Israeli and Japanese private companies have tried unsuccessfully to land spacecraft in recent years. Meanwhile, China aims to land in 2019, land in 2020, and send astronauts by 2030. NASA is working on its own lunar exploration through the Artemis program, which aims to build long-term infrastructure on and around the lunar surface. All of which have sparked something of a lunar race, reminiscent of the Cold War-era rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union, but with vastly different scope and objectives, and with more competitors.
Today’s goal is not so much Not only does it prove that one political system is superior to another, but it is a race to the physical location of the Moon’s South Pole, where water in the form of ice was permanently shadowed. present in the crater. Access to that ice is crucial for human settlements. Not only is water the key to life support, but its components hydrogen and oxygen can be used as rocket fuel, making the moon a potential space gas station. It serves as a starting point for other parts of the solar system.
The United States “had made the Artemis strategy, and we really made the moon an important part of our strategy, and by doing that, I think the whole world was listening,” said Thomas, former NASA science mission director general. Zurbutchen said. “What you are seeing is that the lunar environment has become a destination and a national imperative for many nations.
In a White House statement late last year, NASA said that over the next 10 years, human activity on and near the Moon would be “on par with all activity in the region since the Space Age began in 1957.” or more than that.” made a plan to Coordinate Scientific efforts around the moon.
Matthew Daniels, Deputy Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, said at a news conference. presentation As of June, this level of activity could reach up to 150 missions over the next decade. And it’s “a new situation for us. Wide swaths of the world have expressed interest in going to the moon.” It has expressed a credible intention to begin a new existence,” he added.
For Russia, its landing, known as Luna 25, will be the first lunar landing attempt in 47 years. This is how the country asserts itself in the global space race and proves that it is still a participant despite the space program’s decline since the Soviet era. The spacecraft, loaded with scientific payloads, is expected to land as early as Monday. “All research results will be transferred to Earth,” Yuri Borisov, head of the Russian Space Agency, said on state television. “We are interested not only in the presence of water, but also in many other experiments related to soil and field studies.”
For India, which is also raising its space ambitions, Chandrayaan 3 Mission This is aimed at recovering from the 2019 lunar landing failure. If all goes according to plan, the rover is scheduled to land on Wednesday. The effort follows attempts by private companies in Japan this year and Israel in 2019, both of which crashed, to illustrate the difficulty of landing on Earth, an airless and forbidden neighbor some 340,000 miles away. ing.
China, America’s biggest rival in space, has been steadily advancing its lunar activities in recent years with great success. In 2019, it became the first country to land a spacecraft on the far side of the moon, and the probe is still in operation today. In 2020, it returned to the lunar surface, collected samples for scientific research, and brought them back to Earth. He also built a space station in low Earth orbit and landed a probe on Mars.
Then, of course, there is NASA. Last year, the company launched its Artemis program, sending an unmanned Orion spacecraft around the moon. A similar mission is planned for next year, but the capsule will carry four astronauts. By then, the company has a number of robotic missions planned, the first of which could come to fruition by the end of this year, when the two companies will send a spacecraft to the moon and become their first commercial venture. We aim to become
Under a NASA contract, Houston-based Intuitive Machines moved its landing site to Antarctica this year. decision “Based on the need to learn more about the geography and communications near the lunar south pole, which is expected to be one of the best places for continued human presence on the lunar surface,” NASA said. ‘ said.
The mission is scheduled to launch by Elon Musk’s SpaceX as early as November. The Pittsburgh-based company Astrobotic is also aiming to send a lander with a scientific payload to the moon later this year. It is also under contract with NASA and will be launched on the new Vulcan. rocket From United Launch Alliance.
For decades, little progress has been made on the goal of manned deep space exploration, but NASA is now focusing on returning to the moon and starting to put real money into it. The company has struck a multi-billion dollar deal with SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin to develop a spacecraft capable of landing astronauts on the moon. Blue Origin also won a contract worth more than $34 million to build solar cells and power lines out of lunar regolith (a geological term for loose rocks and soil). (Bezos owns the Washington Post.)
NASA is also working on building a space station called Gateway, which will remain in lunar orbit and serve as a hub for astronauts and supplies. A permanent focus on the moon is an important shift for a space agency that has been given different directions and priorities that change with each presidential administration.
In the decades since the Apollo program ended, space agencies have gone to the Moon, then to Mars and asteroids, and back again. However, the Artemis plan, which was born during the Trump administration, has been fully accepted by the Biden administration. She has bipartisan support in Congress and is eager to fulfill NASA’s promise to send the first woman and people of color to the moon.
Another factor is that the Trump and Biden administrations have said the United States is in a space race with China and is particularly concerned about its lunar ambitions. In an interview with the Post last year, NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy said he was concerned about how China would behave on the moon, especially when it comes to mining resources such as water ice. . “Are you nervous?” she said. “Yes, especially when it comes to China.”
It’s unclear how others will behave similarly. To promote transparency, NASA and the State Department created a program called the Artemis Accords, a legal framework that establishes rules for peaceful uses of space and governs activities on the moon. Nearly 30 nations have signed so far, obliging them to comply with a set of rules, including the public sharing of scientific findings and the creation of a “safe zone” where nations can work undisturbed on the moon. Become. India is a signatory and joined in June. But neither does Russia, nor does China, which aims to have a presence at the lunar south pole.
That raises questions about how they will behave on the Moon. “Will people be open and transparent about what they’re doing?” said Scott Pace, former National Space Council Executive Director and director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University. . He said signatories to the Artemis Accords should provide details about their missions and plans. What if there are failures? Scientific data? So it’s that kind of openness that we want to encourage, and the Artemis Accords will be a good model for others to follow. ”
Still, more activity on the moon may have benefits, he said. “By enabling more and more countries to go to and land on the Moon, we will not only increase our capacity and capabilities, but also make people feel safe to work together and build a scientific community. ” he said.