NASA is currently developing a lunar base at the moon’s south pole, with plans to transport rovers, landers, and drones to the surface before the first Artemis astronauts arrive as early as 2028. This infrastructure push follows the April 2026 Artemis II mission, which carried four astronauts on a record-breaking lunar flyaround.
Lunar Infrastructure and the Artemis Program
NASA has initiated the first phase of its moon base project by awarding hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts to four U.S. companies. The agency intends to establish a permanent presence on the lunar surface, moving beyond the exploration goals of the 1960s and 1970s. According to AP News, the hardware delivery schedule is designed to precede the arrival of human crews.
Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin is slated to provide two landers tasked with delivering lunar buggies to the south pole. These vehicles, known as lunar terrain vehicles, are being manufactured by Astrolab and Lunar Outpost. Additionally, Firefly Aerospace—which achieved a successful lunar landing last year—has been contracted to deliver the mission’s first drones. The contract structure, known as the Lunar Terrain Vehicle Services (LTVS) contract, mandates that these companies provide the rovers as a service rather than NASA owning the hardware outright. Astrolab is developing the FLEX rover, which features a modular payload system capable of carrying 1,500 kilograms of cargo, while Lunar Outpost’s Lunar Dawn rover utilizes a pressurized chassis designed to withstand the thermal extremes of the Shackleton Crater region. Firefly’s delivery system will utilize their Blue Ghost lander, which is currently undergoing final integration testing at their Cedar Park, Texas facility.
The second phase of the base development is scheduled for 2029 into the early 2030s, focusing on the construction of permanent infrastructure, including a power grid. NASA’s moon base program executive, Carlos Garcia-Galan, emphasized the long-term intent of these operations.
“We are not just looking for a footprint; we are looking for a sustainable industrial capability that allows us to leverage lunar resources to power the next generation of deep space exploration,” Garcia-Galan stated during a 2026 industry briefing at the Johnson Space Center.
By the 2030s, the agency expects the base to support astronauts for extended periods within specialized permanent habitats. Prior to these landings, the upcoming Artemis III mission, targeted for mid-2027, will involve a team of astronauts practicing the docking of the Orion capsule with lunar landers currently in development by SpaceX and Blue Origin. SpaceX’s Starship Human Landing System (HLS) has already successfully completed an uncrewed propellant transfer test in Earth orbit, a prerequisite for the high-energy maneuvers required to reach the lunar south pole. Blue Origin’s Blue Moon lander, designated as the Mark 1, is currently undergoing vacuum chamber testing at the Glenn Research Center’s Plum Brook Station to validate its cryogenic fluid management systems.
Scientific Estimates: Trees and Stars
While NASA focuses on expanding human reach into the solar system, public discourse frequently contrasts the scale of Earth’s biology with the magnitude of the cosmos. A common comparison involves the estimated number of trees on Earth versus the number of stars in the Milky Way.
According to research cited by Snopes, a 2015 study published in the journal Nature provided an estimate of 3.04 trillion trees on Earth. This figure represented a significant increase over previous estimates, such as a 2005 calculation of 400.25 billion trees. The 2015 study utilized 428,775 field measurements to map global tree density. Thomas Crowther, the lead researcher on the 2015 study from Yale University, noted that the disparity between previous estimates was largely due to the inclusion of boreal forests and previously unmapped high-latitude regions that contain higher densities of coniferous species than satellite imagery alone suggested.
In contrast, estimates for the number of stars in the Milky Way vary based on the models used and the average mass attributed to stars. Maggie Masetti, a NASA education and outreach specialist, indicated that the most common estimates range from 100 billion to 400 billion stars. Because these figures are subject to significant limitations and are difficult to verify, they remain approximations rather than definitive counts. Independent astronomers, such as those at the European Southern Observatory (ESO), have corroborated these ranges by utilizing Gaia spacecraft data, which suggests that the Milky Way’s star count is heavily weighted toward low-mass M-dwarf stars, which are significantly dimmer and harder to detect than the G-type stars like our Sun.
NASA’s Current Operational Scope
As of May 31, 2026, NASA operates under the leadership of administrator Jared Isaacman, who has held the position since December 2025. The agency is an independent branch of the U.S. federal government with a fiscal year 2026 budget authorized at $24.4 billion. This budget includes a specific $3.2 billion allocation for the Artemis campaign’s surface operations, representing an 8% increase over the previous fiscal cycle.
Beyond its lunar initiatives, NASA continues to manage a wide array of scientific and aeronautical programs. The agency maintains ten field centers across the United States and manages major observatories, including the James Webb Space Telescope and the Hubble Space Telescope. Recent work at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, includes the final inspection of the primary mirror for the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. This 7.9-foot mirror is designed to collect light from distant cosmic objects, enabling the telescope to capture detailed panoramas of space. According to the Roman project office, the mirror is coated with a specialized layer of silver to enhance infrared reflectivity, allowing it to survey the sky with 100 times the field of view of the Hubble Space Telescope.
The agency’s ongoing research spans Earth observation, heliophysics, and robotic solar system exploration, including the continued operation of the Perseverance rover. Perseverance is currently navigating the Jezero Crater delta, having successfully collected 24 samples of igneous and sedimentary rock for the upcoming Mars Sample Return mission. Through its partnerships with international organizations—such as the European Space Agency, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency—and commercial entities, NASA maintains a broad infrastructure for both civil space exploration and aeronautics research. Critics, however, including the Government Accountability Office (GAO), have recently cautioned that the overlap between NASA’s commercial crew programs and internal research development could lead to budget overruns if the current cadence of hardware testing for the lunar base does not meet the established 2027 performance milestones.
