Outer space is one of the great mysteries of this life. Others include, but are not limited to: How was the Sphinx constructed? Is there a lost city of Atlantis? And is the Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce relationship real or a PR stunt? Those are just a few that I think about every day. One mysterious aspect of space exploration and potential bases on other planets is figuring out how we will power it. Well, nuclear might just solve that one.
You may recall that in early August of this year, the United States Secretary of Transportation and acting administrator of NASA, Sean Duffy, announced his plan to put a nuclear reactor on the moon. Now, we have more information: on August 29th NASA released the “Directive on Fission Surface Power (FSP) Development.”
The goal of this directive is to build a nuclear reactor capable of producing over 100 kilowatts of power that could be launched by 2030. This would be done with public and private partnerships and funding from the Space Acts Agreement. With China and Russia announcing plans in 2024 to build a reactor together on the moon, this has become a big moment for the United States. Space travel and exploration have long been important to world powers like the U.S., China, and Russia. So, the United States is eying nuclear as a way to strengthen its influence. If we are ever going to be able to make real strides with building on the Moon (or Mars) as well as have longer expeditions in space, we are going to need power. Things like oil or coal won’t be able to power what we need to do, and we don’t currently have any resources on the Moon to use. So, nuclear is the strong, size-effective, and cost-effective energy source we need.
And here’s where it gets really exciting: NEI, in collaboration with the Association of Commercial Space Professionals, will be hosting a Space Nuclear Seminar next year. Think of it as Comic-Con, but instead of superheroes and lightsabers, we’re gathering the brightest minds in science, policy, and industry to figure out how we keep the lights on… in space.
We’ll be talking about everything from reactors that could power a lunar base to the wild engineering needed for missions that last years instead of weeks. More details are coming soon, but until then, mark your calendar for April 2nd, 2026, or carve it into stone tablets like the Sphinx builders, whichever you prefer.
With this, we’ve solved one mystery. Now we just have to figure out what’s up with the Sphinx, Atlantis, and that pesky Taylor Swift relationship. If I had a tipline this is where I would plug it. Alas, I don’t. So instead of that, listen to this season’s episode of Fissionary where Mary and Jordan sat down with Dr. David Poston, the reactor designer behind NASA’s Kilopower project.
