What we do with the Moon will transform it forever – 01/31/2024 – Science

The Moon remains alone. Unique in the known cosmos, it is a solitary rock a quarter the width of Earth, the only planet where life has ever been found. And the Moon is alone: ​​it is a desolate, sun-baked, cratered wasteland that houses little beyond what we take there with our minds or our spaceships. But that’s about to change.

It is expected that, in the coming weeks, a rocket will leave the Earth’s atmosphere and send the Nova-C spacecraft towards the south pole of the Moon. If everything goes as planned, the spacecraft, built by the private company Intuitive Machines, under the program of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services, will land on the satellite about seven days later and will carry with it a suite of scientific instruments.

It will also carry a collection of narratives stored on microfiche discs, several cameras and a series of small sculptures by artist Jeff Koons, which will be encapsulated in a cube and will remain on the Moon forever.

The launch scheduled for February will be made shortly after another company’s failed lunar landing attempt. The Peregrine module, built by Astrobotic Technology under another Commercial Lunar Cargo Services contract, was successfully launched into space on January 8, but the mission was halted due to a fuel leak. It failed to be the first private mission to land on the Moon, but Nova-C could do it, as could other future missions. While this prospect may seem like a compelling new step for humanity’s cosmic ambitions, it also signals a worrying future in which the Moon will become the target of unregulated human activity that could transform it irreversibly.

Humans have not set foot on the Moon since the end of the Apollo program in 1972, and robots have done so sporadically through costly government-funded efforts that often fail. But what will probably be done in February is new.

For the first time, the Moon will be occupied by private capital, including small companies whose goals go beyond science and exploration, including launching probes and capsules. These missions continue to receive strong support from NASA and other space agencies seeking a definitive return to the Moon. Most are carried out through NASA’s Artemis program, which now aims to take the first astronaut to the Moon by 2026.

The Commercial Lunar Payload Services program, part of Artemis, encourages private companies to build probes and even exploration vehicles that NASA can pay to use, as opposed to the traditional focus on agency-built equipment, meaning that even that are carrying government-sponsored scientific experiments, the new landing probes will be created by commercially funded private companies that may choose to add other non-scientific payloads purchased by other customers.

The freedom to choose any load can generate controversy. The Nova-C will use heat-reflective coatings designed by sportswear brand Columbia; the company’s website shows an artistic concept of the Columbia logo in a prominent place on the spacecraft as it lands on the lunar surface.

The failed Peregrine probe was carrying small amounts of human ashes. In 2019, an Israeli probe carried a few thousand dehydrated tardigrades, microscopic creatures capable of surviving in the vacuum of space. It’s not known for sure what happened to them when the probe crashed, but the attempt has raised new concerns about transporting biological materials to the Moon. Future launches will attempt to send more human ashes there, as well as time capsules, messages and other materials which can generate many objections.

This new era of lunar missions is likely to change humanity’s relationship with the Moon. Before that comes to fruition, we owe it to ourselves — and to it — to think more carefully about what our planet’s only natural satellite represents. Everything we do with it will last forever. We have a huge responsibility for the future of the Moon and the future of anyone who lives next to it.

The inert and spectral world that accompanies the Earth guides our existence. Protect us from climate chaos by moderating the planet’s axis. It fostered the evolution of complex life. Through the tides, it took vertebrate animals to land. The first humans used it to mark time, create calendars and forge the first civilizations; later, it was used for the consolidation of power, the development of religion, and the invention of philosophy and science. It has played a fundamental role in our biological and cultural evolution and is a primary element in everything from the trenches of war to our highest dreams.

Before the end of this decade, if you have a powerful enough telescope, you might see signs of construction or even human habitation on the Moon.

In May 2023, accounting firm PwC estimated that the global space industry was worth US$469 billion and will reach a value of more than US$1 trillion by 2030, as countries and companies increasingly use satellites for manufacturing, power generation and data collection. NASA’s own estimates show that spending on lunar exploration programs will generate more than $20 billion in economic output in the United States by 2022. The agency has already awarded billions of dollars in contracts to private companies, including established giants like Lockheed Martin , new billionaire-backed players like SpaceX and Blue Origin, startups like probe makers Astrobotic and Intuitive Machines, and nuclear energy research company Zeno Power.

“We are at an inflection point where ideas previously confined to the pages of science fiction represent attractive investment ventures,” says the PwC report.

Some of these ventures will provide probe services to space agencies, universities or private research companies; others will help enable energy services, guidance or planning for other lunar missions, with the goal of establishing a self-sustaining lunar economy.

After learning of Celestis Memorial Spaceflight’s plans to send human ashes to the Moon aboard the Peregrine probe, Navajo Nation President Buu Nygren wrote to NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and other officials on December 21, asking for the launch to be postponed. The Navajo people venerate the Moon, giving it spiritual importance. “The act of depositing human remains and other materials on the Moon, which could be treated as waste elsewhere, amounts to the desecration of this sacred space,” Nygren wrote.

President Navajo’s protest is an example of how using the Moon, even for the most well-intentioned purposes, requires a collaborative and deliberate approach. It belongs to everyone, which means it belongs to no one; its use by anyone requires consideration from everyone. Lunar landings scheduled for 2024 and 2025 under the Commercial Lunar Cargo Services program include a water-hunting robot, a navigation system similar to a GPS device, instruments to probe the interior of the Moon, and containers of samples that will be collected on the Moon. lunar soil.

These private spacecraft will join a fleet of exploration vehicles, probes and scientific instruments managed by the governments of the United States, China, Russia and India. In August, the Indian space agency commanded the safe landing of a new rover on the Moon, becoming the fourth country to do so. After several failed attempts, Japan became the fifth country in the world to safely land a spacecraft on the Moon.

But space is still challenging, as demonstrated by the recent lunar landing failures of Russia and the Israeli company SpaceIL, which transported tardigrades in 2019. Although it appears large in our sky most nights and days, the Moon is almost 400 thousand kilometers away. Launching rockets from Earth is one thing; getting to the satellite is another.

Since 2020, NASA officials have tried to forge a more cooperative path to the Moon through the agency’s Artemis Accords, a non-binding framework that confirms the 1967 Outer Space Treaty and calls on signatories to enhance collaboration between countries by agreeing to international standards for equipment, helping each other in emergencies, sharing scientific data, and securing the Apollo landing sites. But the agreements also make room for the extraction and use of mined “resources,” which could include lunar dust, water, rare earth elements or other materials.

It’s important to be on the Moon as explorers, scientists, perhaps even as miners who want to help people on Earth. But we humans tend to turn exploration into extraction, and our intentions for the Moon seem to be heading down the same path. She won’t be alone for long. But it is and will always be silent: it is not home to thunderous storms, crashing waves, birdsong or hymns. We must be their voice. Soon, we will change its surface and our relationship with it forever. At the very least, we owe the Moon a sensible discussion about why and how we will do this.

(Rebecca Boyle, a journalist in Colorado Springs, is the author of “Our Moon: How Earth’s Celestial Companion Transformed the Planet, Guided Evolution, and Made Us Who We Are.”)