What I Learned at the White House Lunar Interoperability Forum

Last week, I had the opportunity to attend the Lunar Interoperability Forum at the White House. It was attended by over 100 space engineers, advocates, and policy professionals and the topic was an internet on the moon. You read that right. NASA, in partnership with several other organizations and companies, already has plans for an internet and position, navigation, and timing services on the moon, cleverly called LunaNet . The forum brought a global audience to discuss technical standards for LunaNet and for an interplanetary internet service that would cover missions to Mars. The forum was enlightening and showed how far along the research and development for this service really is. The focus of the forum was built around the need to create technical standards for LunaNet in the same way that we created things like TCP/IP for the terrestrial internet. There are dedicated scientists and visionaries working on this problem right now and I wanted to share some insights I gained from this event.  Internet in Space is Coming…Soon: With the return to piloted space flight and plans to return to the moon and go to Mars, people are starting to think about permanent habitations on celestial bodies. If that happens, there is a need for communications between habitations, relays from the far side of the moon to Earth, and for inhabitants to be able to transit the lunar surface. The answer to that is an internet and PNT service on the moon that is separate in structure and design from what we use on Earth.   The Speed of Light is Too Slow: On Earth, we can transmit data over wires, airwaves, or fiber and see negligible lag times. Over the distances we are discussing for a lunar or interplanetary internet, the speed of light will still cause delays and disruptions in our internet traffic. There is a concept called Delay/Disruption Tolerant Networks (DTN) that is the dominant technical framework for how to construct internet in space. Our ability to deal with lag times of minutes or hours will be critical to the success of internet in space.  AI Vacuum: Through the entire day, there were few, if any, mentions of the role AI would play in a future space internet architecture. The focus is on traditional radio technology with advances such as DTN built in. The space internet standardization process is not currently looking at how AI could help manage challenges of the internet in space.  Governance: The focus of the forum was on technical standards, so I did not expect a robust policy discussion, but the need for creative governance is clear. Building an entirely new internet presents opportunities for governance based on the lessons learned with the terrestrial internet. There is a need for a parallel effort to study the governance impacts and to create recommendations that can accompany the development of the technical standards.   Overall, it was an incredible experience that shed considerable light on how far the concept of internet and PNT in space has progressed. Some speakers even talked about the standards and the first implementations being within 5 years. Keep an eye on the development of space internet on the moon and beyond as a parallel effort to the continuance of human space exploration.   At the same time, we need more people to get involved in this conversation because there are opportunities to create an internet that is enabled by the most innovative technology, like AI, and for us to avoid some governance pitfalls by studying the concept early. Habitation on the moon is not far-fetched and this kind of infrastructure will be what ensures the continued success of sustained presence missions.  We should also not lose sight of the benefits for terrestrial technology that will come because of this kind of funding and engineering challenges. Building an internet in the harshest environments possible will result in innovations that will apply to people on Earth, the same way they did during the Apollo program , such as thermal blankets and even the Dustbuster. Building the first infrastructure in space, for space, is an incredible engineering challenge that will benefit we Earthlings even if we never make the trip ourselves.  Subscribe now