Europe-based global major aerospace group Airbus, French-based global major industrial gases group Air Liquide and Luxembourg-based lunar micro-robotic exploration company ispace Europe announced on Tuesday that they had jointly created a non-profit organisation which they had named EURO2MOON. They also announced that the European Space Resources Innovation Centre (a department of the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology) had confirmed its intention to become the first non-founder member of the new organisation.

EURO2MOON will focus on three main objectives. First, promoting the better use of the Moon’s natural resources. Second, accelerating the development of the cis-lunar economy (that is, economic activities on the Moon, orbiting the Moon, or undertaken between the Moon and the Earth or in the Moon’s orbit around the Earth). Third, ‘federating’ the industrial efforts, needed to fulfil the first two objectives, across Europe. These will all contribute to its overarching aim of establishing a strong and leading European cis-lunar industry founded on an ambitious vision of ‘in-situ resources utilisation’ on and/or near the Moon.

It seeks to achieve these objectives by providing a platform to exchange ideas and proposals and by so doing, create a common industrial vision that will encompass both industrial and institutional ecosystems across Europe. Such a vision would include recommendations for demonstration concepts, commercial programmes and global roadmaps.

“The Moon will present enormous opportunities over the coming decades both scientifically and economically,” pointed out Airbus space exploration head Andreas Hammer. “By uniting our efforts in Europe we can harness our skills and expertise to bring maximum benefits for everyone on Earth.”

The new organisation will draw on expertise from both its private-sector and public-sector partners to address issues regarding the exploration of the Moon’s surface and the commercial and sustainable exploitation of its resources. It will also focus on related topics such as the life support and energy requirements for operations on the Moon and long-duration transport.

Membership of EURO2MOON will be open to both research organisations and industry, provided they are interested in developing services and technologies that can be used for the management of lunar resources. In geographical terms, membership will be open to any enterprise that has its head office, or undertakes key activities, in countries which are members of the European Space Agency and/or the European Union (these are completely separate entities).