Hi there, Quartz members!
Our lunar future
Nearly 50 years after the first human landing on the moon, a combination of government scientists, private-sector engineers, and startup entrepreneurs are again gazing skyward, thinking about how a return to the moon would happen, and what we would find when we got there.
Our state of play memo looks at the massive opportunities that could lie ahead. If water can be harvested from the moon (it’s been detected, but its availability remains unclear), our only satellite could provide important ingredients for sustaining life there. That same water could also prove to be a reliable source of hydrogen—fuel for rockets returning back to Earth, as well as spacecraft continuing beyond lunar orbit into deeper space.
This is the new space race, with a new set of players. NASA is still in the lead, but China and India are actively working on lunar missions of their own, and Russia and the EU are not to be ignored. Meanwhile, there’s a whole new category of competitors—space startups, from Elon Musk’s game changing SpaceX, to Jeff Bezos’s well-capitalized Blue Origin, to newer companies which are just getting started.
Our field guide this week will address all these topics and more. Including:
- An interview with NASA director James Bridenstine
- An interactive on lunar landing sites
- A look at the true value of a moon rock
- A lunar dictionary
- A tool kit of resources to continue tracking our lunar progress
- And much more…
Let’s keep learning. Send ideas, questions, comments, and astronaut ice cream to members@qz.com.
Hope you have a rewarding day,
Sam Grobart
Quartz membership editor