Establishing a moon base seems far more pragmatic than one on Mars. It's a lot easier to debug problems there so a Mars mission would be much more likely to be a success.
The Race to Develop the Moon
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Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#72Unfortunately there is almost no carbon or hydrogen on the moon with the exception of trace amounts in permanently shadowed craters. Self sufficiency is barely possible in those areas which comprise less than 1% of the moon's surface.
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the plan is to mine the crust and bring it to the earth for fusion.
That seems like a lot of work to get deuterium and tritium on Earth. If mining them from the moon is really the cheapest option, I am even less optimistic about fusion.
It's a lot of work to set up the operation (any extraterrestrial endeavor is) but once there it should be possible to launch canisters of fusion fuel back to earth cheaply using some of that fuel for power, a railgun, and the fact that the Moon is tidally locked to the Earth.
Could easily be cheaper than sifting through huge quantities of seawater for the right isotopes.
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#74If you want to understand why there will never be a Moon base on the Moon, all you have to do is to take a look at any photo of the Moon itself - without atmosphere the planet is being been bombarded so often that you would have to go underground. Deep underground. Too deep underground!
Some plans suggest sealing an old lava tube for micrometeorite and radiation shielding and not having to build all the walls.
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#75When are developing asteroids? The moon is a neat stepping stone, but the raw quantity of space stuff just sitting in asteroids is where I'm really excited to see us go. We're talking chunks of rare metals in the thousands of tons range. As well as kilometers of iron, nickel, and water for building and supplying ships in space.
I miss the Obama space administration. Instead of shooting for platinum mountains, we're planning to spend 20$ billion to repeat a great fucking Kennedy did decades ago.
Except we're in denial about the cost, so we're not actually planning to spend that much money. So we won't succeed.
Honk honk, indeed.
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Good book. Surprisingly little moon stuff, mostly about China’s unique governing system interacting with China’s residency laws. I’m curious how much research he did on China’s internal politics; hard for me to know how much was based in reality.
I’ve wondered the same. He certainly talks as if he did a lot of studying. I wonder if he used a consultant.
According to him at a bookstore appearance he did a few months ago, he did a lot of research. I believe he had substantial discussions with Chinese friends (mostly academics). He also said he did a reading at an event with Liu Cixin.
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#77Why do I get the feeling the first people to make it too the moon in the 21'st century are going to be the first people to make first contact with an alien civilization?
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#78Why do I get the feeling the first people to make it too the moon in the 21'st century are going to be the first people to make first contact with an alien civilization?
Well, the US does operate some of the largest radio telescopes, so that isn't too farfetched.
Unless you meant the 21st century? Since the only people to walk on the moon in the 20th were americans.
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#79Why do I get the feeling the first people to make it too the moon in the 21'st century are going to be the first people to make first contact with an alien civilization?
Well, the US does operate some of the largest radio telescopes, so that isn't too farfetched. Unless you meant the 21st century? Since the only people to walk on the moon in the 20th were americans.
Whoops!
Re: The Race to Develop the Moon
#80India is launching their second moon probe in July, expected to land on Moon by September. China has also ramped up its efforts. US has declared its intentions of landing humans on moon by 2030. I am sure India and China will have similar capabilities till 2030 as well.
I am going to Trump them all. I am building my own moon by 2021 and everyone is welcome. - Donald