When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.A prototype of a Canadian lunar rover in testing at the Canadian Space Agency, on moon-like terrain. | Credit: Canadian Space AgencyCanada will cancel its first rover mission to the moon’s south pole as the Canadian government shifts its spending to other projects.The water-seeking moon rover project, first announced by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) in 2021, is terminated in the department’s spending plan for 2026-27. The news comes as NASA — a major CSA partner — makes big changes to its Artemis program of lunar exploration, including putting a long-planned moon-orbiting space station on hiatus to focus on a base on the surface.AdvertisementAdvertisement”It’s hopefully not a lost cause,” rover mission lead scientist Gordon Osinski, a professor of Earth and planetary materials at Canada’s Western University, told Space.com. “We’ve built up knowledge. I think the science team has come a long way in the last couple of years. The faculty members on it, the researchers — also all of the graduate students and postdocs — they’ll be able to take that knowledge that they’ve learned throughout their future careers.”Osinski, known in the lunar science community as Oz, said the science team received the news in February. His team spent a month “trying to fight the cancellation” to no avail. With NASA hoping, however, to start sending monthly robotic missions to the moon as soon as next year, Osinski said his team would be happy to offer expertise to these efforts — if they are asked.CSA did not cite NASA’s recent Artemis changes in its rationale for cutting the rover, instead pointing to a Canadian priority shift. “The government is committed to restraining the growth of day-to-day operational spending to make investments that will grow the economy and benefit Canadians,” the CSA wrote.A prominent example of current Canadian government space priorities (although CSA did not cite this) was shown earlier this month: The Canadian defense department committed $200 million CDN ($146 million) over the next 10 years to lease a launch pad in Canso, Nova Scotia, for eventual sovereign launches. Jobs and innovation were said to be benefits of the spaceport funding.Decades of background workThe coffee-table-sized moon rover — whose launch was expected on …
