NASA turning to private firms for payloads on lunar missions
NASA’s next lunar science experiments will arrive at the moon via a spacecraft built by one of nine private companies — a first for one of the agency’s science missions.
In an announcement Thursday, the space agency named the organizations that are now eligible to bid on delivering science and technology payloads to the lunar surface. They include some longtime players in the aerospace industry, like Lockheed Martin, but are mostly newer names with start-up cultures, like Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic and Masten Space Systems in Mojave, Calif.
The Commercial Lunar Payload Services program is a priority of NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, who said in May that leveraging commercial capabilities would allow for more frequent and affordable access to the lunar surface. “More missions, more science,” a news release about the CLPS program promised.
It also continues a trend at NASA toward publicprivate partnerships for exploration.
The CLPS contracts have a combined value of $2.6 billion over the next 10 years.
The announcement came just three days after NASA landed a spacecraft on Mars. NASA wants to see how it goes at the moon before committing to commercial delivery services at Mars.
Under President George W. Bush, companies were awarded contracts to fly cargo to the International Space Station. The Commercial Crew Program, developed under President Barack Obama, will pay companies to transport human crews.
The CLPS missions would be the agency’s first such partnership in deep space. The first could fly as early as next year, and NASA hopes to send 2 payloads every year for the next 10 years. It’s not clear what kind of instruments NASA hopes to send, though the first call for proposals should come out in the coming weeks or months.
Most of the companies involved have never flown a spacecraft of this complexity, and Bridenstine said that some of the CLPS missions will likely fail to achieve a “soft” landing on the lunar surface.
“This is a venture capital kind of effort,” he told reporters Thursday. “At the end of the day the risk is high, but the return is also very high for a low investment.”
“It’s a big experiment,” Associate Administrator for Science Thomas Zurbuchen said.
The relatively small and inexpensive payloads delivered via the CLPS program would be followed by more traditional medium- and l arge- class missions, Bridenstine said, including an eventual crewed mission to the moon.
President Donald Trump has named sending American astronauts to the moon as a goal for his administration. His Space Policy Directive 1, signed last December, directs NASA to collaborate with the private sector in returning to the moon en route to a longerterm mission to Mars.
But no U.S. spacecraft has touched down on the moon since the last Apollo mission in 1972, and it’s been exactly 50 years since NASA last sent a robotic mission to the lunar surface. Earlier this year, NASA shocked scientists by canceling the Resource Prospector mission, the only American lunar rover currently in development.
Still, Earth’s only natural satellite is being explored by other nations; China’s Chang’e 4 and 5 missions, which would deliver a rover to the moon, and return rock samples from the surface, are scheduled to launch next year. India and Israel also plan to launch lunar landers next year.
The CLPS announcement comes as NASA conducts safety reviews of SpaceX and Boeing. Both companies have been contracted to fly astronauts to the International Space Station but have suffered setbacks and delays as their work to develop their spacecraft.
SpaceX has drawn scrutiny after founder Elon Musk took a hit of marijuana and drank whiskey on a podcast. Neither company is among those selected for CLPS eligibility.
Associated Press contributed.