PARIS — NASA has revived a robotic lunar rover mission by selecting Blue Origin to deliver it to the moon’s south pole in 2027.
NASA announced Sept. 19 that Blue Origin won a $190 million task order under the Commercial Lunar Payload Services, or CLPS, program to take the Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover, or VIPER, to the moon in late 2027.
Blue Origin will use its Blue Moon Mark 1 lander to transport VIPER. It will be the lander’s second flight, after a mission expected to launch as soon as later this year. VIPER will search for water ice at the lunar south pole, including in permanently shadowed craters.
The award marks a reversal for NASA. In July 2024, the agency said it would cancel VIPER, citing cost overruns and concerns about further growth. Officials also worried the original lander, Astrobotic’s Griffin, would not be ready for a planned September 2025 launch.
NASA later sought proposals for partnerships that could send VIPER to the moon without extra agency funding. On May 7, though, it said it would not pursue a commercial partnership and instead explore unspecified “alternative approaches.”
The new CLPS task order, called CS-7, had not been publicly disclosed before the Blue Origin award. NASA spokespersons could not answer questions about it immediately after the announcement, made near the close of business Sept. 19.
This CLPS award is structured differently. The base award covers only work to design accommodations for VIPER on Blue Moon and to get it off the lander and onto the surface after touchdown. An option would then fund delivery of VIPER. NASA states that option would be exercised after completion of the design work as well as a successful landing of the first Blue Moon mission.
“We’ve been looking for creative, cost-effective approaches to accomplish these exploration goals,” Nicky Fox, NASA associate administrator for science, said in a statement. “This private sector-developed landing capability enables this delivery and focuses our investments accordingly — supporting American leadership in space and ensuring our long-term exploration is robust and affordable.”
“Our second Blue Moon MK1 lander is already in production and well-suited to support the VIPER rover,” Blue Origin said in a social media post. “Building on the learnings from our first MK1 lander, this mission is important for future lunar permanence and will teach us about the origin and distribution of water on the moon.”
NASA is now effectively paying for two rides for VIPER. The agency kept its original CLPS award to Astrobotic, repurposing it to demonstrate Griffin’s landing capabilities. Griffin is now slated to carry commercial payloads, including the FLIP rover developed by Astrolab.
Astrobotic said it chose not to bid on the new VIPER opportunity. “Given the compressed timeline of the CS-7 mission and our commitments to existing customers, Astrobotic made the strategic decision not to submit a bid,” the company said in a statement to SpaceNews. “Our focus remains on the successful delivery of our customer payloads aboard Griffin-1, and our third lander mission thereafter.”
NASA has not disclosed details on the timeline for the CS-7 award or the number of bids it received.
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