KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FL, UNITED STATES, September 9, 2024 — The National Space Society (NSS) has published a position paper concerning NASA’s announced plan to cancel the VIPER (Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover) mission to the Moon. VIPER has been in the works since 2018 and was intended to investigate the useful resources thought to exist at the lunar south pole.

In July, NASA announced its plans to cancel the mission due primarily to cost overruns and concerns with the planned lunar lander. The original budget of the mission was $433.5 million for the rover and another $235.6 million for launch and lunar landing services to be provided by commercial partners Astrobotic and SpaceX. As of NASA’s announcement, the VIPER rover, being developed by the agency’s Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, had exceeded the agency’s budget-growth limits, costing $450 million to date. This was the stated reason for the cancellation, which would save an estimated $84 million, or about one-eighth of the projected total mission cost.

NASA has offered to accept solicitations from private entities to complete and send the VIPER rover system to the Moon “at no cost to the government,” in its current form and without any disassembly.

NSS supports the continuation of the VIPER mission, whether led solely by NASA or in collaboration with commercial partners. However, with VIPER’s future uncertain, NSS additionally proposes that NASA consider adopting a different approach to lunar exploration, as outlined in the NASA-funded Evolvable Lunar Architecture (ELA) report from 2015, which advocates for a fleet of multiple small, low-cost commercial rovers sourced from multiple commercial providers. This approach would eliminate the risk of single-mission failure and promote redundancy. It would also allow for exploration over a wider range of the lunar surface and enhance the chances of success.

The cancellation of VIPER would be a tremendous blow to not just NASA and its commercial partners but would also cripple NASA’s larger goals. VIPER is a cornerstone of NASA’s Artemis program and directly supports the long-term goals of sustainable lunar exploration and resource utilization. Without VIPER, the Artemis program risks falling short of its transformative potential, reducing it to little more than a repeat of the Apollo missions.

Read the NSS Position Paper.

Thursday, June 13, 2024, 9:00 pm to 10:15 pm EDT

Experiencing the Moon at the Kennedy Space Center

Register for this Space Forum

with
Dr. Kirby Runyon, PhD
Planetary Geology Research Scientist
CEO, Planex.Space

The Space Coast has been the launchpad for countless astronauts and lunar spacecraft. But what happens after they embark on their journey to the Moon? Join us for an enthralling space forum with planetary geologist, exploration architect, and NSS member Dr. Kirby Runyon as he delves into the Kennedy Space Center’s pivotal role in lunar exploration. Think the Moon is just a lifeless rock in space where we’ve “been there, done that?” Think again!

Dr. Runyon will take you on a captivating journey, painting a vivid portrait of the Moon as an active planet, bustling with secrets waiting to be uncovered. Learn how innovative collaborations between people and machines are pushing the boundaries of lunar exploration. But this presentation is more than just science; it’s about the human spirit of adventure and discovery. Explore not just the technical aspects but also the emotional and experiential journey of those who dare to explore the Moon. Don’t miss this informative space forum and register today.

 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Dr. Kirby Runyon is a planetary geology research scientist with the NASA-sponsored Planetary Science Institute and also the CEO of his Space Edutourism company, Planetary Experience (Planex.Space). He is also a Zero-gravity coach, having participated in almost two-dozen parabolic flights. A life-long space enthusiast, Kirby loves sharing his amazement, awe, and wonder of the Cosmos with any who will listen. Not content to simply learn about the Cosmos, he seeks to experience the cosmos through space-themed adventure tourism. He lives in Baltimore, MD.

Register today to reserve your seat and ask your questions. Use the link below.

Register for this Space Forum

Register no later than June 13 at 8 pm EST

Past NSS Space Forums and Town Halls may be viewed here.

In a milestone achievement, private company Intuitive Machines succeeded in scoring the first U.S.-backed landing on the lunar surface since Apollo 17 departed in 1972. The privately-developed lander, dubbed Odysseus, made a soft landing near the lunar south pole at 6:23 Eastern Time on February 22. The program is a part of NASA’s private-public Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program, which also underwrote last month’s Peregrine lunar landing mission, flown by Astrobotics on a ULA Vulcan rocket. While that spacecraft launched successfully, it did not ultimately land on the Moon, with its propulsion system failing en route.

After a smooth cruise to the Moon, initiated with a launch by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that left Earth on February 15, the Intuitive Machines Odysseus lander prepared to depart lunar orbit earlier on the 22nd. But that’s when the mission got exciting.

As flight controllers prepared to initiate the landing, it became clear that Odysseus’ laser rangefinders, designed to allow the spacecraft to determine its altitude and horizontal velocity, weren’t working as planned. A NASA experimental payload called NDL, a Doppler lidar laser ranging system, was pressed into service during an additional orbit, and soon a revised landing procedure was underway. This was an impressive example of quick thinking and cooperation between NASA and Intuitive Machines.

At 6:11 p.m. ET, controllers fired the braking rockets to initiate the spacecraft’s descent, and the flight center became quiet as technicians called out mission milestones. Twelve minutes later, Odysseus touched down safely.

“What a triumph! Odysseus has taken the Moon,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson after confirmation of a successful touchdown. “This feat is a giant leap forward for all of humanity. Stay tuned!”

Intuitive Machines Mission Director Tim Crain soon added specifics: “What we can confirm without a doubt is, our equipment is on the surface of the Moon and we are transmitting.”

The mission is not yet entirely in the clear yet, however. Expected communications from the lander did not initially reach Mission Control, and as of Thursday evening, Intuitive Machines teams were working the problem in an attempt to ascertain the operational status of the lander, which was scheduled to operate for about a week until the onset of lunar night (the Moon’s day/night cycle is roughly two weeks in duration).

This does not diminish the laudable success of the first privately designed and flown mission to the lunar surface, however.

“The successful landing of Intuitive Machines’ Odysseus on the Moon is a milestone in private-public partnerships in spaceflight,” said Dale Skran, COO of the National Space Society. “While we wish Intuitive Machines the best of luck in full operation of their lander, success has already been achieved. This new way of doing business is opening the final frontier in ways scarcely imaginable just a decade ago. Odysseus, just by landing on the Moon using a methane-liquid oxygen (LOX) engine—another first—made a giant step toward our future in space. Methane-LOX engines are key to a permanent human presence on both the Moon and on Mars.

One of the commercial payloads attached to Odysseus is an art piece created by Jeff Koons. NSS Director of Creative Arts and CEO of 4Space, Chantelle Baier, said, “It has been great working with Jeff to place this unique artwork permanently on the Moon. NSS looks forward to similar projects that will connect people to our common future in space.”

Updates on the status of the mission are expected in the coming days. NSS congratulates both Intuitive Machines and NASA for reaching this important milestone and looks forward to further public-private successes in the future.

NSS Indian Chapters Jubilant Over Successful Touchdown

Just a few days after Russia’s Luna 26 lander apparently impacted the lunar surface, India’s Chandrayaan 3 lander successfully touched down near the lunar south pole on August 23. It is the first lander and rover to reach the polar area, and India is just the fourth nation to successfully land a spacecraft anywhere on the Moon, after the Soviet Union/Russia, the United States, and more recently, China.

“NSS joins the people of India in cheering this signal achievement, marking the ascension of India to the first rank of spacefaring nations,” said Dale Skran, NSS COO. “We look forward to India being joined by Japan and numerous private U.S. companies over the next few months and years as humanity at long last returns to the Moon in force, this time to stay.”

Touchdown occurred at 8:33 am Eastern Time (1233 GMT or 6:03 p.m. India Standard Time), said the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). ISRO chairman, Sreedhara Somanath, declared, “We have achieved soft landing on the Moon! India is on the Moon!”

Jubilation at Chandrayaan mission control. Credit: ISRO.

Just hours after touchdown, images from the lander were posted to social media. The landing site appeared to be relatively flat and should offer a smooth drive to the small rover, called Pragyan, once it departs the lander, called Vikram.

Madhu Thangavelu, a lecturer at the University of Southern California, Vice President of NSS-India Relationships, and member of the NSS Board of Directors, said, “Lunar touchdown is hard, as we have seen from past missions. Polar landing is harder because of highland topography. India has nailed the first lunar polar touchdown. We’re excited to see how the rover mission proceeds. There is a lot to learn and much hard data to glean in support of upcoming missions.”

Chandrayaan 3 follows the first two Chandrayaan missions. Chandrayaan 1, an orbiter, was successful. The orbiter portion of Chandrayaan 2 was also successful but the lander/rover element of that mission lost contact shortly before impacting the lunar surface. The successful landing of Chandrayaan 3 shows significant growth in India’s robotic exploration progam.

The Chandrayaan mission duration is expected to be one lunar day, or 14 Earth days.

The Sacramento L5 Society (SacL5) Chapter of NSS wrapped up its successful series of 50th anniversary “Breakfast on the Moon” (BOM) events last December 10. The entire series of events can be viewed on the Sacramento L5 YouTube channel.

The Apollo missions spanned a three and a one-half year period but affected a whole generation. On the final December 10th event, SacL5 celebrated the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 17 mission. The celebration was watched around the world. As SacL5 President and moderator Joseph Bland began this event, he reflected that astronaut Eugene Cernan was the last person who stepped off the Moon 50 years ago on December 14, 1972.

Next, Dr. Ami Bera, U.S. Congressman, and Senior Member of the Science, Space, and Aeronautics subcommittee of the U. S House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, congratulated SacL5 for commemorating this historic Apollo 17 anniversary event. He thought on behalf of the Artemis mission, soon there would be a “return to the Moon”; a colony could be built on the Moon; the Moon could be important for the mission to Mars; and lunar ice could be converted to fuel. Bera said “the future of space travel and the future of space exploration is exciting.” “Let’s inspire the next generation,” “to think big broadly, to think about Mars, but to think what is out there in our galaxy and beyond our galaxy.”

Dr. Anthony Paustian, Vice President of the National Space Society, College Administrator, Author, and previous Air Force Fighter Pilot, painted a picture of astronaut Alan Bean’s perspectives from his discussions with him. One remembrance was Bean said he looked at the Earth from the Moon, and thought how good Earth had it in respect to the rest of the universe. Paustian highlighted that Bean said the greatest thing that NASA ever did was create the Agency Contingency plan so procedures were made in advance to save missions. Paustian said Bean recognized the progression at NASA; he saw and appreciated the “doers” of the work, math, science, and engineering that made Apollo happen. This BOM event communicated the reciprocated respect of the astronauts and those who worked on the Apollo missions. Ron Creel, Apollo lunar rover engineer, was noted to have expressed esteem and awe for the Apollo astronauts who drove the lunar rovers on the Moon.

Paustian contacted Gerald Griffin to relay his first-hand accounts of the Apollo Missions as Flight Director during the Apollo program and Director of Johnson Space Center. Griffin told how Apollo 15 mission, astronaut David Scott encouraged him to come along on the astronaut field trips/training to gain perspectives for scientific and geologic missions and later other flight directors and Apollo Headquarter professionals followed suit. Griffin said the missions before Apollo 15 were to safely get to the Moon; but Apollo 15, 16, and 17 focused on why we were going—“to explore the Moon” while keeping safety in mind.

Focusing on Apollo 17, Griffin said not only was Apollo 17 considered the capstone of all of the Apollo missions, but it achieved more time on the Moon, more time on extravehicular activities, and more samples than any other Apollo mission. He said astronaut Harrison Schmitt, Ph.D. geologist, found the rock Trictolite 76535, which proved the Moon once had a magnetic field. Schmitt can be credited for the famous “Blue Marble” picture. Even though Apollo 17 had a problem on the launch pad, and Cernan and Schmitt had to fix the fender of the lunar rover, Griffin considered Apollo 17 a clean mission. Griffin said the Apollo missions were fun and challenging because going to and exploring the Moon had never been done before. He said the Artemis mission will mimic some of Apollo’s steps from safety to exploration, but Artemis has technological advantages such as computer memory size (Apollo Mission—five-IBM 365s within a large area was the same as his current cell phone). He said the Apollo missions did not have the performance to go to the lunar South Pole, but Artemis is going to the lunar South Pole on the first mission.

This event expounded the heart-warming stories of how NSS leaders were inspired by or took part in these Apollo missions. NSS Downlink editor Fred Becker, who has worked on many key space programs, was at the Apollo 16 launch at the age of 16. He shared a video combining launch commentary from Martin Caidin and photographs that he captured from touring KSC and viewing the Apollo 16 launch. During Apollo 17, Gerald Nordley, then a 1st. Lt., contributed as part of a NASA contingency plan that used USAF-managed Vela Hotel satellites to detect possible coronal mass ejections and recall astronauts from the Moon in time to minimize their radiation exposure.

Space publication and communication experts took part in this event with outstanding space perspectives. This Week in Space broadcast hosts Rod Pyle, Editor in Chief of ad Astra, and Tariq Malik, Editor in Chief of Space.com, communicated their viewpoints on the Apollo Missions. Malik gave his interpretation as kid of the space age; he considered Apollo 17 signified “the mission we stopped going to the Moon.” Pyle shared a remembrance of Joe Engle, Apollo 17 astronaut, from his discussions with him. Pyle remembered how gracious Engle was because of his understanding that a scientist was needed when Schmitt replaced him on the last Apollo mission. Pyle also shared his disappointment of the cancellation of the Apollo 18. 19, and 20 missions when the hardware had already been built and the flight operations were cancelled. Malik and Pyle further discussed unique outlooks of Apollo and future Moon missions. An entertainingly witty commentary was made by Christopher D. Carson, former Regional Director for the National Space Society. Carson said the Apollo Missions were to be built upon and propelled his clever perceptions of the future in space.

Preservation of the Apollo sites was explained. Lisa Westwood, Space Archaeologist, and Cofounder of the Apollo 11 task force, said the achievement of first-time milestones are memorialized because they represent important events in human history. Dr. Beth O’Leary, Professor Emeritus of the New Mexico State University Department of Anthropology and Pioneer in Space Archeology and Heritage, said “after 50 years according to the U.S. Historic Preservation law, a place becomes historic and is easier to get nominated to the National Register of Historic places.” Westwood, O’Leary, and their colleagues successfully achieved designation of the artifacts and structures of Apollo 11’s Tranquility Base on the Moon on the California and New Mexico historical registers. Westwood said “This was the first time that a historical site not located on Earth became listed on a historical registry.” O’Leary said “It has been singled out as exceptionally important in the 2011 NASA guidelines to protect this historic and scientific values of American lunar artifacts.”

Anita Gale, CEO of the NSS and retired Boeing engineer who worked on the Space Shuttle, said “as the Artemis mission is returning from the Moon, we are going back, and maybe we needed to wait this long to get it right because now, instead of flags and footprints, we are now planning infrastructure and industry, which is really how it needs to go.” She added NSS is helping make future commercial space, settling of space, and the use of lunar resources through visits with congressional offices, conferences, educational programs, and alliance with other organizations.

Michelle Hanlon, President of NSS, Space Lawyer, and Cofounder and President of For All Moon Kind Inc., said “the Apollo Program is the greatest technological achievement of humanity to date,” and “we reach for the stars not simply because they are there but because the future of humanity both here on Earth and in space depends on our ability to explore and discover.” Hanlon ended with “This has billed as the last breakfast; and certainly, it is the last of our 50th celebrations for Apollo. But let me challenge you to make this the first breakfast of Artemis and a future where humans do not have to be heroes to go to space. Here is to Apollo 17, here is to Apollo, here is to Artemis, and here is to protecting the boot prints and all that Apollo stands for.” Her words lead to where Cernan’s last words on the Moon left an open door for humanity.

“As I take man’s last step from the surface, back home for some time to come (but we believe not too long into the future), I’d like to just say what I believe history will record: That America’s challenge of today has forged man’s destiny of tomorrow. And, as we leave the Moon at Taurus-Littrow, we leave as we came and, God willing, as we shall return: with peace and hope for all mankind.” —Gene Cernan

By Dale Skran

With the long-awaited November 16, 2022 launch of the much delayed and far over budget Space Launch System on the Artemis 1 mission, many eyes have turned to NASA with the general view that at long last something like the glory of Apollo is on the horizon. Yet the bigger story builds all around, hidden in the long shadow cast by the SLS.

On November 15th, NASA announced the award of a $1.15 billion contract to SpaceX for a second lunar landing using an upgraded Starship lunar lander. This lunar lander will accompany the Artemis 4 mission, supporting a 2nd landing with a longer surface stay. This contract adds to the $2.9 billion already awarded to SpaceX for the Starship lunar lander targeted for the first return to the Moon on the Artemis 3 mission. The grant of the second award both reflects the confidence NASA has in SpaceX, and via the provision of greater funding, increases the probability of the success of both planned lunar landings.

The greater significance is that assuming the Artemis program achieves a reasonable degree of success, regardless of whether it is on-time or not, at the end SpaceX will be operating a Starship/SuperHeavy system with the following characteristics:

• Reliable launch of large payloads (50MT and up) to LEO on a single fully reusable vehicle at a price point lower than the Falcon 9.
• With added launches of reusable tankers, reliable launch of large payloads (50MT and up) to GEO using fully reusable vehicles at a price point lower than the Falcon Heavy.
• With a few more launches of reusable tankers, reliable launch of large payloads (50MT and up) to lunar orbit “Apollo 8” style using fully reusable vehicles.
• With yet a few more launches of reusable tankers, reliable launch of large payloads (50MT and up) to the lunar surface using fully reusable vehicles except for the lunar lander.
• Demonstrated operation of a “fuel depot” in some orbit around the Earth. The current Artemis plan is to fully fill a Starship tanker in orbit, and then use the “depot” to top off the Starship lander heading to the Moon.

Taken together, these capabilities amount to a revolution in access to space and cis-lunar capability. When combined with a crew launched and landed on a Falcon 9, a system capable of delivering crew to the lunar surface seems well within reach without the need to even crew rate Starship for Earth launch/landing.

Yet this is only the most obvious thing hidden in the shadow of the SLS launch. On November 13, a 55-pound 12U cubesat called CAPSTONE (Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment) completed a thruster burn to put the satellite in a near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO) around the Moon. This is the first cubesat in lunar orbit and the first spacecraft in NRHO, beating Artemis 1 to reach this orbit by a few days. The purpose of the mission is to verify the stability of the NRHO orbit, where NASA plans to construct a Lunar Gateway. The big deal is not the mission, but the launch vehicle and the cost: It was launched June 28 on a Rocket Lab Electron with a Photon kick stage, and the total mission cost to NASA was $30M. The Electron/Photon combination opens the possibility of a new era of low-cost lunar and planetary missions. Next up: Venus!

Peering a bit deeper into the shadow, we see the ispace M1 Lunar Lander, targeted for launch November 28th on a Falcon 9, as the first mission of ispace’s lunar exploration program called Hakuto-R. Ispace, inc. is a Japanese company that is part of the Draper Commercial Lunar Payload Services program that builds lunar landers and rovers. The planned landing site is the Atlas Crater on the edge of Mare Frigoris. The primary function of the M1 Lunar Lander mission lies in demonstration of the technology to be used on later Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) missions for NASA.

The NASA CLPS program promises vast scientific and commercial rewards at price points much lower than those typically associated with lunar missions funded by NASA, such as Artemis 1, where the cost of just the launch alone, depending on who you ask, was $500 million, $1 billion, or $4 billion.

Together the combination of the Starship Lunar Lander, the Electron/Photon launch vehicle, and the many lunar landers of NASA’s CLPS program point the way to a new array of low-cost options supporting our return to the Moon to stay!

© 2022 by Dale Skran.

You can’t develop or settle that which is not yet explored, so there is a synergistic relationship between planetary probes, especially missions to the Moon, asteroids, and Mars, and future space development and settlement. Of course, in the longer term the entire solar system is a destination for settlement, but focusing on the Moon, the asteroids, and Mars in 2021 seems appropriate.  Let’s review the year by mission target.

The Moon was not a popular destination in 2021. The only notable mission activity was the Chinese “Chang’e 5”, the orbiter component of which was captured by the Sun-Earth L1 point on March 15th, 2021, becoming the first Chinese spacecraft to do so.  The purpose of the extended mission appears to be on-going testing of maneuvering capability, since a lunar flyby was conducted on September 9th, 2021.

The main purpose of the “Chang’e 5” mission was the sample return accomplished in 2020, and it was reported in 2021 that initial analysis of those samples showed them to be about 1.96 billion years old. These “young” lunar samples fill an important data gap that will advance lunar research.

2022 promises to be a much more exciting lunar year.  Among the more significant missions planned are:

• Artemis 1: Delivers 10 lunar cubesats as a secondary mission to testing the Orion capsule launched by the SLS.
• CAPSTONE: A lunar orbiter that will test positioning technology. This will be the first lunar cubesat, and is being launched by a Rocket Lab Electron rocket.
• Intuitive Machines IM-1: First NASA Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) mission on the Nova-C lunar lander; lofted via a Falcon 9.
• Korea Pathfinder Luna Orbiter: The first South Korean lunar orbiter focuses on resource mapping and technology demonstration and will be launched on a Falcon 9.
• Chandrayaan-3: A Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle Mark III (GSLV Mk III) will power India’s second attempt to land on the Moon. The first failed in 2019.
• Hakuto-R Mission 1: ispace Japan is sending a lunar lander technology demonstrator to the Moon on a Falcon 9.
• Emirates Lunar Mission: A lunar rover that will be aboard the above mentioned Hakuto-R Mission 1 lander.
• SLIM (Smart Lander for Investigating Moon): The first Japanese surface mission is focused on demonstrating precision lunar landing technology, and will fly on an H-IIA rocket.
• Mission One: The first NASA CLPS mission using the Astrobotic Technology lander and lofted to the Moon on the Vulcan Centaur.

Incredibly, this is only a partial list of planned 2022 missions.  If only half of them succeed, 2022 has the potential to be the busiest year ever for robotic lunar exploration and development.

Unlike the Moon, Mars had a busy 2021. Three major missions launched in 2020 arrived at Mars during 2021, including:

• Emirates Mars Mission/Hope: The orbiter entered Mars orbit February 9th.
• Tianwen-1: This Chinese mission included an orbiter that arrived on February 10th, and a lander that touched down May 14th, disgorging the Zhurong rover, which is currently operational. This first of its kind Chinese mission entered China into an elite club whose members have successfully soft-landed something on Mars.
• Perseverance: The U.S. NASA rover landed on February 18th, and is currently collecting samples for return to Earth via a future mission.
• Ingenuity: A helicopter delivered with Perseverance; it flew on Mars for the first time April 19th.

The Perseverance mission held special importance from a space development perspective.  The Ingenuity helicopter—the first powered flight on a planet other than Earth—will surely lead to capabilities that will prove useful in the development and settlement of Mars. Additionally, Perseverance carries MOXIE (Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment), an experiment that will extract oxygen from the Martian atmosphere, making it the first ever demonstration of the potential of ISRU (In-situ Resource Utilization).

Looking ahead to 2022, only two new probes to Mars are in queue:

• Psyche: A U.S. asteroid mission that will fly by Mars in 2023 enroute to a metal rich asteroid.
• ExoMars 2022: A Joint Russian/ESA lander/rover is planned for a launch to Mars. This mission was originally planned for launch in 2020, but was delayed to 2022 due to technical issues.

At one point, Elon Musk was talking about a Starship/Superheavy launch to Mars in the Q3 2022 launch window, but this is now out of reach as the major goal for Starship/Superheavy is to make orbit in 2022.  The Q4 2024 Mars window is still a possibility, so stay tuned.

Two important asteroid events occurred in 2021:

• DART: A NASA asteroid redirection test launched November 24th on a Falcon 9. It is planned to encounter the asteroid Dimorphos on September 26, 2022. The target asteroid is part of a binary asteroid system, with the main asteroid being Didymos A. Dimorphos is not an Earth-crossing asteroid and there no possibility that its orbit will be altered by the experiment such that Earth is endangered. DART itself will impact the asteroid in an attempt to alter its orbit.
• Lucy: A NASA mission to the Jupiter Trojan asteroids launched on a 12-year voyage October 16 by an Atlas V. We won’t see much from Lucy in 2022 since it will not encounter its first target, 52246 DonaldJohanson, until April 20, 2025. In addition to this asteroid, Lucy will visit an impressive seven more: 3548 Eurybates (12 August 2027), 15094 Polymele (15 September 2027), 11351 Leucus (18 April 2028), 21900 Orus (11 November 2028), and 617 Patroclus-Menoetius (2 March 2033). The Jupiter Trojans are a high-priority science target in the Decadal Survey. They are old, dark, and cold, and are expected to provide a window into the evolution of the solar system. From a space development perspective, all information about asteroid resources is valuable, and it is possible that the Jupiter Trojans are as numerous as the main belt asteroids, making them a rich source of potential resources.

Another exciting NASA asteroid mission, Psyche, is planned for an August 2022 launch on a Falcon Heavy, with an expected encounter with the metal-rich asteroid Psyche in 2026.

2021 was a great year for asteroid exploration and planetary defense, setting the foundation for an actual asteroid deflection test in 2022 and years of discoveries from the Lucy mission.

In summary, during 2021 robot probes made significant advances that will support space development and settlement, but 2022 looms as even more exciting, especially with regard to lunar and asteroid missions.

The NASA Artemis Moon program aims to land the first woman and the next man on the Moon by 2024, a goal that the National Space Society (NSS) applauds. Due to on-going efforts to cancel or reduce some of the best aspects of Artemis, NSS has decided to specifically endorse the following:

Human Lunar Lander Commercial Contracting

• NSS strongly endorses NASA contracting the service of landing on the Moon, rather than building, owning, and operating a lunar landing system itself.
• NSS endorses NASA’s recent selection of three technologically dissimilar vendors, Dynetics, SpaceX, and the Blue Origin “National Team” for the initial contracts to provide human class lunar landers. Although only one vendor can be selected to support the initial return of humans to the lunar surface, NSS urges the development of preferably all three, and definitely at least two of the vendors’ proposals to operational status to ensure that NASA can reliably reach the lunar surface in a sustainable fashion.
• NSS endorses the use of commercially procured launch vehicles to send lunar lander components to the Moon.
• While it may in the short term seem burdensome to U.S. taxpayers to fund three human landers versus a single government owned vehicle, longer term such a strategy will lead to more diverse capabilities, higher total resiliency, and lower program risk and indeed cost to taxpayers. Instead of funding a government-owned vehicle like the Shuttle that has a finite program life and no market checks on cost, this procurement strategy will create a new sustainable commercial space sector that will over time compete and innovate to bring new capabilities to the market at ever lower price points.

Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS)

• NSS strongly endorses NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program with its emphasis on multiple commercially procured lunar landers and a willingness on the part of NASA to assume greater risk than is normally the case with NASA programs. CLPS is literally NASA done right and provides a shining example for other NASA programs to follow.
• NSS is pleased to note the selection of Astrobotic and Intuitive Machines in the smaller class of CLPS lunar landers and looks forward to their initial lunar landings in 2021.
• NSS applauds the recent additions of Blue Origin, Ceres Robotics, Sierra Nevada Corporation, SpaceX, and Tyvak to the pool of vendors eligible to bid on proposals to provide deliveries to the surface of the Moon through NASA’s CLPS initiative. These additions increase the list of CLPS participants on contract to 14.
• NSS supports the addition of the Masten medium-class XL-1 lander to the CLPS program and looks forward to many successful landings in the area of the lunar south pole.

Role of the Gateway

• NSS endorses the flexibility NASA has shown in not requiring that a lunar lander dock with the Gateway.
• NSS supports the use of commercially procured launch vehicles to resupply the Gateway and is pleased to note that NASA has selected SpaceX’s Dragon XL as the initial logistics vehicle to supply the Gateway. NSS urges that a second technologically dissimilar commercial provider be selected to help ensure reliable service to the Gateway.

Sustainable Lunar Economy

• NSS supports the efforts of NASA to create an economically sustainable lunar landing program and cautions against any approach to Artemis that is not targeted toward future commercial operations on and around the Moon. It is essential the ISRU (In-Situ Resource Utilization) be a core part of Artemis.
• NSS endorses the focus on exploring the potential water resources of the lunar poles.
• NSS strongly endorses NASA’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER), a mobile robot that will roam around the Moon’s south pole looking for water ice. The VIPER mission will provide surface-level detail of where the water is and how much is available for use.

Tipping Point Grants

NSS also endorses “Tipping Point” grants[i] in general and calls attention to the following Moon-related actions by NASA:

• An unfunded Space Act Agreement with SpaceX to study the impact of landing large vehicles on the Moon. An additional Space Act Agreement with SpaceX calls for the study of on-orbit Starship-based fuel transfer.
• Three unfunded Space Act Agreements with Blue Origin related to the development of lunar lander technologies.
• A $3M Tipping Point grant to SpaceX to study methods of on-orbit ship-to-ship fuel transfer
• A $10M Tipping Point grant going to Blue Origin to conduct a ground-based demonstration of hydrogen and oxygen liquification and storage.

NSS looks forward to these and other Tipping Point grants becoming the core of a program of lunar exploration and development that leads eventually to lunar bases and finally settlements, rather than another unsustainable “flags-and-footprints” Apollo-like program. NSS believes that the costs of establishing and maintaining a lunar base will be paid back many-fold in lowering the amount of new technology needed to be developed to go to Mars.

[i] The public-private partnerships established through Tipping Point selections combine NASA resources with an industry contribution of at least 25% of the program costs, shepherding the development of critical space technologies while also saving the agency, and American taxpayers, money. See https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/solicitations/tipping_points.

— National Space Society leadership.

WASHINGTON, D.C., US, May 5, 2020 /EINPresswire.com/ — The National Space Society (NSS) has distributed a letter of public support to NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine supporting the agency’s forward-looking decision to issue contracts to commercial space companies SpaceX, Dynetics, and Blue Origin to provide human landing hardware for NASA’s Artemis missions to the Moon. The three companies, all of which have already made strong investments in their lander designs, are now greenlighted to continue the development of their diverse lunar landing systems. This decision provides a base of robust technologies to accomplish this important national goal at great savings to the taxpayer over more traditional contracting agreements. The letter, which is also addressed to NASA’s Associate Administrator for the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate Doug Loverro, follows.

A Public Letter to:

Administrator James Bridenstine
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Washington, D.C. 20546

Dear Administrator Bridenstine,

The National Space Society (NSS) wishes to commend your April 30 announcement concerning NASA’s choice of SpaceX, Dynetics, and Blue Origin’s National Team to provide human landing systems to carry crew to the Moon for Artemis III. We also laud Associate Administrator for Human Exploration and Operations Doug Loverro for his diligence in assuring that commercial companies are key for making sure the Artemis Program is a timely success.

We believe NASA has shown great wisdom in selecting three different architectures for its Human Landing System to increase its chances for success. We also believe that your announcement further enhances NASA’s earlier decisions to leverage commercial companies for its Commercial Lunar Payload Services, Resupply Services and Gateway Logistics Services. Through these actions, NASA demonstrates that it is deeply committed to achieving its goal of sending humans to the Moon, Mars, and beyond in the most cost-effective and sustainable manner possible.

Concerning space development costs, many outside NASA do not realize that NASA’s public-private partnerships leverage commercial space services in a way that maximizes the return on precious taxpayer dollars. We note, for example, that the private companies selected for the HLS have already invested large sums in Artemis Program initiatives. Moreover, the record clearly shows that NASA’s purchase of commercial services with non-cost-plus contracts has already saved many tens of millions in taxpayer dollars when compared with the use of cost-plus contracts to develop government-owned and operated vehicles.

The National Space Society (via policy papers and outreach to the public with articles, press releases, blogs, books, and social media) stands ready to support your policies facilitating the participation of commercial space companies in the Artemis Project and other NASA endeavors. Our 30 chapters, located worldwide, and NSS leadership broadly back commercial space as essential to making space development affordable and sustainable, ultimately leading to humans living and working in space for the benefit of people everywhere, including those on Earth.

In sum, we fully support NASA’s effort to put the first woman and next man on the surface of the Moon by the end of 2024 via the Artemis Program and stand ready to collaborate with NASA to ensure that commercial companies are central to that endeavor.

The letter was signed by:

Alfred B. Anzaldúa, Chair of the NSS Policy Committee and Executive Vice President
Dale Skran, Chair of the Executive Committee
Geoffrey Notkin, President of NSS
Karlton Johnson, Chairman of the NSS Board of Governors
Bruce Pittman, Senior Vice President and Senior Operating Officer
Greg Autry, Vice President of Space Development

NASA’s newest actions are in step with the NSS Roadmap to Space Settlement, which lays out an overall plan to increase the human presence in cislunar space, on the Moon and beyond.

“We have great companies that have invested many of their own resources into this great effort,” Bridenstine said. “So much work has already happened….  We are going to the Moon, with commercial partners…and ultimately, the goal is to get to Mars.” Bridenstine added, “Some contractors might focus on speed while others focus on sustainability more,” an additional indication that NASA is in for the long-term.

NSS Chair of the Executive Committee Dale Skran said, “NASA has shown great wisdom in selecting three technologically different architectures for its Human Landing System to increase its chances for success. It is especially exciting to see that for the first time NASA is officially including the SpaceX Starship/SuperHeavy in a major project. This is the right program structured the right way, with NASA allowing competing companies to design the human landers with mission-appropriate oversight, and then to provide NASA with lunar landing services without NASA owning the landers.”

NSS Executive Vice President Alfred Anzaldúa added, “Today NASA again shows its deep commitment to achieving its goal of sending humans to the Moon and continuing to Mars in the most cost-effective and sustainable manner possible. This decision aligns with the NSS’s Roadmap to Space Settlement by supporting the use of commercial entities in returning to the Moon.”

It is noteworthy that NASA officials made it clear that they would be carefully considering design specifications to avoid delays due to changing requirements on the space agency’s end.

Artemis III is slated to take place after the Artemis I uncrewed flight test, carried out by NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft, followed by Artemis II, a crewed flight by SLS and Orion. The overall aim of the Artemis Program is to deliver the first woman and next man to the lunar surface by the end of 2024, with the intention of maintaining a U.S. presence there indefinitely.

Read the NASA announcement.