New NASA boss aims to land a nuclear reactor on the moon by 2030

Daily Mail​

16 hours ago

New NASA Administrator Sean Duffy's (pictured) first project will be an attempt to take American energy dominance to the moon. Duffy - who also serves as Transportation Secretary and took the NASA job after Elon Musk's preferred candidate was rejected - is expected to announce an ambitious plans to build a nuclear reactor on the moon this week.
The Daily Mail has reached out to NASA and the White House for comment. In 2022, NASA announced plans to put a nuclear reactor on the moon by 2030 as part of a vision to turn the lunar body into an orbiting power station but Duffy wants an expedited, more definite timeline. The goal is for United States to outpace China in 'winning the second space race,' a source told Politico. Earlier this year, it was revealed China may team up with Russia in an attempt to build their own lunar nuclear reactor.
Sure enough, Duffy's directive claims that China or Russia or any American enemy could 'declare a keep-out zone which would significantly inhibit the United States' if they got to the moon first. Duffy's directive commands NASA to get someone to lead the effort in the next 60 days and solicit companies that can help launch ahead of China. A former Fox News and reality TV star, Duffy is also pushing an effort to replace the International Space Station. Duffy, a former Congressman from Wisconsin, oversees the $25 billion space agency.
In 2022, the US space agency chose three design concept proposals for a fission power system that could be ready to launch by the end of the decade. It is unclear if Duffy is going from the same plans. The plan is for the 40-kilowatt class fission power system to last at least 10 years in the lunar environment, with the hope that it could one day support a permanent human presence on the moon, as well as support manned missions to Mars and beyond. If NASA is to build a base on the lunar surface, one of the major problems to solve will be how such a proposed settlement would be powered.
Solar panels are great for powering rovers, but a human base would need a continuous and reliable source of power. NASA experts are looking into nuclear fission as the answer because the technology has been used extensively on Earth. Relatively small and lightweight compared to other power systems, fission systems are reliable and could enable continuous power regardless of location, available sunlight, and other natural environmental conditions, the US space agency said. If the demonstration of such a system on the moon was successful, it would pave the way for the fueling of longer duration journeys through space.
It is hoped that the development of these fission surface power technologies will also help NASA advance nuclear propulsion systems that rely on reactors to generate power. These could then be used for deep space exploration missions. The goal will also be to beat China and Russia to the same mission. The East Asian country aims to become a major space power and land astronauts on the moon by 2030, and its planned Chang'e-8 mission for 2028 would lay the groundwork for constructing a permanent, manned lunar base.
In a presentation in Shanghai, the 2028 mission's Chief Engineer Pei Zhaoyu showed that the lunar base's energy supply could also depend on large-scale solar arrays, and pipelines and cables for heating and electricity built on the moon's surface. Russia's space agency Roscosmos said last year it planned to build a nuclear reactor on the moon's surface with the China National Space Administration (CNSA) by 2035 to power the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS).
The inclusion of the nuclear power unit in a Chinese space official's presentation at a conference for officials from the 17 countries and international organisations that make up the ILRS suggests Beijing supports the idea, although it has never formally announced it. 'An important question for the ILRS is power supply, and in this Russia has a natural advantage, when it comes to nuclear power plants, especially sending them into space, it leads the world, it is ahead of the United States,' Wu Weiren, chief designer of China's lunar exploration program, told Reuters on the sidelines of the conference. After little progress on talks over a space-based reactor in the past, 'I hope this time both countries can send a nuclear reactor to the moon,' Wu said.