Google search of Moon could result in $20 million

William Atkins
Saturday, 23 February 2008 20:13

Science - Space

If a privately funded spacecraft can find its way to the Moon and travel about on its surface, Google will award the developers $20 million in the quest for the Google Lunar X Prize.         

The Google Lunar X Prize, commonly called Moon 2.0, is a lunar exploration contest, announced on September 13, 2007, and organized by the X PRIZE Foundation and sponsored by Google.

According to the Google Lunar X Prize website, the challenge is for privately-funded organizations to attempt to launch, land, and operate a lunar rover on the Moon’s surface.

The first team to successfully complete this task and to move a rover over 1,640 feet (500 meters) on the lunar surface and to transmit back to Earth high-definition images, data, and video will win US$20 million.

The second team to successfully complete this mission will receive $5 million.

However, the teams must complete the mission by December 31, 2012 to receive all of the prize money.

If the mission is completed after that date to December 31, 2014, the first-place team only receives $15 million.

Thus, ten space-faring teams have announced their intention to go for the Google Lunar X Prize (and to go where a private company has not gone before).

They are (in alphabetical order):

1. ARCA (Aeronautics and Cosmonautics Romanian Association—headquartered in Valcea, Romania)

http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/lunar/teams/arca

2. Astrobotic Technology Inc. (University of Arizona, Carnegie Mellon University (headed by Dr. William “Red” Whittaker), Raytheon Missile Systems Company, and others)

http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/

3. CHANDAH (founded by Adil Rahim Jafry, a one-man operation out of the United States)

http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/lunar/teams/chandah

4. FredNet (Team FREDNET—three Open Source systems, software, and hardware developers, led by Fred J. Bourgeois, III)

http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/lunar/teams/frednet

5. Italia (Team Italia—Italy)

http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/lunar/teams/team-italia

The final five competitors to the Google Lunar X Prize follow on the next page.