The tree · Energy · Happens to the world · Could be decided within 5 to 20 years
A nuclear reactor runs on the lunar surface for a year
A lunar night lasts two weeks, so any permanent base needs power that does not come from the Sun. A small fission reactor of a few tens of kilowatts is the planned answer; on January 13th, 2026 the US space agency and energy department announced a 2030 target for a reactor on the lunar surface, a target rather than a flight. It is the planned power source for mining, refining, and a permanent outpost, and since September 25th, 2026 one of three routes to the power they need (E-power-through-the-lunar-night-at-a-surface-site).
The test: what counts as it having happened
A fission reactor on the lunar surface makes at least forty kilowatts of net electrical output available to external loads for at least ninety percent of a twelve-month period, confirmed by the responsible agency's mission record.
Settled by: The responsible agency's mission record
The odds, by how long I live
| baselineto 2071 ± 8 | moderateto 2080 | strongto 2095 | radicalto 2136 | openno deadline |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 70% | 80% | 90% | 95% | 96% |
Each column is a different guess at how long I live, from current trends (baseline) to open-ended. The number is the chance this happens before that deadline, assuming everything it depends on happens first. As of September 19th, 2026.
Why these numbers: The schedule has already slipped to the early 2030s and reactor programs slip more than most, but two space agencies and a rival national program are all aimed at it.
What this one is worth
If this happened tomorrow and nothing else changed, the chance that I live and work off Earth by 2071 goes from 0.5% to 0.4% (too small to tell apart from chance). If it turned out no, the same number goes to 0.5% (too small to tell apart from chance).
| Longevity scenario | baseline2071 ± 8 | moderate2080 | strong2095 | radical2136 | openno deadline |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The headline as it stands | 0.5% | 1.2% | 3.8% | 11% | 15% |
| If this settled yes now | 0.4% | 1.2% | 3.9% | 11% | 15% |
| If this settled no now | 0.5% | 1.3% | 3.8% | 11% | 15% |
This is what the site says in advance, before the thing happens. When it does, the
ledger entry that records it quotes this figure beside what actually followed, so a
reader can see whether the prediction held. Worked out at the run
2026-10-11-scan by holding this step at each outcome in turn and
playing the whole tree out again, 20,000 times per
scenario. That is a throw of the dice, so a move smaller than about
0.10 points is inside the noise rather than
a finding.
What the ledger says about this step
- Forty-one steps had their criteria tightened so that two readers would agree when each has happened, with no number moved for that alone 2026-09-20 The tree itself changed
The last 3 checks
Once a week the tree is read against the news, node by node, against the test above. Open a line to see what that week held. Every check ever made on this node is on the Radar page.
-
2026-11-01 Nothing new
No new schedule or award news dated in the window; results were older NASA and DOE design-phase coverage and 2025 to early 2026 China and Russia lunar plant plans (mid-2030s).
-
2026-10-04 Nothing new
Idaho National Laboratory's request for information on Fission Surface Power closed September 8th, 2026, with a request for proposals to follow, and the target remains about 2030. Plans and procurement steps only, no reactor operating.
-
2026-09-19 No change
NASA's SPARC or Lunar Reactor-1 solicitation for a 20 kilowatt lunar flight system remains a draft as of September 1st, 2026, with no contractor selected; the January 2026 NASA-DOE agreement targeting a reactor by 2030 remains the operative plan. This is procurement-process news, not hardware progress toward operation.
Revisions
| Date | Field | From | To | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-09-19 | resolution | 'delivering at least forty kilowatts ... operates ... for twelve continuous months' | at least forty kilowatts of net electrical output available to loads for at least ninety percent of a twelve-month period | Step 27 outside-model review, item 64 (docs/reviews/2026-09-19-rulings.md): 'twelve continuous months' would have failed on a single maintenance outage, and net output to loads was unspecified. Decided September 19th, 2026. |
| 2026-09-19 | description | 'aimed at the end of this decade ... plans delivery of a reactor to the launch pad in the early 2030s' | the 2030 target announced 2026-01-13, dated | Step 27 outside-model review, item 64: the description needed a dated update; the release of January 13th, 2026 was fetched and checked. Decided September 19th, 2026. |
| 2026-09-25 | description | 'It is the power source that mining, refining, and a permanent outpost assume.' | the planned power source, and since 2026-09-25 one of three routes to power through the lunar night | Candidate 1 of docs/proposal-function-over-route-2026-09-25.md, I approved September 25th, 2026: lunar material at scale now depends on the function step E-power-through-the-lunar-night-at-a-surface-site, with this reactor as one route under it. Text only; the reactor's criterion and numbers are unchanged. |
Notes
Drafted as a leaf; moved to mid on September 8th, 2026 after checking the program's schedule, which has slipped to the early 2030s. NASA release of January 13th, 2026 setting a 2030 surface-reactor target fetched September 19th, 2026.
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The record itself is data/E-energy.toml in the public repository.