Argo Space's plan to power orbital tugs with moon water pulls in $7.9M
Summary
)The startup, which was founded by three brothers who all formerly worked at SpaceX, is developing an orbital transportation spacecraft called the Argonaut, named for the famous seafaring heroes of Greek mythology. Alongside this, Argo Space says it also developed a method to extract water from lunar regolith, which could then be used as part of an off-planet fuel-creation process.Its long-term vision is to bring a true logistics vehicle to space: one that can take a customer payload to an intended orbit, refuel, then do it all over again.Thats more of a fundamental change in architecture, Argo CEO Robert Carlisle said in a recent interview. But Carlisle said that its the integrated vision of a reusable, refuelable spacecraft that sets Argo apart from its peers.Investors are behind this vision: Argo raised another $7.9 million led by Crosslink Capital, with participation from existing investors Stellar Ventures and Type One Ventures.The ability to access different orbits and to have dynamic missions in space would be nothing less than revolutionary for spacecraft operations. That mission is intended to demonstrate the Argonauts propulsion system and the high-delta V, or velocity change, capability operating beyond LEO.A differentiating capability for us is our unique propulsion system, and actually providing a lot of delta-V going out to MEO, GEO, and cislunar space, Carlisle said.The Argonaut uses a water plasma thruster, a less common propulsion system that he said provides a good balance of thrust and efficiency. Blue Origin and SpaceX, theyre working primarily on human landing systems, so they have a much more intense and broad set of requirements related to that, but those guys and others are working on export capabilities as well.Although the Argonaut subscale demo mission is happening first, that doesnt mean the lunar water extraction piece has been put on the back burner: Since closing its pre-seed round last April, the company has validated its novel lunar water extraction method using simulated regolith, showing it can extract water even when it is barely present: concentrations as low as 1 part per thousand.In the nearer term, Carlisle said the company plans to refuel Argonauts using water launched from Earth, which would be retrieved by depots in low Earth orbit.