NASA announced Feb. 21 it awarded a task order through the NASA Launch Services II contract for the launch of the Near Earth Orbit (NEO) Surveyor spacecraft on a Falcon 9. That task order is valued at approximately $100 million, the agency stated.
NEO Surveyor will launch on a Falcon 9 from Florida as soon as September 2027. It will operate from the Earth-sun L-1 Lagrange point, 1.5 million kilometers from Earth in the direction of the sun.
The spacecraft will feature a telescope 50 centimeters in diameter equipped with infrared detectors. That instrument will allow NEO Surveyor to detect near Earth objects and determine both their orbits and their sizes. The mission has a goal of detecting two-thirds of the NEOs at least 140 meters across in five years, and a congressionally mandated goal of 90% of such objects in 10 to 12 years.
The launch contract came just after the $1.2 billion mission passed its critical design review Feb. 6. That allows NEO Surveyor to move into the next phases of assembly and testing. Part of the spacecraft, called the instrument enclosure, is undergoing environmental testing at the Johnson Space Center. Later this spring, that and other sections of the spacecraft will go to the Space Dynamics Lab in Utah to integrate other components and perform more testing.