Mass Value Report for March 2026

NASA makes its plans for the Moon public

I am publishing this on the eve of the flight of Artemis II, the first visit to the Moon by humans since 1972. If all goes well, today will be the mark the beginning of the end of the sad era in which humanity turned away from exploring the cosmos.

This is against the background of an acceleration in the race to return humans to the Moon. This month, NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman led an event called “Ignition”, which laid out the full plan that has been teased for some weeks now. America is going to build a Moon base, and we now have some details on precisely how and when this is going to happen.

Credit: NASA

Not only does this plan include the already announced SLS/Orion missions - Artemis III as an Earth orbit mission in 2027, and Artemis IV and V as landings in 2028 - but the agency also announced an intensification of CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services - pronounced “clips”).