Indeed, even to the moon.

The auditor for NASA didn’t mince words Tuesday when he stated to lawmakers that NASA’s lunar program will cost more than originally projected a decade ago.

“We have found out that four Artemis mission launches will cost each $4.1 billion, which is a high price that we find unsustainable,” NASA Inspector general Paul Martin told a House Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics.

NASA’s lunar program is called Artemis. This is a list of NASA’s lunar missions. The agency has been developing the Space Launch System (SLS), a rocket and Orion capsule that would carry astronauts to the Moon. BoeingSLS is being built by the principal contractor, Lockheed MartinOrion Development is at the forefront of his efforts.

In 2012, just after SLS’s announcement, NASA officials estimated that each mission would cost about $500 million — with the rocket targeting a 2017 debut. According to NASA auditors, today’s cost of the rocket has risen eightfold.

You will also need to pay other expenses. Martin stated that the estimate of $4.1 billion is for production and ground operations only, and does not account for development costs to bring the Artemis program up to the point it has.

“It is a difficult development [process], of course, but we did see very poor contractor performance on Boeing’s part – poor planning and poor execution,” Martin said. We saw NASA use cost-plus contracts to build the combined SLS/Orion system. NASA was not benefitting from the contract management.

Boeing has not yet responded to my request for comment about Martin’s comments.

While NASA last year delayed the first Artemis astronaut moon landing to 2025Martin indicated that it would take time to build a lunar crew lander, and that next-generation spacesuits will be developed. This means that the launch date for the first mission is likely to slip to 2026.

SLS’s rocket launch costs are much higher than any other monster rocket currently in development. SpaceX’s Starship.

SpaceX’s fully-reusable rocket Starship has been developed with the aim of transporting cargo as well as people to Mars. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk recently estimated that Starship’s development cost would be 5% to 10% of the Apollo-era Saturn V rocket – which, at an inflation-adjusted $50 billion, puts Starship’s development cost at $2.5 billion to $5 billion.

Beyond a development cost at a fraction of SLS, SpaceX also expects the cost per launch will be far less expensive – with Musk saying last month that he is “highly confident it would be less than $10 million.”

Starship and SLS have not yet reached space, however both launch sites for their inaugural launches this year are being considered.

NASA’s Artemis program is equally concerned with Starship. SpaceX was awarded a contract worth $2.9 billion to build a rocket that will be used as the crew lunar landing vehicle. SpaceX continues to develop its Starship since it began testing in earnest in 2019. NASA has lost seven months due to the protest and lawsuit. Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin last year.

NASA representatives keep presenting Orion and SLS to be crucial for a sustainable approach that re-establishes a human presence at the moon.

However, the cost continues to rise. But the costs continue to mount. Inspector General’s recent audit of ArtemisNASA has “proposed to spend $93B on Artemis efforts through 2025,” and $40 billion of that money was spent already.