Office of Space Commerce loses 40% of budget in rescission

WASHINGTON — The Commerce Department has moved to rescind 40% of the current-year funding for the Office of Space Commerce.

According to industry sources, the office was informed in late August that the department was clawing back about 40% of the $65 million appropriated to it in fiscal 2025, putting on hold many of its initiatives. Bloomberg first reported the move.

It was not clear why the rescission was made and whether it was at the direction of the department or the White House. It was not included in a package of rescissions released by the Office of Management and Budget Aug. 29, which focused on State Department and foreign aid programs.

Spokespersons for both the Commerce Department and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration did not respond to questions about the rescissions from SpaceNews Sept. 5. The Office of Space Commerce has been part of NOAA, but a White House executive order on commercial space Aug. 13 directed that it be moved within the Office of the Secretary of Commerce within 60 days.

The clawback of funding, sources said, will particularly affect how the office works with industry on the Traffic Coordination System for Space, or TraCSS, a civil space traffic coordination system. While the office handles commercial remote sensing regulation and the promotion of the space industry, most of its budget is devoted to the ongoing development of TraCSS.

During a side meeting at the Small Satellite Conference Aug. 11, Dmitry Poisik, TraCSS program manager, said core TraCSS work could continue even with reduced budgets but that initiatives to work with industry would be affected.

“We have more than enough money to do the basic mission,” he said at the time, with reductions primarily affecting funding to commercial space situational awareness providers for pathfinder and pilot projects.

At that time, the concern was about projected fiscal 2026 budgets for the office. The administration proposed canceling TraCSS, cutting most of the office’s budget in the process. House and Senate appropriators have restored most of that funding in their respective appropriations bills, which are still pending passage.

Work continues on TraCSS, for now, despite the rescission. The office announced Sept. 2 that Amazon’s Project Kuiper was the latest pilot user of TraCSS as the system goes into the final months of testing ahead of a “production release” in January. It also released solicitations Sept. 5 for a pilot program to improve conjunction assessment screening services, seeking both providers of such services and a company to monitor the quality of their data.