Matt Miller

I think our generation appreciates having a program that now we get a chance to take our own moonshots, what we call great things that humans accomplish.

NASA's Artemis program is the space agency's ambitious mission to send humans back to the moon for the first time in more than half a century.

The last time NASA sent humans to the moon, they were locked in a space race with the Soviet Union.

This time, NASA wants to go back to the moon to stay in order to learn how to live sustainably off of the lunar surface.

Prior to Artemis II, NASA launched the very first major mission in the Artemis program called Artemis I, which sent the Orion crew capsule around the moon to demonstrate that they could work without a crew on board.

Now it's time to show that they can actually keep a crew alive while traveling to deep space.

The entire Artemis program has come under significant criticism for how much time it's taking to build and how much money it's costing the taxpayer.

There is an estimate that between 2012 and 2025, the Artemis program has cost roughly $93 billion.

Despite the criticism, it does benefit from strong congressional support.

Many of the programs that are needed for Artemis are spread across the entire United States and provide a lot of jobs for constituents.

While the Artemis 2 mission is coming up, Artemis 3, Artemis 4, Artemis 5 are all a bit of open question marks at the moment.

There's development that needs to happen for hardware, notably with the landers that will actually take the humans to the surface of the moon.

NASA is pulling out all the stops with its contractors to ensure that a landing occurs no later than 2028, but it remains to be seen if that date will actually be possible.

You can watch the full episode online or on the Bloomberg Terminal.

And whenever I'm wondering about space, I just watch this show because Ed Ludlow and Lauren Grush know more about going to space than anybody else.

Let's talk right now, though, about what to expect from this historic mission tomorrow, what it means for America's broader space ambitions.

For that, we're joined by...

Esne Uzo-Okoro, she is a senior fellow at the Harvard Belfer Center, but also a former NASA executive and a former assistant director for space policy at the White House under the Biden administration.

And Esne, thanks so much for joining us.

Why do we have to go up there and fly around?