Lunar Compass: Charting a Practical Course for Sustainable Development
Author: Christine Tiballi, Open lunar fellowThe following work is completed by Christine, Open Lunar fellow researching the lunar zones research scope. This is part 1 of a series, stay tuned for more.
Imagine the Moon not as a distant, lifeless rock in the night sky, but as an ancient sibling of Earth. A consequence of immense cosmic forces that, billions of years ago, ejected a part of our planet into what would become a vital partner in Earth's own climatic and ecological dance.
Our cosmic companion’s gravitational pull is not just a distant force, but a benevolent stabilizer for Earth's axis, laying down the foundation for life's beginnings.
As evolutionary partners, our story sits on the precipice of a new shared narrative. The Moon's deceptively barren facade harbors resources of immense promise: evolutionary cosmology and geology, commercially viable critical elements and rare isotopes, and perhaps the grandfather of them all - water ice. Echoing the early terrestrial explorers who opened vast unexplored tracts to development, the Moon now beckons as the next frontier.
But there is urgency in how we proceed. While Earth has limited regenerative capacity, the Moon has no such buffer, where billions of years of cosmic bombardment from solar winds to asteroids have been the delivery mechanism of abundance. Unchecked use could turn the Moon’s surface into a cosmic dust bowl or trigger a geopolitical crisis. Unless we establish operational frameworks and regulatory constraints, we risk political tensions and resource depletion, putting our shared future in jeopardy.
Introduction
In the coming decade, with over 100 missions planned by 2030, humanity’s relationship with the Moon will fundamentally change. Beneath the urgency of exploration lies an enormous challenge: safeguarding this fragile, shared frontier from geopolitical conflict, environmental degradation, and unchecked development. The Moon’s vast resources, located within concentrated regions, will become the focal point of a bustling but concerning intersection of interests between science and industry. Currently, there are no strategic operational frameworks for regulating and monitoring lunar activities, aside from the guiding levers of the Outer Space Treaty (OST) outlining due regard, non-appropriation, and access as the province of all mankind.
Without a clear operating framework, code of conduct, and governing guidelines, we risk a “wild west” approach where the greater good can be traded for short term profit and prestige by those with current means, at the expense of future actors and the finite and pristine lunar ecosystem. Without cataloging and carefully coordinating activities in four dimensions (who, what, where, when, and how long), we risk not just mission success, but contamination across other activities, safety, geopolitical conflict, and potentially the very resources we wish to study and harness for future exploration.
This research proposes a novel operating framework, governance structure, and sustainability guidelines for future lunar missions. Using elements of the Svalbard Treaty, Oceanic sovereignty, resource management frameworks, and Public Purpose Trusts (PPTs) as terrestrial guides, specifically regarding open access, adaptable environmental protocols, and a unique local governance arrangement, a lunar equivalent is proposed: a lunar equilibrium policy which ensures equal access and non-discrimination to established lunar areas, adaptive environmental protocols including evolving strategies based on data and discovery feedback loops, lunar precautionary areas and harmonization areas where sensitive activities, proximity activities, or high contamination probability exists, and a lunar consortium comprising a broad spectrum of both national, commercial, and community stakeholders to manage stewardship and areas deemed high-importance.
The Current Landscape
Over the next decade and beyond, the Moon will bear witness to increasing levels of activity: the most significant and perhaps consequential loci are the Artemis Base (US-led coalition) and the China and Russia led International Lunar Research Station (ILRS). Both align signatories along mission milestones with increasing cadence and complexity, married to technological and scientific advancement, In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU), and strategies of incremental autonomy. But despite the parallel focus on standards, cooperation, and interoperability, neither explicitly states its objectives in relation to non-appropriation (permanence), nor its willingness to cooperate (beyond due regard) with the other, setting the stage for terrestrial geopolitical conflict to remain tethered to us.
With the predicted mission cadence, comes an equal breadth of anticipated mission objectives: from orbiters and rovers to early power systems, excavation capabilities, and even “permanent” habitation. This evolution from exploration into strategic operations presages a crucial shift in our underlying approach. How we prepare for that inevitable “gold rush” will lay the groundwork for humanity’s future posture off-planet.
Amidst this new wave of activity, the OST, representing the cornerstone of international space law, stands at an acute juncture. This foundational agreement is facing unprecedented challenges around non-appropriation and the assertion of space as a shared domain for all. Increases in commercial missions indicate a new lunar economy is developing around resource extraction, triggering questions around resource jurisdiction, rights and equitable access. Stakeholders are reevaluating the definition of “value”, whether that pertains to location, resources, or data.
By upholding the ethical and open-access principles safeguarded by the Outer Space Treaty (OST) and the Moon Treaty, scientific exploration can thrive alongside commercial ventures, resources can be sustainably managed while respecting the future rights of all stakeholders, and more importantly, we can lay the foundations for a new equitable and cooperative blueprint driving our collective push into the deeper cosmos.
Pivotal to preventing geopolitical conflict and ensuring continued advancement, frameworks that hinge on open collaboration, transparent communication, and due regard are fundamental to peaceful exploration.
Framework for Designated Activity Areas
As the number of stakeholders accessing the Moon rises, the necessity for clear boundaries and a code of conduct becomes tantamount. In order to avoid accidents and conflict in this burgeoning arena, it is essential to establish precise guidelines that delineate 'who' does 'what', 'where', 'when', and for 'how long.' Such guardrails are not merely administrative guidelines, but a foundation to prevent significant economic, environmental, and safety risks. Unrestrained activities could lead to resource conflicts, contamination, and operational hazards that compromise scientific, commercial, and broader human objectives.
Adaptive Environmental Protocols
Drawing from terrestrial resource management practices, use types and activity areas have been codified and regulated in environments with similar concern for sensitive environmental conditions, scarce or complex resource availability, and competing commercial and geopolitical interests. Co-opting these systems into lunar adaptive protocols requires thinking in both near and long-term horizons to promote compounding discovery, as well as careful consideration for mutable and fluid conditions. Near-term paralysis can only be ameliorated with precise definitions of resource boundaries and activity guardrails.
The focus on resource management as a framework stems from the careful consideration of all proposed lunar activity. In order to support, enable, and unlock the lunar/cislunar economy, resource utilization is a fundamental cornerstone. Leveraging similarly complex terrestrial models with measurable and sustainable outcomes can yield fruitful operational examples. In particular, marine resource management which centers oceanic sovereignty, fluid boundary conditions based on dynamic feedback loops, and temporally adjusted resource capacity provide ripe case studies to formulate a lunar alternative. Other frameworks lack the adaptive capacity and relevant governance mechanisms for sustainable growth. By using a governance structure like the Svalbard Treaty, activity can coalesce around open access and management, adding another layer of operational functionality.
Additionally, ecosystem management models found across many Indigenous Knowledge (IK) systems elucidate a respect for resources that transcends modern notions of exploitation. These concepts are particularly visible within the Cook Islands’ marine use policy and the Tongan-Fijian scholar Epeli Hau’ofa’s concept of ‘‘Oceanian Sovereignty’’. Ongoing comprehensive assessments with stringent ecological safeguards will ensure minimal impact without hampering discovery or progress. This structured approach, endorsed by existing frameworks and broadened with adaptive new insights, is key to unlocking the Moon's potential without repeating the oversights of our own world’s industrial ventures.
In order to push these models into an executable process, let’s imagine a scenario where concurrent missions sit adjacent to one another in a permanently shadowed region: one involves a mining operation to extract water ice and the other is a scientific mission studying geological artefacts with contamination-sensitive equipment. The adaptive protocols could use pre-agreed contamination risk scores for all overlapping missions and use digital tools to monitor and forecast risks, in order to manage an allowable margin of error. Adaptive policies would also mandate regular reporting between stakeholders, so that active prevention of contamination risk prevents future conflicts.
Moving beyond resource and sustainability frameworks, Part II will explore a viable starting point for applying adaptive resource models, based on existing and forecasted missions and payloads. A new mechanism for architecting designated activity areas which correspond to both operational strategies and guidelines for communication, cooperation, and transparency is highlighted.
This is Part I in a series, stay tuned for Part II.
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