Houston-based company among nine tapped by NASA to build moon landers

This is a rendering of Houston-based Intuitive Machines' moon lander, known as Nova-C. The company was one of nine chosen by NASA to build a lander that could carry science experiments and instruments to the lunar surface. less This is a rendering of Houston-based Intuitive Machines' moon lander, known as Nova-C. The company was one of nine chosen by NASA to build a lander that could carry science experiments and instruments to the ... more Photo: CREDIT: Intuitive Machines Photo: CREDIT: Intuitive Machines Image 1 of / 23 Caption Close Houston-based company among nine tapped by NASA to build moon landers 1 / 23 Back to Gallery

Houston-based Intuitive Machines was one of nine companies tapped Thursday by NASA to build moon landers as part of a new strategy in which the space agency is a customer rather than a builder.

“When we go to the moon we want to be one customer of many customers in a robust marketplace between the Earth and the moon,” NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said during a news conference livestreamed from NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. “We want multiple providers that are competing on cost and innovation.”

Taking this approach will allow NASA to focus on furthering human exploration to the moon and then to Mars, which President Donald Trump has tried to expand since taking office in 2017.

The companies chosen Thursday will build the landers but not necessarily the science experiments and instruments that are sent to the moon. Instead, NASA will present them with projects they can bid on to transport there. Some of those projects will be NASA’s.

Under the 10-year contracts, the companies will not get paid until they start launching projects to the lunar surface.

“We have to pay for the launch costs and development, but we will recoup that over multiple missions to the moon,” Trent Martin, vice president of aerospace services for Intuitive Machines, told the Houston Chronicle Thursday. “We’ll charge customers based on their needs, such as mass, power and data.”

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Thursday’s announcement is the latest step by the Trump administration to bolster commercialization of space, but it came at a price.

The commercial landers are meant to replace a rover that NASA abruptly canceled in April after sinking more than four years and $100 million into it. The rover, known as Resource Prospector, was being built by the space agency to find water on the moon.

Headed to the moon

Intuitive Machines personnel have been working on their lunar lander, known as Nova-C, since June after securing millions of dollars in private funding, Martin said.

“We are extremely excited to be developing the Nova-C spacecraft/lunar lander line and look forward to landing payloads on the moon,” Steve Altemus, the company’s president and chief executive, said in a statement.

Nova-C is mid-range in size: Weighing 3,300 pounds and standing about 10-feet tall and seven-feet in diameter, the lander will be capable of carrying a payload of nearly 190 pounds.

Martin would not disclose how much funding Intuitive Machines has secured or who provided it. But the company will cover both the building of the lander and the launch services until it can make up the costs through transporting payloads, he said.

RESOURCE PROSPECTOR: NASA's lunar rover could enable deep-space exploration

The lander should be ready to head to the moon by mid-2021, Martin added, and he expects they will launch it on a SpaceX rocket.

“What we anticipate is that NASA will issue a task order to all nine companies and say ‘We want to deliver this instrument to the moon in 2021,” he said. “Then companies will bid to deliver the payload … and then they’ll pick between the companies.”

One other Texas company was among those chosen — Firefly Aerospace in Cedar Park. The other companies chosen are Astrobotic Technology in Pennsylvania; Deep Space Systems in Colorado; Draper in Massachusetts; Lockheed Martin Space in Colorado; Masten Space Systems in California; Moon Express in Florida; and Orbit Beyond in New Jersey.

Over the course of 10 years, the nine companies will get paid a total of $2.6 billion to fly experiments and instruments to the moon. NASA wants to launch the first payloads as early as 2019 but no later than Dec. 31, 2021.

NASA officials said Thursday they will re-evaluate the companies on the list every few years and might offer opportunities to other companies.

“Today’s announcement marks tangible progress in America’s return to the moon’s surface to stay,” Bridenstine said. “The innovation of America’s aerospace companies, wedded with our big goals in science and human exploration, are going to help us achieve amazing things on the moon and feed forward to Mars.”

Unexpected decision

The cancellation of Resource Prospector earlier this year came as a shock to the scientific community, with many questioning the motives given Trump’s push to put humans back on the moon for the first time since 1972.

In looking for water on the moon, Resource Prospector would have greatly assisted NASA in its quest for deep space exploration. If there is enough water that can be collected easily, the elements could be broken down to create rocket fuel, for example, or astronaut life support.

Initially, officials said that the time and money invested in the project wasn’t in vain. The instruments — such as its ice drill, a system to search for hydrogen below the lunar surface, and a tool to quantify water extracted from the moon — would fly on future missions such as these commercial landers.

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But NASA later acknowledged that the parts may not be reused, and the agency put out bids this fall for experiments and instruments to fly on the landers.

On Thursday, Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, skirted the question when asked about the canceled rover, saying that the agency already has some experiments in mind for the new landers.

“Some of them are resource-focused instruments,” he said at a Thursday news conference. “We’ve continued to support those instruments.”

Resource Prospector was slated to fly in 2022 or 2023. Much of the work on the rover was being done at Houston’s Johnson Space Center.

Commercialization

Increased commercialization of space has been a key talking point of Trump’s administration in his quest to return to the moon as a stepping stone for Mars.

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For example, Trump has called for NASA to transition activity on the station to commercial companies and an end to federal funding after 2024. The push follows one started in 2014 — prior to Trump’s presidency — in which SpaceX and Boeing will become the first commercial companies to send crews to the International Space Station, eliminating the nation’s dependence on Russia to ferry astronauts to and from the orbiting laboratory.

The commercial crew program has faced numerous setbacks and delays, most recently with an investigation by NASA into the workplace culture at both Boeing and SpaceX. And many oppose Trump’s plan for the space station, saying companies likely won’t be ready to take on the fiscal responsibilities that come along with the station. Just in fiscal year 2017, NASA spent $1.45 billion on the space station — not including the costs to transport astronauts and supplies there.

BRIDENSTINE: 2024 space station funding cut off may not be possible

Even Bridenstine has said that ending federal funding for the space station after 2024 isn’t feasible.

“It sounds really difficult and it is, no doubt, really difficult, but there definitely is interest,” he previously said. But “that doesn’t mean it can be done and it doesn’t mean it can be done in seven years.”

Alex Stuckey covers NASA and the environment for the Houston Chronicle. You can reach her at alex.stuckey@chron.com or Twitter.com/alexdstuckey.