"NASA Unveils Plan to Establish America's First Moon Base" (Building the Moon Base fact sheet)

Document: building-the-moon-base-1.pdf, two pages. No printed date. The Ignition page lists it as the "Building the Moon Base" fact sheet, "Mar 24, 2026, 173.23 KB"; the download is 177,390 bytes, which is 173.23 KB (sources/manifest.csv). Text: sources/text/docs/2026-03-building-the-moon-base-1.txt.

Summary. NASA's Ignition-day fact sheet on the Moon Base: the three phases with dates, names, what each phase delivers and how much cargo, then a page on commercial and international participation. It gives the phases' dates, figures and contents together; so does Ignition deck 2 (listed 26 March 2026; Phases). The Users Guide has figures without dates, and the Moon Base Phases page dates without launch, landing or mass figures. Its phase names differ from every other source's (open question 76). Its Phase 1 and Phase 2 figures agree with the Users Guide's, and it calls Phase 2's "during this phase"; on the wiki's reading, that makes the guide's figures per phase (open question 6).

Contents

• Opening (p. 1). The Moon Base is "Located at the lunar South Pole"; it will "serve as the proving ground for missions to Mars" and be built "alongside our commercial innovators and international partners".
• Phase 1 (Now–2029): Experiment, Learn (p. 1). "robotic and early uncrewed missions to scout, experiment, and prepare for surface operations ahead of the astronaut missions in 2028":
  • "Up to 25 missions, including 21 landings"
  • "Crewed and autonomous rovers for basic mobility and surface improvement demonstrations, hopper drones called MoonFall, and communications relay and observation satellites"
  • "Early power, navigation, communication, and nuclear RHU demonstrations to ensure systems can survive the lunar night"
  • "All the scientific payloads that can be incorporated on every lander and rover"
  • "four tons of payload delivered to test what works on the surface", called "The first real 'footprint' of the Moon Base effort"
• Phase 2 (2029–2032): Early Habitation (p. 1). "assembling semi-permanent infrastructure and begin early habitation and logistics operations":
  • "improved solar and initial nuclear-based power stations (potentially including both fission reactor and RTGs), upgraded rovers, advanced MoonFall drones, and habitation"
  • "surface-to-orbit communications stations to ensure reliable, high-quality connectivity across the lunar South Pole"
  • "up to 60 tons of cargo during this phase through up to 24 landings with low, medium and heavy cargo-class landers"
• Phase 3 (2032 and beyond): Sustained Human Presence (p. 1). "a true enduring presence as crew rotations become routine":
  • "semi-permanent habitation modules with spacious interior volume"
  • "An operational fission surface power station with sufficient power to provide steady, reliable energy through the long lunar nights, leveraging in situ resource manufacturing"
  • "Operating pressurized rovers that enable long distance exploration and surface travel"
  • "advanced logistics networks, leveraging a fleet of crewed and autonomous rovers"
  • "up to 38 tons of cargo per year … taking advantage of low cost, reusable heavy lift capabilities"
• "Commercial, International Partners at Center of Lunar Build-Up" (p. 2):
  • CLPS expanded "to include larger, more capable landers and rovers, with new task orders issued immediately"
  • "Multiple classes of LTVs starting on Phase 1, with simplified functionality, developing to more advanced vehicles in later phases" for "exploration, surface preparation to logistics"
  • "dozens of commercial launches per year through the Launch Services Program"
  • "Increasing the demand for crew and heavy-cargo beyond Artemis V, with redundant pathways to the Moon and leveraging Human Landing System and HDL Programs"
  • "multiple onramps, for new and existing providers"
  • payload opportunities in "surface and orbital relay communication, PNT, observation, in situ resource manufacturing, habitation and all the scientific payloads that mass and volume support"
  • "Opportunities for all Artemis Accords signatories to contribute technology demonstrations, scientific payloads, and foundational infrastructure in every phase"

Against the Users Guide's figures

The Users Guide prints launches, landings and payload per phase without saying whether they are per phase or running totals (Users Guide, p. 4; open question 6). The fact sheet, a month earlier, gives:

Phase	Users Guide, p. 4	This fact sheet, p. 1
1	25 launches, 21 landings, ~4,000 kg	"Up to 25 missions, including 21 landings"; "four tons of payload"
2	27 launches, 24 landings, 60,000 kg	"up to 60 tons of cargo during this phase through up to 24 landings"
3	29 launches, 28 landings, 150,000 kg	"up to 38 tons of cargo per year"; no landing count

The wiki's reading: the fact sheet's "up to 60 tons … during this phase through up to 24 landings" and the guide's 60,000 kg and 24 landings are the same figures, so the guide's Phase 2 figures are per phase; Phase 1's numbers agree too, if "four tons" is the guide's ~4,000 kg and "25 missions" its 25 launches. Neither document says it restates the other. Phase 3's figure is a yearly rate, not a phase total, so it can't be set against the guide's 150,000 kg. The fact sheet says "tons" and "missions" where the guide says kg and launches; the wiki quotes each as printed.

Where it differs from other sources

• Phase names. "Experiment, Learn", "Early Habitation" and "Sustained Human Presence" match neither the Ignition fact sheet nor the release of the same day, nor the web pages. See Phases.
• Pressurized rovers in Phase 3. The release, the Ignition fact sheet and the phases page put JAXA's pressurized rover in Phase 2. This fact sheet lists "Operating pressurized rovers" under Phase 3 and doesn't name JAXA. It doesn't say when the first arrives.
• Habitation in Phase 2. "begin early habitation" and "habitation" in Phase 2; the release has "semi‑habitable infrastructure".

What the PDF shows that the text loses

The text layer drops a dash on p. 1, joining two sentences: the PDF reads "missions to Mars - and NASA will not undertake this endeavor alone" (PDF p. 1 checked).

Related pages

Phases · Missions and assets · Moon Base needs · Ignition page · Ignition fact sheet · Human-Class Delivery Lander · Lunar Terrain Vehicle · CLPS · Lunar Nuclear Fission System