illustrates the largest project the space agency has ever taken on components have already been successfully tested but the rocket has only taken off in computer simulations. another competitor is a private rocket projects that was successfully tested for the first time in february of twenty eighteen fountainhead vegas considered the most promising heavy lift launch vehicle today it was developed by tesla founder iran musk's other high profile company space x. the falcon heavy has drawn attention in the field at just one hundred fifty million dollars for takeoff it's ten times cheaper than the plans nasa rocket and parts of it are even reusable but it won't be bringing people to the moon just yet because there's another problem there's not enough money in. cold hard cash the second reason why no one has returned to the moon the apollo program had an annual budget worth the equivalent of fifteen billion dollars by. today's standards back then the