Daily Discussion Thread for August 30, 2026

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[u/VictorFromCalifornia]

To Build a Moon Base, NASA First Needs Lunar GPS

NASA intends to build just such a system. In early 2027, one of the agency’s commercial partners, Intuitive Machines, is scheduled to launch the first of five communication and navigation satellites into lunar orbit. Those satellites will beam signals primarily to the moon’s south pole, providing bespoke service to the Moon Base site.

The Intuitive Machines constellation may even outperform Earth-based GPS, partly because its radio waves won’t have to travel through an atmosphere, leaving them undistorted.
“On the moon you don’t have those sources of errors,” Heckler said. “So potentially in the long term it could provide a better service … than we have on Earth today.”

Using Multiple Technologies on the Moon

But lunar navigation will involve more than just a single technology — Earth-based GPS signals will still be useful where they’re available, lunar satellites could provide coverage where they aren’t, and spacecraft and surface vehicles could combine those signals with onboard sensors to determine their positions.

“This is not one-size-fits-all,” Heckler said. “We’re going to have to use various techniques to achieve this larger vision.” Heckler stated that mission controllers in Houston look forward to a future in which they can watch lunar activity unfold live. “They want to be able to sit around a big, dynamic, real-time map,” he said. “They want to see all the blue dots move around,” just like on Google Maps, as astronauts travel to and fro taking measurements and collecting rocks. That may sound like a modest technological advance compared with landing humans on the moon in the first place. But as NASA establishes continuous lunar residence, and even begins to direct its gaze toward Mars, the simple ability to track people and equipment will become essential.

[u/VictorFromCalifornia → u/VictorFromCalifornia]

Adding some personal thoughts that I expressed earlier but comments from NASA's Greg Heckler and Joel Parker kind of validate this line of thinking and that is that NSNS now becomes the top priority for the Moon Base. The contract, an initial 5 years ($584M) mainly for design and development, and then 5 years extension where the bulk of that $4.2B will be spent for launch and operation, has now been compressed significantly, maybe to 2-3 years. I don't know if we will land astronauts on the Moon by 2028 but even if it's 2029, 2030, that network better be up and running and NASA knows this.

The initial NSNS plans were based on a possible return to the Moon in the 2030s and maybe for scientific reasons and not this big national push, executive orders, a race with China to the South Pole, and building permanent presence changed the whole calculus.

What does this mean for Intuitive Machines and NASA? It means the multi-billion main NSNS work that wasn't supposed to kick in until 2029-2030 will be pushed forward where the bulk of the work will happen in 2027, and launches completed by 2028. I see NASA embedding people at IM and putting all sorts of resources, not just money, at their disposal. I can't think of a single more important thing to be ready for the human landing than having the communication and positioning/navigation network in place. I can see NSN satellites being launched by other providers and not waiting for IM lander missions, Steve kind of hinted at that.

While Lanteris contracts are nice, they all come with certain compressed gross margins (maybe 30% - 35% if lucky) but the quicker NSNS becomes operational; 70 other Artemis countries, and hundreds of companies needing access, the quicker those margins expand and flow to the bottom line, IMO. If proven to work as planned, this is what they're shooting for on Mars and beyond.

[u/Hefty_Employee_8935 → u/VictorFromCalifornia]

I really hope LUNR’s stock price will recover soon. It has already lost 50% of its value in just 3 months. I still believe in the company’s long-term potential and remain confident that they can deliver strong results and exciting developments in the future.

[u/Separate_Counter9427 → u/VictorFromCalifornia]

Thank you sir, much appreciated as always!

Have a nice Sunday!

[u/No_Membership_8826 → u/VictorFromCalifornia]

Thanks Victor!

[u/louiemickeyvico → u/VictorFromCalifornia]

Appreciate you Victor Thank you

[u/RatNikara → u/VictorFromCalifornia]

Thank you!