NASA's Artemis Program Updates and Discussion Thread 6

[yg1968]

That is not how I read them... The Reports aren’t law... None of them are binding...

You can read report language however you want, but it doesn’t provide legal authority to proceed with a new program.  That has to be in bill language, whether authorization or appropriations.

I am almost certain that the LTV isn't in any bill and neither is the lunar nuclear reactor and both are being funded in FY26. I believe that is because they are part of the Moon to Mars program. The NASA Authorization bill and the CJS Appropriations bills aren't that specific.

I know what you mean by CMPS.

CMPS is in the FY26 budget request:

This budget creates a new Commercial Mars Payload Services Program - modeled off the success of Commercial Lunar Payload Services - to deliver science and technology payloads to Mars through commercial partnerships.

https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/fy-2026-budget-technical-supplement-002.pdf

[Jim]

The analogy is not perfect, but I think this may be the AMTRAK-ification of Artemis and NASA. 

I like it

[yg1968]

SLS is in trouble

What have you heard, Jim?

If Mars is off the table and SpaceX is all in on the moon, then Starship is going to be more than just a lander for Artemis.

Not until after Artemis V at least, which would not put "SLS in trouble" for at least another seven years. SLS is in trouble once U.S. Congress zeroes out the budget for SLS. IMO that won't happen in the next five years. But I would love to be proven wrong.

Another possibility is that both SLS/Orion and commercial options could overlap.

[Stan-1967]

The analogy is not perfect, but I think this may be the AMTRAK-ification of Artemis and NASA. 

I like it

As a west coaster, i dont get it?

[Vultur]

SLS is in trouble

What have you heard, Jim?

If Mars is off the table and SpaceX is all in on the moon, then Starship is going to be more than just a lander for Artemis.

Not until after Artemis V at least, which would not put "SLS in trouble" for at least another seven years. SLS is in trouble once U.S. Congress zeroes out the budget for SLS. IMO that won't happen in the next five years. But I would love to be proven wrong.

Another possibility is that both SLS/Orion and commercial options could overlap.

Something like adding a non SLS "Artemis 4.5" between Artemis 4 and 5, then an "Artemis 5.5" etc ?

[catdlr]

The analogy is not perfect, but I think this may be the AMTRAK-ification of Artemis and NASA. 

I like it

As a west coaster, i dont get it?

The West Coast has Amtrak, too.  Just read up on the history of AMTRAK.  Good analogy.

[VSECOTSPE]

I am almost certain that the LTV isn't in any bill and neither is the lunar nuclear reactor and both are being funded in FY26.

A “Nuclear Surface Power Program” was authorized under Section 10841 “Space Nuclear Capabilities” in Article VII (the NASA authorization section) of the 2022 CHIPS Act.  Scroll way down here but be prepared to wear your scrolling finger to the bone:

https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/4346/text

There’s also been nuclear surface power and nuclear propulsion earmarks in NASA’s annual appropriations for a while now.

You may have a point on LTV.  If a human lunar rover or such isn’t called out in any existing bill (I’m not going to further ruin my eyes in a quest to find out), NASA may be relying on language like “The Program shall include the following elements... (vii) any other element needed to meet the requirements of the Program.”  That’s in Section 10811(b) at the link above.

I doubt NASA could sneak a big Mars lander or cargo program through such language.  To the extent Mars gets discussed at all in such Moon-to-Mars bill language, it’s in the context of either Gateway or the lunar missions being used to prepare for Mars (which they don’t except for Starliner involvement but that’s beside the point).  Nowhere in any signed bill language that I’m aware of has anyone envisioned or even hinted at human-scale Mars landers or cargo.

Maybe if the White House or Isaacman went to the Republicans and said with confidence that the President really wants a big Mars landing by 2028, they’d look the other way and let such a major Op Plan change go forward.  But absent that kind of Executive push, Congress controls its prerogatives tightly and would just tell NASA to work the request through the next approps or authorization bill.  And based on what Isaacman keeps saying/not saying and what is/is not in the new White House space policy, I think any Mars push outside whatever Science can salvage for an MSR retry in another year or two is off the table. 

(At least until Trump contradicts Isaacman like he did Pence with a tweet asking why NASA is wasting so much time on the Moon and why it’s not focused on Mars...)

Also, the whole big Mars lander thing may be moot given that Musk has retreated for now from Mars in conjunction with the new White House space policy.  If SpaceX is not interested in attempting a Mars Starship landing for another 5-7 years (probably 10+ years in Elon time), it’s hard to see NASA going out with such a procurement now.  I’m sure other contractors would step forward if enough money was offered, but a relatively low-cost and near-term effort via piggybacking on Starship was the compelling argument.

Musk says SpaceX focus is on the moon rather than Mars

A little more than a year after dismissing the moon as a “distraction,” Elon Musk says SpaceX will focus on lunar settlement before sending humans to Mars.

In a social media post Feb. 8, Musk said SpaceX was deferring its long-held ambitions of establishing a permanent human presence on Mars, instead devoting resources to creating a “self-growing city” on the moon.

“For those unaware, SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20-plus years,” he wrote...

In his social media post, Musk said focusing on the moon allows for faster development than Mars.

“It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months (six-month trip time), whereas we can launch to the Moon every 10 days (two-day trip time),” he wrote. “This means we can iterate much faster to complete a Moon city than a Mars city.”

While Musk has long been interested in human missions to Mars, his interest in the moon has waxed and waned over the years. “If you want to get the public really fired up, you’ve got to have a base on the moon,” he said in a July 2017 speech.

Later that year, he unveiled updated designs for his BFR rocket  — a precursor to Starship — that included a concept for a lunar base he called Moon Base Alpha. “It’s 2017. I mean, we should have a lunar base by now,” he said at the International Astronautical Congress.

By early last year, however, Musk was focused almost exclusively on Mars. “No, we’re going straight to Mars. The Moon is a distraction,” he wrote in a January 2025 social media post, responding to a proposal to use liquid oxygen produced on the moon to fuel Starship missions to Mars.

That stance mirrored early policy signals from the second Trump administration that appeared to emphasize Mars exploration at the expense of lunar programs. Those included proposals to end the Space Launch System and Orion programs after Artemis 3, along with NASA budget requests for Mars exploration technologies and capabilities.

Congress rejected efforts to end SLS and Orion, as well as the lunar Gateway. An executive order issued by President Trump in December called for a human return to the moon by 2028 and the establishment of the first elements of a permanent lunar outpost by 2030...

Musk said he remains interested in sending humans to Mars, but as a secondary objective to lunar settlement.

“That said, SpaceX will also strive to build a Mars city and begin doing so in about five to seven years,” he wrote, “but the overriding priority is securing the future of civilization, and the Moon is faster.”

https://spacenews.com/musk-says-spacex-focus-is-on-the-moon-rather-than-mars/

To be clear, I wish this had all turned out differently.  I think it’s idiotic to focus so much of Artemis on beating China back to the Moon instead of leapfrogging them with a robust ongoing lunar presence and at Mars.  I’m talking about how things are currently, not how I wish they would be,

FWIW...

[yg1968]

Also, the whole big Mars lander thing may be moot given that Musk has retreated for now from Mars in conjunction with the new White House space policy.  If SpaceX is not interested in attempting a Mars Starship landing for another 5-7 years (probably 10+ years in Elon time), it’s hard to see NASA going out with such a procurement now.  I’m sure other contractors would step forward if enough money was offered, but a relatively low-cost and near-term effort via piggybacking on Starship was the compelling argument.

Thanks for looking up the LTV and the nuclear reactor. I meant to double check it but never got around to it.
 
Some of the more recent events may have indeed changed things. Perhaps, Isaacman and the Trump Administration will focus more on a commercial crew to the Moon program than on anything Mars related. I would still like for Isaacman and the Trump Administration to initiate a CMPS program in the not so distant future. SpaceX has not yet given up on the 2028-2029 launch window and NASA should take advantage of that by having a Mars payload on board Starship.

P.S. Musk said that SpaceX would still try to send astronauts to Mars in 2031 or 2033 which implies that 2028 for a Mars Starship cargo mission is still being considered.

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/2020848181433491910

Likely manned Mars flights in 2033

Maybe 2031 [for a crewed mission]

[VSECOTSPE]

As a west coaster, i dont get it?

Long-distance passenger rail travel became somewhat unprofitable for the railroads during the Great Depression and threatened major losses after the introduction of jet travel and the interstate highway system in the 1950s and 1960s.  So the federal government created AMTRAK in the early 1970s to take over the provision of passenger rail travel from commercial railroads in the United States.  Except for the Northeast Corridor between Boston and DC (including NYC, Philly, and Baltimore), AMTRAK in unprofitable and has to be supported by the federal budget to the tune of low single-digit billions of dollars annually.  This is done to maintain some minimal (and declining) level of service everywhere else in the country, even though only like 1-2% of total US passenger miles are delivered by AMTRAK versus airlines, buses, etc.  I’m not arguing whether that’s good or bad.  I’m just stating that the US federal government via AMTRAK subsidizes an older mode of transportation that has not been utilized in the vast majority of the long-distance US passenger travel for decades.

Orion/SLS is the AMTRAK analogy for Artemis.  While the rest of the space sector — commercial, defense, unmanned, even manned LEO — has moved to or is moving to newer modes of launch (Falcon 9, New Glenn, Vulcan, and Starship), Artemis is stuck subsidizing Orion/SLS to the tune of billions annually through at least Artemis V in 2030+.  And it’s more than just the cost — the extremely low flight rate of Orion/SLS places fundamental limits on Artemis flight safety and capabilities.  Unlike AMTRAK passengers, there is not even limited demand for Orion/SLS outside the Artemis missions that Congress forces to use Orion/SLS.  Fundamentally, Orion/SLS exists to send dollars to jobs and votes at certain contractors in certain congressional districts.  The four astronauts it will place in lunar orbit every couple years for $8-10 billion are a fig leaf at best when every other public and private astronaut and payload (even Artemis lunar cargo) is using other, newer, better, and less costly launch vehicles and space transport systems.

Another analogy might be ghettoization.  Artemis is (or should be) the nation’s flagship space program.  But Congress is forcing Artemis astronauts onto very substandard crew transport capabilities when everyone and everything else going to space has or is “gentrifying” (upgrading) to lower cost, higher flight rate, more capable, and usually partially or fully reusable launch and space transport systems.

I might even argue that NASA human space flight has been AMTRAKed or ghettoized since Challenger, when defense, commercial, and unmanned payloads moved off the Space Shuttle and onto Atlas/Delta/Titan launchers.  Given their high cost and low reliability and very limited user base, NASA should have been allowed/directed to move off Shuttle legacy systems after Challenger or Columbia or the demise of Constellation.  But jobs and votes and inertia have kept NASA astronauts wedded to Shuttle legacy systems despite the high price to NASA’s budget and in astronaut lives.

Again, it’s not a perfect analogy.  It’s a long-winded way of pointing out that Artemis crew transport is in a harsh penalty box compared to every other space player.  But sometimes these mental constructs are useful in making a point.

FWIW...

[VSECOTSPE]

Perhaps, Isaacman and the Trump Administration will focus more on a commercial crew to the Moon program than on anything Mars related.

For that to happen, Isaacman has to get out of his “after Artemis V” mentality and initiate the necessary program formulation and procurement decisions so they occur on his watch before 2028.  It’s mind-boggling to me that a couple old (but enlightened) hands at NASA were okay trusting lunar crew landers to the likes of Starship and New Glenn starting a half-decade ago, but now the world’s foremost commercial astronaut keeps repeatedly saying we have to wait another half-decade before making the same transition for lunar crew transport.  Unlike Griffin, Isaacman is too rich to be paid off, so it must be his political naïveté and lack of support in this direction from the White House that causing this.  But at a gut level, I still don’t get it.  Not what I expected when he was nominated the first time.  (Same goes for his unbounded core competency insourcing initiative but that’s another story.)

The other ingredient is clear, consistent air cover from the White House.  Even if Isaacman makes moves in the direction of commercial lunar crew transport, the Orion/SLS mafia will counter with another extension to Artemis VI or whatever via Cruz or other Congress-critters.  I may not be a fan of Trump II, but between the White House’s earlier stranglehold on congressional Republicans and the spending tools Vought/OMB were brandishing, there was a real opportunity to get commercial lunar/Mars crew transport in legislation and to put stakes in the heart of Orion/SLS.  But that window has been squandered, and even if the White House had put that in its new space policy, I’m not sure they have the focus and good will anymore to make it happen given their gross overreach in other areas.

But like I wrote, maybe it will all change direction again with an unexpected Trump tweet.

FWIW...

[VSECOTSPE]

Musk Embraces the Moon

https://spacepolicyonline.com/news/musk-embraces-the-moon/


Moderation:

Restored this and the following post to their rightful place.

Tony

[VSECOTSPE]

Elon Musk wants to build an AI satellite factory on the moon

Elon Musk told employees at xAI, his artificial intelligence (AI) company, on Tuesday (Feb 10) evening that the company needed a factory on the moon to build AI satellites and a massive catapult to launch them into space.

Inspired by the billionaire’s love of science fiction, the space catapult would be called a mass driver, and would be part of an imagined lunar facility that manufactured satellites to provide the computing power for the company’s AI.

“You have to go to the moon,” Musk said during an all-hands meeting, which was heard by The New York Times. The move would help xAI harness more power than other companies to build its AI, he said.

“It’s difficult to imagine what an intelligence of that scale would think about, but it’s going to be incredibly exciting to see it happen,” he added.

Last week, Musk said he was merging xAI with his rocket business, SpaceX, to facilitate his plans to create AI data centres in outer space. Now that vision has expanded to include the lunar facility, though he did not say in his hourlong talk, which also featured remarks from other executives, how it could be built.

Those two arms of Musk’s business empire are merging as SpaceX prepares an initial public offering, which could come as early as June. A representative for xAI did not respond to a request for comment.

Musk’s fixation with the moon is a recent one. Since founding SpaceX in 2002, he has said making humanity multiplanetary, first by establishing a colony on Mars, was the company’s raison d’etre. But in recent months, he has posted frequently on X, his social media platform, about the company’s new focus: the moon.

Two former SpaceX executives told the Times, on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak publicly about corporate plans, that the moon had never been a main focus of the company.

In his remarks on Tuesday, Musk described the moon as a steppingstone to Mars. First, he said, the company would build “a self-sustaining city on the moon”, then travel to Mars and finally explore star systems in search of aliens…

https://www.businesstimes.com.sg/international/elon-musk-wants-build-ai-satellite-factory-moon

[woods170]

Perhaps, Isaacman and the Trump Administration will focus more on a commercial crew to the Moon program than on anything Mars related.

For that to happen, Isaacman has to get out of his “after Artemis V” mentality and initiate the necessary program formulation and procurement decisions so they occur on his watch before 2028.  It’s mind-boggling to me that a couple old (but enlightened) hands at NASA were okay trusting lunar crew landers to the likes of Starship and New Glenn starting a half-decade ago, but now the world’s foremost commercial astronaut keeps repeatedly saying we have to wait another half-decade before making the same transition for lunar crew transport.  Unlike Griffin, Isaacman is too rich to be paid off, so it must be his political naïveté and lack of support in this direction from the White House that causing this.  But at a gut level, I still don’t get it.  Not what I expected when he was nominated the first time.  (Same goes for his unbounded core competency insourcing initiative but that’s another story.)

Emphasis mine.

Well, that's exactly the main reason why I didn't want Isaacman as the NASA administrator. Politically speaking he's a total rookie. And as you pointed out so well, that's beginning to show. Isaacman doesn't have the political "weight" to influence anything. Like you said in an earlier post: he just rolled over when Cruz shoved Congressional funding for two more SLS-Orion missions down NASA's throat recently (Artemis IV and Artemis V). And it's not unrealistic to assume that Cruz will tie SLS and Orion to Artemis VI (and possibly beyond) as well, given that NASA already has a production contract with Boeing in place for SLS core stages AND upper stages in place for up to Artemis VI.

IMO the Artemis program will remain firmly tied to SLS and Orion for many more years to come. Isaacman being the current NASA administrator won't change that IMO. Neither will this current Trump administration IMO. As always, the fate of a government program will be decided by those holding the purse strings. In that sense, nothing has changed really; AMTRACK-ification indeed, but not happening right now... instead it happened when the NASA Authorization act of 2010 was signed into law IMO.

[TheRadicalModerate]

Well, that's exactly the main reason why I didn't want Isaacman as the NASA administrator. Politically speaking he's a total rookie. And as you pointed out so well, that's beginning to show. Isaacman doesn't have the political "weight" to influence anything. Like you said in an earlier post: he just rolled over when Cruz shoved Congressional funding for two more SLS-Orion missions down NASA's throat recently (Artemis IV and Artemis V). And it's not unrealistic to assume that Cruz will tie SLS and Orion to Artemis VI (and possibly beyond) as well, given that NASA already has a production contract with Boeing in place for SLS core stages AND upper stages in place for up to Artemis VI.

Let's assume this is true.  What happens when reality catches up to the program?  If we believe that Musk has now retrenched to the Moon first, then long before Arty 5, at least SpaceX is going to be running private missions at 2-4x the cadence and 25% of the cost of an SLS/Orion mission, and will be busy integrating the ES-LO-ES leg with the LO-LS-LO leg, resulting in even lower total mission costs.

Blue will likely be doing the same thing, because ceding those operations to SpaceX jeopardizes its long-term mission.

Isaacman knows this.  Cruz knows this.  Even the incumbents know this.  Note that nobody is talking about finalizing the EPOC contract, which has been ready to go for years without it being signed.  There's a reason for that.  Nobody will be willing to sustain the political embarrassment involved in maintaining SLS/Orion ops in the face of end-to-end commercial alternatives.

[bulkmail]

...
Fundamentally, Orion/SLS exists to send dollars to jobs and votes at certain contractors in certain congressional districts.  ...

Assuming SpaceX, Blue Origin and/or other companies begin performing privately funded missions with humans on the Moon or Mars - does it matter what Congress does with Orion/SLS/NASA human spaceflight budget?

If Congress can't send dollars for jobs and votes via NASA they'll do it via some other program (I assume Orion/SLS don't have a monopoly on such spending).
NASA budget may get lower, but also access to space will be cheaper, so maybe that'll balance out.
Space exploration will expand and even transform into exploitation and thus settlement (e.g. the elusive answer "why do it? what's the business case?" will be found), so space enthusiasts will be happy.

Interesting metric to track is SpaceX profit (+Blue and others when they get there) vs NASA budget - that shows who's the (potential) leading spender in deep space.

[woods170]

Well, that's exactly the main reason why I didn't want Isaacman as the NASA administrator. Politically speaking he's a total rookie. And as you pointed out so well, that's beginning to show. Isaacman doesn't have the political "weight" to influence anything. Like you said in an earlier post: he just rolled over when Cruz shoved Congressional funding for two more SLS-Orion missions down NASA's throat recently (Artemis IV and Artemis V). And it's not unrealistic to assume that Cruz will tie SLS and Orion to Artemis VI (and possibly beyond) as well, given that NASA already has a production contract with Boeing in place for SLS core stages AND upper stages in place for up to Artemis VI.

Let's assume this is true.  What happens when reality catches up to the program?  If we believe that Musk has now retrenched to the Moon first, then long before Arty 5, at least SpaceX is going to be running private missions at 2-4x the cadence and 25% of the cost of an SLS/Orion mission, and will be busy integrating the ES-LO-ES leg with the LO-LS-LO leg, resulting in even lower total mission costs.

Blue will likely be doing the same thing, because ceding those operations to SpaceX jeopardizes its long-term mission.

Isaacman knows this.  Cruz knows this.  Even the incumbents know this.  Note that nobody is talking about finalizing the EPOC contract, which has been ready to go for years without it being signed.  There's a reason for that.  Nobody will be willing to sustain the political embarrassment involved in maintaining SLS/Orion ops in the face of end-to-end commercial alternatives.

Note that with the addition of funding for Artemis IV and Artemis V, Cruz has already financially covered 80% of the EPOC contract. He only needs to add funding for Artemis VI, and EPOC becomes nothing more than a formality.

[Hadley Delta]

Musk Embraces the Moon

https://spacepolicyonline.com/news/musk-embraces-the-moon/


Moderation:

Restored this and the following post to their rightful place.

Tony

Nice to see him finally bow to the obvious.

[TheRadicalModerate]

Note that with the addition of funding for Artemis IV and Artemis V, Cruz has already financially covered 80% of the EPOC contract. He only needs to add funding for Artemis VI, and EPOC becomes nothing more than a formality.

EPOC is Arty 5 through 9.  20%.  And EPOC also has an option to cover missions through Arty 14.

[TheRadicalModerate]

Assuming SpaceX, Blue Origin and/or other companies begin performing privately funded missions with humans on the Moon or Mars - does it matter what Congress does with Orion/SLS/NASA human spaceflight budget?

The government can make long-term investments that can establish infrastructure that no private company would attempt on its own, but which would dramatically reduce the cost of investment for a bunch of good ideas.  Alternatively, it can establish infrastructure that wouldn't be available to build a broad ecosystem of private companies if one company owned it.

Even before its leader became a pariah to half the country, it would have been a bad idea to concentrate that much economic power in one company.  Some day, SpaceX will be a bad company, possibly technically, possibly morally, possibly both at the same time.  When that day comes, you want several companies that can take its place--or at least force it to behave.

[Nonexistence]

So Isaacman states that Artemis is a national security concern.
I am trying to see how that is remotely the case. China landing there hardly constitutes a national security issue. Thoughts?