A $30 Million Prize for safely landing a robotic rover on the moon traveling 500 meters, record video and collect data and send it back to Earth. The first team to do this receives $20 million dollars. Well I’m in! No wait, that’s right I can’t join, I don’t have a team. Oh well guess I’ll have to work on that one.
So, how much would it cost to put a lander/rover on the moon? There is so much that needs to be planned and engineered. Everything has to go right. Most likely there will be no second chances due to the high cost. But I’m curious what it would really cost the private sector companies who are staffed by some of the brightest minds in science to land a rover on the moon, take a few pictures, some video, and transmit that video back to Earth.
First, you have to leave Earth, then you must travel to the moon, take up orbit and then safely land on the surface of the moon. Landing isn’t easy and a craft could crash land. If all goes well, the rover will roll out over the surface of the Moon and beam home to Earth new photos of the historical event.
It shouldn’t take more than a few million dollars right? Even if it took $20 Million to complete the mission successfully, the winning team would break even on cost. The BIG money comes afterwards! Huge corporations will want a piece of that pie. Huge corporations are already vying for a spot on the list of Lunar X-Prize teams that are pursuing this ambitious undertaking. Corporations will want to invest in the winning teams, many companies are already investing in teams or have teams of their own. After one of these teams are successful there will be a rush to the moon like not other.
The next obvious step is putting a man on the moon. So where’s the Lunar Manned Mission X-Prize? Year 2020? How about sooner?
So how much money is it going to take?
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