steps we need to get to that point.”

“There are these embryonic industries that will be ready to transition to these space stations, including pharmaceuticals and materials,” says Guenther. “It will be interesting to see which of these embryos will flourish and grow.”