Abstract
INTRODUCTION: During the sixties, NASA and other space agencies did not need to defend their budget. Now things have changed with the trend towards commercialising space and new ambitions to conquer the Moon offering interesting resources. There is no doubt that the lunar exploration will generate economic value. A need is therefore emerging, whether from institutional actors or from new private actors to measure the economic value of such a space exploration or even space exploitation. Short-term economic impacts of space exploration are already well documented in the literature. However, measuring the economic impacts of space activities is complex, and even more trying to get a return on investment in lunar activities.
OBJECTIVES: This work aims at exploring how the economic valuation of the lunar exploration can be made and improved, where the economic value comes from and could come from. Finally, a further aim is to provide recommendations on how to better assess and discern the lunar economic impact.
METHODS: Literature review
RESULTS: The Moon is full of resources, not all of which are interesting in the short term but the lunar economy can address all sectors of the economy. Measurements of lunar potential economic impacts can be improved with better cooperation between the different stakeholders.
CONCLUSION & RECOMMENDATIONS: The recommendations are mainly based on the creation of an economic framework which can be done with more collaboration on data sharing.
