Planning a trip for 2032? You might want to start saving up for a stay at the first hotel on the Moon, a highly ambitious new project from a California-based company looking to take adventure tourism off-planet.
GRU Space, short for Galactic Resource Utilization, opened applications for a spot at its proposed lunar hotel. Wealthy space tourists can put their hat in the ring for a hefty deposit of $1 million to be the first guests at the company’s hotel on the Moon, with the grand opening planned for as early as 2032.
The commercialization of the Moon seems inevitable at this point, and space startups are wanting to secure their spot on the lunar soil. GRU Space aims to begin testing its technology on the Moon by 2029, deploying inflatable structures and turning lunar regolith into bricks.
Open for reservation
GRU Space is a newcomer on the space industry scene. Twenty-two-year-old Skyler Chan founded the company just last year, and it has since received backing from investors at SpaceX and Anduril.
At the heart of the company is the idea that space tourism is ideal for fueling the lunar economy, targeting former participants who have already taken part in commercial spaceflight, as well as first-time thrill-seekers looking to go beyond Earth for their next adventure.
Moon-based hotels may seem far-fetched or like something out of science fiction, but the company has laid out a plan to make it happen sooner than expected. In 2029, GRU Space aims to send its first mission to the Moon using NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS), which contracts companies to land small payloads on the lunar surface.
The payload includes an inflatable structure designed to demonstrate the material that will eventually be used to build the hotel. GRU Space also plans to test a method for turning lunar regolith into bricks, which would later be used to surround the inflatable structure and protect it from the Moon’s harsh environment.
If all goes well with the first mission, GRU Space hopes to launch a larger payload on a subsequent CLPS mission. This time, the inflatable structure would be set up inside a lunar pit, a collapsed depression on the Moon that may offer warmer temperatures than the surface.
For its third mission, tentatively planned for 2032, the company aims to deploy the first version of its hotel, a much larger inflatable structure manufactured on Earth. This initial version of the Moon hotel would be big enough to support four guests at a time.
Afterwards, GRU Space will continue to scale up its lunar hotel, adding more inflatable structures surrounded by lunar bricks.
Vacation spot
NASA already has plans in place to establish a sustainable human presence on the Moon. The space agency is gearing up to launch its Artemis 2 mission as early as February, followed by Artemis 3 in 2028, which aims to land the first astronaut crew on the Moon since Apollo. Through its new lunar program, NASA seeks to establish the Artemis Base Camp for astronauts to live and work on the Moon.
China has similar plans, aiming to land its first crew of astronauts on the Moon by 2030 and build a lunar base near the south pole around 2035.
As the commercial space industry continues to grow, the privatization of space forces tourism into the equation alongside state-backed ventures. “We live during an inflection point where we can actually become interplanetary before we die,” Chan told Founded. “If we succeed, billions of human lives will be born on the moon and Mars and be able to experience the beauty of lunar and martian life.”
GRU Space will begin reviewing applications for its Moon hotel this year. If selected, participants will be asked to put down a deposit ranging from $250,000 to $1 million. The deposit will go into the final price for a stay at the hotel, which the company estimates will exceed $10 million.
Read the full article here
