NASA’s Moon Base plans take shape
Moon Base Alpha is real.
The success of Artemis II’s lunar loop in April has energized plans for a permanent lunar foothold in the next decade. Once the purview of science fiction, an actual Moon Base will occupy hundreds of square miles and house future Artemis crews during long-duration stays that will fuel a lunar economy, assert America’s dominance in space, and possibly serve as a springboard to Mars.
“The Moon Base will be America’s and humanity’s first outpost on another celestial world,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman during a May 26 press conference. “Each mission will cement the skills needed to live and operate in one of the most demanding and dangerous environments imaginable.”
But first, baby steps. Lots of them. Isaacman and his colleagues described the first of more than a dozen mission announcements expected this year, designed to generate operational data and reduce risk for astronauts.
It’s a Herculean undertaking in an unforgiving environment fraught with a temperature range of 650 degrees Fahrenheit, no atmosphere, a 14-day lunar night, severe radiation, corrosive regolith, and meteorites. The resulting technologies and data gleaned will also help determine future explorations, improve life on Earth, and inspire the next generation of STEM talent.
Three phases to the Moon Base
Given that the Apollo program produced only 80 hours of lunar ground time a half-century ago, NASA realized it needed a better understanding of its environment and how to survive it. Earlier this year, the space agency revamped its strategy from broad leaps to more iterative steps.
“We’re going to experiment on the things that we’re going to need to build a permanent infrastructure,” said Moon Base program manager Carlos García-Galán.
García-Galán outlined three phases for that progress, with phase one already started. Running through 2029, phase one will use 25 launches and 21 landings to deliver some 4.5 tons of equipment and instruments to the lunar surface. They’ll help gain a better handle on terrain mapping and regolith composition, water-ice locations, and radiation levels; locating a base site; and establishing more robust navigation and communications networks.
Cargo hauls will increase to 66 tons during phase two, from 2029 to 2032, and 165 tons by phase three, from 2032 onward. Phase two will involve 27 launches and 24 landings to establish early infrastructure and a power grid layout. Phase three will engage 29 launches and 28 landings, and mark the establishment of a permanent base for sustained lunar presence.
Artist’s rendering of Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 1 lunar lander. [Rendering: Blue Origin]
Within phase one, the first three Moon Base assembly missions are targeted for this year. To that end, NASA announced new commercial contract awards for landers and rovers that will enable autonomous and crewed technology demonstrations and scientific data gathering.
In the first assembly mission, Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket and Blue Moon Mark 1 Endurance lander will deliver NASA payloads to the Shackleton Connecting Ridge at the lunar south pole. They include the SCALPSS (Stereo Cameras for Lunar Plume-Surface Studies) instrument to gauge how lander thrusters interact with the moon’s dusty surface, and the Laser Retroreflective Array, which uses reflected laser light to help orbiters determine more precise locations.
That launch was expected later this year. However, last night’s massive explosion of the New Glenn rocket during a static fire engine test at Cape Canaveral will likely delay it. Cause of the failure wasn’t immediate apparent, and while there were no injuries, it severely damaged the company’s launch complex.
Artist’s rendering of Astrobotic’s Griffin Mission One lunar lander delivering the FLIP rover to the lunar surface. [Rendering: Astrobotic]
The second assembly mission will see Astrobotic’s Griffin lander shuttle more than 1,100 pounds of cargo, including Astrolab’s FLIP rover, to develop mobility systems for future lunar terrain vehicle operations.
In the third, Intuitive Machine’s Nova-C Trinity lander will deliver the Lunar Vertex—the first payload chosen through NASA’s Payloads and Research Investigations on the Surface of the Moon initiative—to Reiner Gamma on the lunar nearside. The probe will study lunar swirls, reflective markings associated with magnetic anomalies, to better understand the behavior of the materials they comprise. It will also carry payloads from the European Space Agency and the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute.
IM-1, the first NASA Commercial Launch Program Services launch for Intuitive Machines’ Nova-C lunar lander. [Photo: Intuitive Machines]
To support these missions, NASA awarded Astrolab $219 million and Lunar Outpost $220 million to build and deliver the first phase of Lunar Terrain Vehicles (LTVs) by 2028. These are lighter, simpler versions of initial proposals selected through NASA’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative, and developed at lightning speed after NASA asked for revised designs following its mission schedule revamp in March.
Astrolab’s Crewed Lunar Vehicle (CLV‑1), adapted from its FLEX architecture, will transport astronauts and supplies, and support remote operations. At 2,000 lbs, it can reach more than 6 mph on level terrain.
Lunar Outpost, which last year landed the first commercial rover on the moon and raised another $30 million earlier this month, designed its Pegasus LTV as a lighter, pared-down version of a larger Eagle-class model that will journey to the moon at a later date. It will enable manual, autonomous, or teleoperated mobility and terrain mapping. At 2200 lbs, Pegasus can hit speeds over 9 mph, has a 560-mile range, and can operate for a year. It LTVs are in partnership with General Motors, Leidos, and Goodyear.
[Render: Lunar Outpost]
Both will finalize their designs over the next 18 months. Deploying different types of LTVs early will accelerate technology demonstrations and gather more robust datasets on terrain challenges, better informing site planning. NASA awarded Blue Origin $188 million (with a performance-based option period worth $280.4 million) for two task orders to deliver these rovers to the lunar south pole in 2028.
Four surveillance drones, through NASA’s MoonFall mission, will scout potential landing sites for Artemis astronauts, the Moon Base perimeter, and future exploration areas. Moonfall manager and drone designer Jet Propulsion Laboratory awarded Firefly Aerospace—the first private company to stick a fully successful lunar soft landing—a $75 million subcontract to deliver the drones to the moon in 2028.
Meanwhile, NASA is expanding opportunities for new vendors through a CLPS 2.0 initiative, with proposals due June 30. These include technologies for next-generation lunar cargo landers and mobility, as well as energy generators and storage for two-week lunar nights.
Over time, NASA expects more nuanced data of economic worth and investment returns. “It is vitally important that we figure out what generates value in the unique environment of microgravity or on the lunar surface in excess of the cost it takes to go into it,” said Isaacman. “We can’t force a lunar economy into existence. I suspect in the years and decades ahead, as we build and operate multiple lunar outposts, we will uncover something along the way.”
The next crewed missions
Meanwhile, Artemis III is slated to launch next year to conduct rendezvous and docking tests with commercial landers. NASA will announce its crew members at a live-streamed event on June 9. Partner facilities around the U.S. are already transporting hardware for the 2028 Artemis IV and V crewed missions to the lunar surface to Kennedy Space Center.
“With Moon Base Artemis, astronauts will stay longer, explore farther, and conduct the kinds of science that advance exploration itself—understanding how humans operate off-world, how we build infrastructure, and how we prepare for Mars,” says Lori Glaze, acting associate administrator of NASA’s Human Spaceflight Mission Directorate. “We are building humanity’s first outpost beyond Earth. Through Artemis, we are going. And with the Moon Base, we’re going to stay.”