In April 2025, China reportedly unveiled plans to build a nuclear power plant on the Moon by 2035. This plant would support its planned international lunar research station. The United States countered in August, when acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy reportedly suggested a US reactor would be operational on the Moon by 2030.

The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) is expected to fast-track plans to build a nuclear reactor on the moon by 2030. The reactor is said to be part of the country’s broader ambitions to set up a permanent base for humans to live on the lunar surface.

Placing an atomic energy source on the lunar surface is “not science fiction,” experts say, but does pose technical challenges.