America’s private lunar lander has overcome a major hurdle on its way to its first spaceflight this year. The Peregrine lunar lander built by Astrobotic completed its final space qualification tests this month, the Pittsburgh-based company announced Wednesday (January 25th). Engineers are now awaiting United Launch Alliance (ULA) approval to ship Peregrine from Pittsburgh to Florida to mate with the United Launch Alliance (ULA) Vulcan Centaur rocket.

“These tests finally proved the quality of Peregrine’s design and manufacture,” said Sharad Bhaskaran, Astrobotic’s mission manager for Peregrine’s first mission, in a statement (opens in new tab). “Everyone worked hard, even during the holidays, for this incredible achievement.”

Peregrine is scheduled to launch from the Space Force Station at Cape Canaveral in the first quarter of 2023, but like all other launch dates, these dates are subject to change based on technical issues, weather and many other factors. As the first flight of the new Vulcan Centaur, this mission represents the next generation of lunar exploration by private companies.

Loaded with 11 NASA payloads, the Peregrine lander has been selected for service through the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program. NASA is using special robotic lander, rovers and other spacecraft to work with astronauts of the Artemis program, which could land on the south pole of the moon as early as 2025 as part of the Artemis 3 mission.

CLPS represents a new form of lunar exploration, as all successful moon landing attempts to date have been undertaken by countries, not private companies. But this is expected to change significantly in the 2020s as multiple missions are being developed in the United States and elsewhere.

The first few CLPS missions will be for reconnaissance before the astronauts land, and future missions are expected to take place at the moon’s south pole as NASA builds infrastructure for a possible permanent settlement there. (The South Pole appears to be rich in water ice, making it an ideal location for water-intensive machines and astronauts as they can extract the precious resource locally rather than send it from Earth.)

Meanwhile, another country’s special mission is already heading to the moon: the Hakuto-R lander built by Tokyo-based ispace is expected to land in April. After landing, Hakuto-R will deploy a small Rashid rover provided by the United Arab Emirates space agency.