• Question: How much does it cost to go to the moon?

    Asked by lauralufc to Suzie, Sheila, Rob, Geoff, Adam on 14 Mar 2011 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Suzie Sheehy

      Suzie Sheehy answered on 13 Mar 2011:

      I’m not sure this is an accurate estimate, but the total cost of all the Apollo missions was $25.4 billion in 1973. That was for 24 astronauts who actually went to the moon. Half of those walked on it. Does that mean it cost £1 billion per astronaut? If you want to view it that way, perhaps!? But we now have a lot more infrastructure and a lot more technology… but it’s still expensive! (Especially as £1billion in 1973 would equate to a lot more in today’s money…)

      My question to you, though, is “do you think it was worth it?”

    • Photo: Sheila Kanani

      Sheila Kanani answered on 13 Mar 2011:

      This is a tough one because the value of money changes so much over the years!
      We reckon that in the 60s, during the Apollo era, ALL the missions cost a total of $20 billion in todays terms. Some of the missions were more expensive, some were cheaper, but they got cheaper as the technology had been built and everyone understood what they were doing.
      Nowadays we dont actually have the techonology to go to the Moon, so we’d have to start from scratch again, which would be costly. I’d put an estimate of about $3 billion, but it might be way more than that!
      However, a space tourist agency is advertising a round trip at the cost of $100 million, so if you have some spare cash you should go!

    • Photo: Robert Simpson

      Robert Simpson answered on 13 Mar 2011:

      If the Apollo space programme, which put men on the Moon in 1960s and 70s, was done today, it would cost around $200 billion (£125 billion). That is a lot of money, but it is estimated that for every $1 put into the Apollo program more than $10 came back into the US economy through innovation and through inspiration. That’s pretty good value!

    • Photo: Adam Tuff

      Adam Tuff answered on 14 Mar 2011:

      There is actually a company in America selling tickets to the moon for $100m (about £60,000,000). I think you’d have to find more people to go with you though!

      I think the space shuttles cost about two billion dollars each, and that’s before you even pay or your fuel! Space travel certainly is not cheap!

    • Photo: Geoff McBride

      Geoff McBride answered on 14 Mar 2011:

      A complicated question since no two spacecraft are the same and different missions used different methods. The Apollo missions took 3 days to get there with a crew of 3. The SMART-1 mission took roughly 15 months it had no crew and was contolled from mission control in Germany. My real answer would be to say that it takes roughly 18 kg of fuel to get 1 kg into orbit then more fuel to go to the moon. Space missions are relatively cheap these days about the price of an average block buster movie.

Comments