Sierra Space-Blue Origin's Orbital Reef space station completes NASA's feasibility review

Sierra Space, on Monday, announced that its Orbital Reef space station has completed the System Definition Review (SDR) with NASA and is now ready for the designing stage. Orbital Reef is the commercial space station that Sierra Space is jointly developing with Jeff Bezos’ space tourism firm Blue Origin. 

In an official release, the company revealed that the recent SDR, conducted between mid-June and mid-July, demonstrated to NASA that the Orbital Reef space station is feasible and achievable and validated that it is on track to proceed into the design phase.

“The SDR included an extensive review to ensure that the proposed Orbital Reef architecture is responsive to the functional and performance requirements”, the company said in its statement. “It examined the proposed system architecture and the flow-down to all functional elements of the Orbital Reef system”. 

Notably, the space station will be installed in the low-Earth orbit (LEO) under NASA’s Commercial Low-Earth Orbit Development (CLDP) program. Sierra Space, along with Blue Origin and others, entered this agreement in December 2021 through which NASA would shift its LEO research activities to commercial habitats after the retirement of the International Space Station (ISS). Notably, the other partners involved in the development of Orbital Reef are Arizona State University, Boeing, Genesis Engineering Solutions and Redwire Space.

Recently, NASA revealed its plan to de-orbit the ISS early next decade, as the orbital outpost is now too old and costly to operate. According to the proposed plan, the space station will be crashed at point Nemo in the south Pacific Ocean. This location is also referred to as 'spacecraft cemetery' because it is the most distant point from land and thus is the preferred spot to crash a decommissioned spacecraft.

Earlier in April this year, Orbital Reef completed the System Requirements Review (SRR) which assessed Orbital Reef’s ability to meet safety and mission requirements and evaluated the technical design readiness, operational concept and project feasibility. 

When will the Orbital Reef launch?

If the partners stick to the schedule, the Orbital Reef would launch between 2025 and 2030. Once launched, it would house ten people while offering a platform for tourism and research in the space. Notably, other private firms such as Nanoracks, Voyager Space, and Lockheed Martin have also collaborated for another private space station called Starlab, which is expected to be operational by 2027. In addition to this, Axiom Space is also working to develop its Axiom Station, the first module of which is targeted for launch in late 2024.