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WASHINGTON – NASA announced May 31 contracts worth more than $ 250 million to three companies for the supply of NASA payloads to the lunar surface by 2021.
The agency announced that it has signed contracts with Astrobotic, Intuitive Machines and OrbitBeyond to carry up to 23 payloads to the moon as part of three lunar commercial missions planned between September 2020 and July 2021. All three companies were selected companies that received awards for Lunar Payload Commercial Services (CLPS) in November 2018.
"Today, NASA is becoming a customer of business partners who will deliver our scientific instruments and lunar technology to the moon's surface," NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said in a statement released today. during the webcast of this ad.
OrbitBeyond is the first of three scheduled flights. The company is currently planning to launch its Z-01 landing gear on a SpaceX Falcon 9 in September 2020. The New Jersey-based company, which has links to the Indian group TeamIndus, a former Google Lunar The X Prize team has received $ 97 million of NASA to fly up to four payloads on a landing gear planned to land at Mare Imbrium.
Astrobotic plans to launch its Peregrine lander in June 2021 and disembark in July. The company had already announced its intention to use the secondary payload of the United Launch Alliance Atlas 5, but John Thornton, chief executive of Astrobotic, said on NASA's webcast that the company "was evaluating our launch options and made a very decision The company received $ 79.5 million for the transportation of 14 payloads to Crater Lacus Mortis.
Intuitive Machines plans to launch its Nova-C landing gear on a Falcon 9 in July 2021, then on the Moon six and a half days later. The Houston-based company has received $ 77 million to haul up to four payloads on its lander, which will land on Oceanus Procellarum or Mare Serenitatis.
NASA has not revealed the payloads it will steal during each mission, although it has selected a dozen payloads within the agency in February for a potential flight as part of CLPS missions. In a statement, NASA said it would submit specific payloads for each mission by the end of summer.
"These experiments focus primarily on volatile substances, such as water," said Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA's assistant administrator for science, during NASA's webcast. Other areas of interest are the geology of the moon and its environment, including those that help prepare future human missions under the agency's Artemis program.
"We really want to land first, with robots," he said of the agency's exploration plans. "We want to go explore where we want to land with our peers and be ready for it."
NASA targeted the south pole of the moon for the first lunar landings. None of the companies selected in these contracts with SPDP plans to land on the Moon with its initial missions, but future missions could land near the South Pole.
NASA plans to award more CLPS missions in the future, Zurbuchen said, but without a timetable.
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