NASA working on creating standard time zone for Moon that could be used elsewhere in solar system

NASA is working on discovering exactly what time it is on the moon by creating a standardized time zone. The space agency hopes to then use that standard elsewhere in the solar system.

The time zone, known as Coordinated Lunar Time (LTC), will be set by finding the weighted average of multiple atomic clocks on the moon, a calculation similar to the one used on Earth to determine Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), NASA said.

Scientists are still working to find out where these clocks should be based on the moon, as atomic clocks on the moon’s surface go faster than Earth’s by around 56 microseconds a day. A second is equal to 1 million microseconds.

At the speed of light, something can travel just over 9.54 miles in 56 microseconds. If the discrepancy is not corrected, then people on Earth would think something or someone orbiting the moon is at a position that distance away from where they actually were.

“If someone is orbiting the Moon, an observer on Earth who isn’t compensating for the effects of relativity over a day would think that the orbiting astronaut is approximately 168 football fields away from where the astronaut really is,” Cheryl Gramling, NASA’s lead on lunar position, navigation, timing, and standards, said in an agency release Thursday.

Once NASA determines exactly how to calculate moon time by Earth standards, those methods can then be used to find out the time on other planets in the solar system.

LTC will also help further future moon exploration as the first step in creating a moon equivalent to GPS.

“This work lays the foundation for adopting a navigation and timing system similar to GPS, which would serve near-Earth and Earth-bound users, for lunar exploration,” National Institute of Standards and Technology physicist Neil Ashby said in an NIST release last month.

The effort to figure out LTC was first mandated in April by a directive from the Biden administration.