AEPS Advanced Electric Propulsion System — Hall-Effect Ion Thruster for NASA Gateway
Description
L3Harris Technologies is a US defense technology company providing space systems, communication electronics, and space propulsion. L3Harris (formed by the 2019 merger of L3 Technologies and Harris Corporation) is building the Advanced Electric Propulsion System (AEPS) — a 13 kW Hall-effect ion thruster for NASA's Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) of the Gateway lunar space station (Artemis program). The AEPS thruster shown was delivered to NASA Glenn Research Center in March 2025 as the first flight-unit AEPS thruster — the highest-power solar electric propulsion thruster NASA has ever procured. Each AEPS unit produces 0.5–0.6 N thrust at 13 kW using xenon propellant at 3,000 s specific impulse, enabling Gateway to perform large orbit changes around the Moon and rendezvous with the Artemis crew for lunar surface missions. The PPE will carry three AEPS thrusters (two operational, one spare). L3Harris also provides the AN/PRC-117G tactical radio for space communications relay terminals, and through its Space segment provides focal plane arrays, optical systems, and AEHF communications satellite payloads. Harris (pre-merger) built the instruments for the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-R series) Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI).
