Ocean advocates say NASA’s plan to move the ISS to the South Pacific leaves key environmental and legal questions unanswered. (File photo) NASA’s plan to decommission the International Space Station (ISS) at the end of the decade is being criticized by ocean conservation experts, who say the agency’s strategy raises significant unresolved environmental and legal concerns. The ISS, which has been continuously occupied since 2000, is expected to be retired around 2030.

Under NASA’s current plan, a specially designed US Deorbit Vehicle (USDV), being developed by SpaceX, will guide the football field-sized station into a controlled re-entry before debris falls in a remote area of ​​the South Pacific Ocean known as Point Nemo. Point Nemo, often called the world’s “spacecraft graveyard”, lies further from land than any other place on Earth and has long been used as a disposal site for decommissioned spacecraft.

NASA selected this area to minimize risk to populated areas.