Transition to Commercial Lunar Operations Workshop

Thursday, October 12, 2023

Venue: Community College of Allegheny County, Pittsburgh, PA & Hybrid

In order to stimulate commercial participation in our return to the lunar surface, our understanding of the initial commercial on-ramp of logistics support needs to be broadened and expanded. This workshop will begin the examination of how this could be done.

In this one-day workshop, we will work to articulate the coordinated steps across stakeholders that will enable the transition a longer/sustained human presence on the lunar surface, with particular emphasis on how commercial operations be stimulated from improving knowledge of supply and demand and through the development of robust commercial on-ramps. Pre-workshop materials and questions will be distributed so that progress can be made during the one-day workshop without devoting a large amount of time to overview talks. This information will be collated by the Workshop Steering Committee and sent out to participants prior to the workshop.

Pre-workshop questionnaires will be distributed to registered participants.

WHY? Learning from history, a successful transition to commercial space operations requires construction of hardware, agreements and operations with the future in mind.

WHO? While the workshop is predominantly aimed at enabling commercial stakeholders, participation is essential from all domestic and international partners.

WHAT? A step-by-step approach to facilitate commercially-led efforts on the lunar surface aimed at a future of predominantly commercial customers and providers at the Moon. Such activities have been proven though successful commercial cargo and crew missions to the International Space Station, and through the development of commercial space stations that will operate in low-Earth orbit.

HOW? Through facilitated dialog rather than presentations, with specific outcomes and required actions identified by workshop close.

Workshop Products:

• Actions – with roles and timelines identified
• Input to 2024+ NASA annual architecture review
• Virtual follow-up meetings to review progress between stakeholders
• Define next steps

Proposed Agenda:

Supporting Materials:

This workshop will bound the issue by jointly defining the criteria needed to enable sustainable human presence while facilitating commercial interest. While lunar surface infrastructure development is underway, defining the type of bases and services of interest (McMurdo-type science, industry/technology park and laboratory, and/or tourist destination), and the criteria for where that base and infrastructure should be placed is of primary importance.

Workshop participants are assumed to be familiar with the following documents

• M2M Executive Summary
  • https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/m2m-objectives-exec-summary.pdf
• M2M Strategy and Objectives Development
  • https://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/atoms/files/m2m_strategy_and_objectives_development.pdf
• M2M Additional Architecture Context
  • https://www.nasa.gov/MoonToMarsArchitecture
• STMD Envisioned Futures Priorities
  • https://techport.nasa.gov/framework
• DARPA LunA-10
  • https://www.darpa.mil/news-events/2023-08-15