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Did White House ask NASA to develop special time zone for the moon? All we know about the agency's new task
The White House has given NASA a new mission as it wants the agency to create a single standard time for the moon and other celestial bodies.
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White House has directed NASA to create a Coordinated Lunar Time for the Moon
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It is aimed at making space missions more efficient by providing enhanced assistance
NASA has been assigned by the White House to establish a universal time standard for the moon and other celestial bodies, as part of the US initiative to set global space standards amidst increasing space competition.
White House asks NASA to collaborate with other agencies
In a memo, the head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) requested that NASA collaborate with other US government agencies to develop a strategy for establishing "Coordinated Lunar Time," or LTC, within two years. The head of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Arati Prabhakar, stated in the letter that "international collaboration, economic development, and scientific discovery are fundamentally dependent on a specific time zone."
Similar proposals to assign a time zone on the Moon were revealed by the European Space Agency in 2023. The concept was discussed in late 2022 in the Netherlands during a gathering of representatives from different space agencies, according to AP. It was decided by everybody present at the meeting that a common lunar reference time was desperately needed.
NASA had already dealt with the issue of establishing time in space before. The International Space Station was the target of that. Though it lacks a precise time zone, the International Space Station (ISS) operates on Coordinated Universal Time, or UTC, a standard that is closely monitored by atomic clocks. As partners in the ISS program, the United States, Russia, Japan, and Europe have reached a compromise by using UTC.
In addition to global concerns, there are a few technical challenges to handle. Its gravity is less than Earth's, thus clocks there will run faster, gaining about 56 microseconds a day. Next comes the question of the day: how long is a day on the moon? It is about equivalent to 29.5 Earth days. Thus, NASA and other institutions are working on the "Lunar Standard Time" or "Coordinated Lunar Time"
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