NASA Extends International Space Station Contract

Michael Curie

Headquarters, Washington     

Kelly Humphries

Johnson Space Center, Houston

WASHINGTON -- NASA has awarded a five-year, $1.24 billion contract extension to The Boeing Co. to continue engineering support of the International Space Station through Sept. 30, 2015.

Work under the contract extension is intended to maintain the station at peak performance levels so the full value of the unique research laboratory is available to NASA, its international partners, other U.S. government agencies and private companies. NASA officially accepted the space station from Boeing at the conclusion of a March 2010 Acceptance Review Board that verified the delivery, assembly, integration and activation of all hardware and software required by the contract. The acceptance signified the transition from assembly of the station to utilization.

This action extends the space station’s Vehicle Sustaining Engineering Contract, which was originally awarded in January 1995 and most recently extended in 2008. The extension brings the total contract value through the end of fiscal year 2015 to $16.2 billion.

Work under the contract extension will include sustaining engineering of station hardware and software, and support of U.S. hardware and software provided to international partners and participants in the station program. The extension also includes end-to-end subsystem management for the majority of station systems, including materials and processes, electrical, electronic, and electromechanical parts, environments and electromagnetic effects.

NASA and its international partner agencies are in the final stages of analyzing the ability to sustain station operations through 2020 and awaiting formal confirmation of this goal by the governments of participating countries. This contract extension also includes assessment of the feasibility of extending the life of the primary structural hardware that was installed in orbit through the end of 2028.

The work will be performed at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., and at other domestic and international locations.