It’s a power move.
The Trump administration aims to accelerate the construction of a nuclear reactor on the moon, Transportation Secretary and acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy wrote in a memo distributed internally on Monday.
The space agency has previously explored the possibility of installing an electricity-generating nuclear reactor on the lunar surface capable of powering a sustained human presence, but Duffy intends to fast-track the project and more than double the reactor’s power output, according to documents obtained by The Post.
“To properly advance this critical technology to be able to support a future lunar economy, high power energy generation on Mars, and to strengthen our national security in space, it is imperative the agency move quickly,” Duffy wrote in the memo.
“It is about winning the second space race,” a NASA senior official told Politico, which first reported on Duffy’s plans.
Duffy’s directive will instruct NASA to seek out proposals for a 100-kilowatt nuclear reactor that would be ready for launch by 2030.
In 2022, NASA’s “Fission Surface Power Project” awarded design contracts for a 40-kilowatt nuclear reactor, which the agency said is capable of powering 33 households.
If another country, such as China or Russia, were to build a reactor on the moon first, it could “declare a keep-out zone which would significantly inhibit the United States,” Duffy’s order noted.
The directive calls for NASA to appoint a leader for the reactor project and to get private industry input within 60 days.
NASA will look for private spaceflight companies able to get the reactor to the moon by 2030, when China intends to launch a manned moon mission.
President Trump named Duffy, 53, the acting head of NASA last month after he withdrew the nomination of billionaire Jared Isaacman, an ally of ex-DOGE chief Elon Musk.
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The surprise move came in response to a “review” of Isaacman’s history, Trump said at the time.
Isaacman has donated tens of thousands of dollars to Democratic candidates and causes as recently as October 2024, when he gave more than $41,000 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Federal Election Commission records show.
Duffy outlined NASA’s ambitious objectives — to circle the moon, land and eventually build a base on the surface — last month in an interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity.
“We’re going to go back to the moon during Donald Trump’s presidency,” he told Hannity.
“Next year … start of the year, we are going to go back to the moon. We’re not going to land. We’re going to go around the moon. And then about a year later, we’re going to land back on the moon,” Duffy explained. “And then after that, we’re going to set up a base camp.
“We’re going to stay on the moon, and what we learn on the moon is what’s going to take us to Mars.”
A spokesperson for NASA did not respond to The Post’s request for comment.
