Overview
- NASA has publicly awarded Phase 1 contracts to U.S. companies to supply surface systems for a lunar base, with the agency committing hundreds of millions of dollars to the effort.
- Under the awards, Blue Origin will provide two landers to carry payloads to the surface, Astrolab and Lunar Outpost will build rovers, and Firefly Aerospace will supply aerial drones for surface surveys.
- The work is staged: NASA expects delivery of these assets before the agency's planned crewed Artemis landing, with reporting citing agency targets in the 2027–2028 range.
- Permanent base infrastructure, including power networks, is slated to begin around 2029 with the goal of enabling long-duration human stays in the 2030s as systems and habitats are added.
- NASA says the program will drive new science at the lunar south pole and mature landing, mobility and aerial technologies that are needed for deeper-space missions such as Mars, while shifting development risk to commercial partners.