Once manufacturing/launch systems are in place on the moon, the costs drop enormously. You no longer have to bring large supplies from Earth, only people. Fuel, systems for escaping Earth’s atmosphere aren’t needed when launching from the moon. You have no(minimal) atmosphere, minimal gravity, etc. Now all that weight in fuel and the lift package can actually go to research equipment, and supplies. Getting materials from space to Earth isn’t nearly as costly as launching them from Earth to space.

That is why getting a base/colony on the moon is so important to future space exploration.

But we do have to go back to the cost to get to that point which your points stand, is a large amount and prohibitive.

Look, this hole was to be expected, predicted even, by FSM theology. FSM made the moon, set it upon its axis, and made it spin around and around. The problem was that the spin was wobbly and out of sync with the lunar orbit of the earth. This made the light side and dark side of the moon flash erratically all night long and nearly made humans go extinct from epilepsy. So FSM placed the axis in a more balanced diameter and attached it to the gears that make it stay in sync with it orbit around earth.

This is basic mythistory, Phil! That hole is where the old axis was.

You might want to check out this presentation to Google on what appears to be a very viable approach to reducing base launch costs by 95%.

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News.asp?NewsNum=2741

GAry 7

I completely agree with you…

But if you are a long time reader of this blog you would know that he has commented/posted/whatever you call it tons and tons of times about his support for a long term presence on the moon and support for the ISS (he may critique it, but only mildly, still supporting us shoveling money into it). He may be right 80% of the time but sorry, on these issues, epic fail. Hurt science kind of fail.

Space-based solar power sounds intriguing, and probably has a pretty good chance for being the first big enabling space-based resource that will drive future colonization, but I’m betting that space-based orbital zero-g installations will win out over installations built at the bottom of any pre-existing gravity well, lunar or otherwise.

@73 – But there’s got to be some compelling reason to motivate building those 50 rockets in the first place. The water, and any other resource for use in situ, is enabling, but alone it isn’t enough, unless you’re talking about exporting that water back to earth, and if it comes to that (a water shortage on earth necessitating the contemplation of importing more from space), I think we’ll be having bigger problems to be worrying about!

Another possibility is the export of that lunar water to other space based installations, orbital outposts, NEO outposts, etc. But those are situations where the lunar base can’t be our first step off earth. It will only become economical after some other extraterrestrial outpost is established.

I really think that the likelihood is that the moon will never be a primary destination for space colonization, but instead will at most serve as a waystation/resource source for other, more promising locations.

(It does remain quite possible that despite such reservations, we will still go ahead and build a lunar colony, which will last several decades, never achieve self-sufficiency, and ultimately fail, possibly because an economic downturn results in earth-based support drying up, BUT that during its period of operation, it will serve as a support hub enabling colonization of other targets further out in the solar system. Then several centuries later, archeologists will come back to dig up the buried ruins of the old lunar colony, ala Jamestown and Vinland, and speculate as to the proximate causes of its failure.

If this does happen, I suppose with hindsight we can say that the lunar colony succeeded, after all.)

This issue has been discussed since before the first Moon landing. Von Braun pointed out that if you want the cost of some activity to come down, the way to do that is not to sit around hoping for some serendipitous technological solution, but rather to do the activity over and over again. That’s why he wanted Apollo to produce a lasting infrastructure for space travel.

Yes, sending three men to the Moon was/is hideously expensive. But you do it, and the second time, it’s a little cheaper, since you’ve done it before. Third time is cheaper yet. Commit to a program of sending three men to the Moon every year for the next 50 years, then you can get private companies to compete for the contracts for rockets, space capsules, etc. etc. If we say we’re sending one rocket to the Moon, that’s one thing. Say we’re sending 50 rockets, then the contract to produce those rockets becomes very attractive for companies. Get companies competing against one another for multi-billion dollar contracts, then you’ll get your innovation and your lower costs.

Some people can’t tell the difference between a hole in the ground and a mountain,,,maybe he’s a mathematician.

67. amphiox

I seriously doubt we’ll have He3 fusion before we have Boron11 + Proton fusion(Bushards preferred fusion cycle). ,,,and Boron11 is a whole lot more available than He3.

There has been at least one scientist pushing for building solar power generating facilities on the moon and transmitting the power to earth. Presumably because he believes it easier to build such devices under 1/6 G than in free fall. Personally, with Tele operated robots doing the “outside” work in space, I see little to dissuade us from building these mega engineering projects. I expect it will require national commitment on a global scale to really make these projects possible. We only need to show ONE likely profitable return on the investment and solar power sats are one such. Once the infrastructure is in place to build these devices, there will be many other profit making ventures that can piggy back on the initiating venture(Power Sats).

,,,or we could just build dams across the Straits of Hormuz and Gibraltar. Both the Persian Gulf and the Mediterranean lose more water from evaporation than is replenished from fresh water flow into these water bodies, so a power generating dam across these sites would allow the water levels to fall and provide the hydraulic drive for these dams. Of course, the millions of people who live around these seas would probably object to losing their shore property but,,,hey, it’s all about (electric) power (to the peeples). Of course, those dams wouldn’t do US much good. They would probably cost just as much as building the infrastructure to create power sats.

GAry 7

Talk about bad astronomy!!

If you got this most basic and obvious observation wrong, doesn’t that call into question the accuracy of your entire thesis?

Most definitely NOT awesome.

Rather than Heinlein, I was thinking more of “The Lotus Caves” by John Christopher… only those caves were self-sealing.

Ah yes. I remember really enjoying that novel as a young kid too. Good memory & reference there JB, thanks.

Just because something is difficult doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Lunar resources fall in the same category:hard to access but potentially profitable. Just a few more problems to work around.

No argument with you there on the overall principle. But I’m not quite as convinced yet that lunar resources, even with the water the helium-3, have enough economic potential to justify a large scale habitation in the near future. I’m leaning more towards the likelihood that as we colonize space, we’ll bypass the moon for greener pastures – Mars, NEOs, etc.

There’s also the possibility of a smaller scale occupation of the moon for research/military purposes, of course, or as a waystation for longer journeys (but in these situations the likelihood is that the lunar facility won’t be established first – it’ll come later, after more distant but more profitable colonies have already been set up).

Phil, you’d be a great real estate broker.

Granted, economic(read as: recovery of essential resources) is the final imperative for large scale development/colonization. If the original explorers to the new world had found gold(and nothing else), I’d expect some entrepreneur would have developed it and that takes man power in situ. The closest parallel we have is the rush to develop arctic resources(no people, no food,everything for human support has to be transported in, except air and water). Or another weak parallel was the development of Saudi oil resources, which was very difficult(vast deserts, little water, etc). Just because something is difficult doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Lunar resources fall in the same category:hard to access but potentially profitable. Just a few more problems to work around.

GAry 7

@62 – It is important to note that the historical analogies indicate that big centralized efforts may be necessary for exploration, and for the establishment of colonies, but beyond this first step, the longterm success of the colonization effort is driven entirely by economic imperatives acting on private individuals and organizations. If the first explorers of the Americas had found just a ice strewn or volcano blasted wasteland with no edible animals or plants or drinkable water, no one (save for the occasional scientist on short term trips) would ever have come back.

The medium and long term success of any space colony, lunar or otherwise, depends on becoming self-sufficient – completely independent from earth. If this does not happen, sooner or later, the colony will fail.

” How do you shore it up if it needs it and/or repair structural flaws?”

I expect we’d just put inflatable domes inside the tubes. As far as shoring up the tube walls/ceiling, a solar refractory mirror could be used to melt lunar dust, shape it in molds into structural components and use those to stabilize the tunnels. On Earth, we’d probably use concrete but that’s not a likely solution on Luna.

Electrostatic field effects would act to DEFLECT charged particle radiation, since the incident energy of solar particles and cosmic rays is on the order of billions of electron volts, a true “shield” would have to be hideously powerful(billion volts or so). But we only need to shift those particles to one side, not stop them cold, so a few million volts electric field should do the job of deflection.

It’s been pointed out by others that only 3 meters of lunar dust could provide adequate radiation shielding. Which is one solution but if you’re adverse to living under dust, the magnetic/electric field solution seems to be a workable one. I just prefer simple solutions to these problems, so living inside a lava tube strikes my fancy(Occams Razor). It’s a pretty elegant solution.

If we ever get serious about using nuclear power (See: nuclear light bulb), we would also have the exact device to drill holes in a crater rim for habitation(an exhaust temp of 20,000Kelvins would male a great plasma cutter). Just point your fission rocket exhaust at the rim and presto,,,tunnels with their walls melted into a strong, non-porous material.

The first settlers of the new world came here on foot and by small boats. The next wave came in state supported ships. The first time anyone landed on the moon, it was a national effort by the richest nation on earth(at the time, we controlled 60 % of the worlds resources).

THAT was for exploration. To develop lunar resources, make them into solar power satellites and other goddies, will likely require the productive capacity of the entire planet.

Big projects require big cooperation.

GAry 7