Blue Origin Wants to Build a Space Station - The New York Times

Blue Origin says it will team up with Sierra Space, Boeing and other companies to build an outpost that could help replace the International Space Station.

Blue Origin, the space company owned by Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, is teaming up with other firms to build a space station in Earth orbit.

The group announced its plans on Monday, revealing the latest concept for a privately built orbital outpost that could replace or complement the International Space Station.

The proposal by Blue Origin and its partners, called Orbital Reef, only exists in digital animations and drawings, and executives said it could be built by the end of the decade.

Key partners in the project are Sierra Space, which has been building its own space station idea for years, and Boeing, the aerospace giant that has built and managed American segments on the I.S.S.

Their proposed space station aims to “generate new discoveries, new products, new forms of entertainment and global awareness of Earth’s fragility and interconnectedness,” Brent Sherwood, a Blue Origin vice president, told reporters on Monday from a space conference in Dubai.

The Orbital Reef team is already talking with other countries, Janet Kavandi, Sierra Space’s president and a former astronaut, said in an interview, highlighting the space program of the United Arab Emirates.

Mike Gold, an executive vice president at Redwire Space, another firm partnering with Blue Origin, said elements of the new space station could be a test bed for technologies that will eventually help astronauts live on the moon.