Is the moon the next fuel source ?

[Modelworks]

I was watching the nasa channel and they were discussing how the moon is loaded with helium3 . There is little to none of it on the earth, but the moon is said to have millions of tons of the stuff. They want it because it would allow clean fusion power with no waste.
Nasa said that just two shuttle loads of he-3 could power the entire usa for one year.

They made a comment that its not cooincedence that japan, china, russia , usa all are planning moon landings in the next 5 years and possible mining in the next 10-20 years..

My questions is who decides what belongs to who ?
Is it just whoever gets there first ?
http://fti.neep.wisc.edu/proj?rm=he3&s=1
check out the video, covers how it would be mined, used and why its wanted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium-3

 

[JulesMaximus]

Originally posted by: Modelworks
I was watching the nasa channel and they were discussing how the moon is loaded with helium3 . There is little to none of it on the earth, but the moon is said to have millions of tons of the stuff. They want it because it would allow clean fusion power with no waste.
Nasa said that just two shuttle loads of he-3 could power the entire usa for one year.

They made a comment that its not cooincedence that japan, china, russia , usa all are planning moon landings in the next 5 years and possible mining in the next 10-20 years..

My questions is who decides what belongs to who ?
Is it just whoever gets there first ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium-3

Well, since the United States was there first I say it belongs to us.

 

[NuclearNed]

I don't have a source to back it up, but I think I've read that there is an international treaty where most nations have agreed that the moon will never belong to any particular nation.

 

[randay]

Originally posted by: JulesMaximus

Originally posted by: Modelworks
I was watching the nasa channel and they were discussing how the moon is loaded with helium3 . There is little to none of it on the earth, but the moon is said to have millions of tons of the stuff. They want it because it would allow clean fusion power with no waste.
Nasa said that just two shuttle loads of he-3 could power the entire usa for one year.

They made a comment that its not cooincedence that japan, china, russia , usa all are planning moon landings in the next 5 years and possible mining in the next 10-20 years..

My questions is who decides what belongs to who ?
Is it just whoever gets there first ?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium-3

Well, since the United States was there first I say it belongs to us.

[conspiracy]
you can have the studio, we want the MOON!
[/conspiracy]

 

[imported_LoKe]

He who has the bigger guns.

But I heard this stuff is difficult (or was that impossible, at this time) to mine, and you need a lot to do a little.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: NuclearNed
I don't have a source to back it up, but I think I've read that there is an international treaty where most nations have agreed that the moon will never belong to any particular nation.

Treaties can be rewritten, or outright violated, if the price is right.

 

[ultimatebob]

Something tells me that the energy cost of mining this stuff on THE FREAKING MOON will be a wee bit more than the energy output we'll get back

 

[Modelworks]

Yeah, I'm not sure about the economics of mining for he3.
I'm more interested in hearing how its decided who gets what.
Like if we found some exotic metal that only existed on the moon, how would it be divided up ?

Bigger guns win ?
Imagine going to war with a country over minerals on the moon

 

[randay]

Originally posted by: Modelworks
Yeah, I'm not sure about the economics of mining for he3.
I'm more interested in hearing how its decided who gets what.
Like if we found some exotic metal that only existed on the moon, how would it be divided up ?

Bigger guns win ?
Imagine going to war with a country over minerals on the moon

space pirates.

 

[johnjbruin]

Originally posted by: Modelworks
Imagine going to war with a country over minerals on the moon

I think this will happen in less than 20 years.

 

[Modelworks]

Was just reading up on the he3 stuff.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITER

On November 21, 2006, the seven participants formally agreed to fund the project.[1] The program is anticipated to last for 30 years?10 years for construction, and 20 years of operation?and cost approximately ?10 billion (US$13.1 billion), which would make it one of the most expensive modern technoscientific megaprojects. It will be based in Cadarache, France. It is technically ready to start construction and the first plasma operation is expected in 2016.

ITER will be designed to produce approximately 500 MW (500,000,000 watts) of fusion power sustained for up to 400 seconds (compared to JET's peak of 16 MW for less than a second) by the fusion of about 0.5 g of deuterium/tritium mixture in its approximately 840 m3 reactor chamber. Although ITER is expected to produce net power in the form of heat, the generated heat will not be used to generate any electricity.

All from half a gram of the stuff ?
talk about packing a punch.

 

[Throckmorton]

Whichever oil company contributes the most money to Lunar politicians owns the moon, just like here on earth.

 

[foghorn67]

Originally posted by: Throckmorton
Whichever oil company contributes the most money to Lunar politicians owns the moon, just like here on earth.

Wow. You are a moron.

 

[ultimatebob]

Since we've already signed treaties that nobody can "own" the moon, I guess that the mining rights would be on a first come, first served basis. It's like the California gold rush all over again, except that this time it's on THE FREAKING MOON! This exotic metal better cure cancer or allow for time travel or something, or it's just not worth the trip.

Sure... some poorer nations might complain to the UN about that... but don't forget that we're talking about THE FREAKING MOON here! There are only a handful of nations who could afford to build and maintain a spaceship capable of getting there and back with a few tons of mining equipment onboard.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: ultimatebob
Something tells me that the energy cost of mining this stuff on THE FREAKING MOON will be a wee bit more than the energy output we'll get back

Fusion has the potential to get a LOT of energy out of a small amount of mass. The typical figure I see online is that a 7 gram uranium pellet can produce as much energy as "3.5 barrels of oil, 17,000 cubic feet of natural gas or 1,780 pounds of coal."Link1, Link2.

A small amount of helium-3 could potentially produce a lot of energy. If a large-scale mining operation is to be attempted, there might be at least some cost reductions, due to economies of scale.

There are only a handful of nations who could afford to build and maintain a spaceship capable of getting there and back with a few tons of mining equipment onboard.

And as such, those nations would be the ones in the competition to stake out the best spots first.


What is the deal with helium-3 though? Is it just easier to fuse than deuterium?

 

[Alistar7]

I'm still going with salt water, far easier to obtain.

 

[IceBergSLiM]

fusion bombs on the horizon. cant wait.

 

[BrokenVisage]

Don't worry, Haliburton already has moon bases.

 

[Xavier434]

I am a fan of the project currently being considered which involves placing solar panels on the moon. the energy collected is supposed to be sent back to earth via microwaves and then processed into usable energy. The rate of energy collected by these solar panels is theorized to be about 10,000 times more than if the same panels were collecting energy from earth. This is due to the moon being closer to the sun. I read about this project a few years ago. They said it would take something like 50 years to fully bring it into reality though so who knows.

Maybe they can bring this idea with Helium 3 into reality sooner?

 

[sdifox]

Feasibility aside, the only possible use would be a forward base for space exploration. Dropping it back to earth is just nuts. A giant solar panel farm in orbit is probably cheaper and more feasible than this moon doohickey.

 

[JulesMaximus]

Originally posted by: ultimatebob
Something tells me that the energy cost of mining this stuff on THE FREAKING MOON will be a wee bit more than the energy output we'll get back

Really? More than what it costs to power the United States for one year?

 

[K1052]

Originally posted by: Jeff7

Originally posted by: ultimatebob
Something tells me that the energy cost of mining this stuff on THE FREAKING MOON will be a wee bit more than the energy output we'll get back

Fusion has the potential to get a LOT of energy out of a small amount of mass. The typical figure I see online is that a 7 gram uranium pellet can produce as much energy as "3.5 barrels of oil, 17,000 cubic feet of natural gas or 1,780 pounds of coal."Link1, Link2.

A small amount of helium-3 could potentially produce a lot of energy. If a large-scale mining operation is to be attempted, there might be at least some cost reductions, due to economies of scale.

There are only a handful of nations who could afford to build and maintain a spaceship capable of getting there and back with a few tons of mining equipment onboard.

And as such, those nations would be the ones in the competition to stake out the best spots first.


What is the deal with helium-3 though? Is it just easier to fuse than deuterium?

IIRC, the Deuterium-Tritium reaction throws off a lot of free neutrons and gives much less power in some cases than reactions using Helium 3. The neutrons hit parts of the reactor structure degrading it and creating radioactive waste. The reactor must also be shielded to protect people.

 

[JulesMaximus]

Originally posted by: Xavier434
I am a fan of the project currently being considered which involves placing solar panels on the moon. the energy collected is supposed to be sent back to earth via microwaves and then processed into usable energy. The rate of energy collected by these solar panels is theorized to be about 10,000 times more than if the same panels were collecting energy from earth. This is due to the moon being closer to the sun. I read about this project a few years ago. They said it would take something like 50 years to fully bring it into reality though so who knows.

Maybe they can bring this idea with Helium 3 into reality sooner?

WTF? How can the moon be closer to the sun? It revolves around the Earth.

I think the moon would be able to collect more solar energy because it has no atmosphere but not because it is closer.

 

[Modelworks]

http://fti.neep.wisc.edu/proj?rm=he3&s=1
Theres a video on the site that explains why they want he3.
If they can get over the technical problems of using the stuff, it could easily do like they say and replace everything else we use for power generation and cheaply.

The video says that the moon contains enough of the he3 that if its used would be more energy than 10 times the amount of energy there ever was from oil, coal, natural gas combined.


Still how will the stuff be divided.
will just the major powers have it and smaller countries be stuck in the past with older tech ?

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: IcebergSlim
fusion bombs on the horizon. cant wait.

Um...we already have fusion bombs.

Originally posted by: JulesMaximus

Originally posted by: Xavier434
I am a fan of the project currently being considered which involves placing solar panels on the moon. the energy collected is supposed to be sent back to earth via microwaves and then processed into usable energy. The rate of energy collected by these solar panels is theorized to be about 10,000 times more than if the same panels were collecting energy from earth. This is due to the moon being closer to the sun. I read about this project a few years ago. They said it would take something like 50 years to fully bring it into reality though so who knows.

Maybe they can bring this idea with Helium 3 into reality sooner?

WTF? How can the moon be closer to the sun? It revolves around the Earth.

I think the moon would be able to collect more solar energy because it has no atmosphere but not because it is closer.

I have never heard this idea.
And it's nowhere NEAR 10,000 times more. On Earth, average irradiation from the sun is about 342 watts per square meter.. For 10,000 times that, you'd have to be closer to the Sun than Mercury is. 10,000 times 342 is 3,420,000 watts per square meter. I don't think any known substance could withstand that kind of energy bombardment without either melting, or vaporizing. The best you might get from the Moon is about a thousand watts more than that - Earth's outer atmosphere gets about 1,368 watts per square meter.

Plus, any one point on the Moon is in darkness for around 15 days at a time. It'd make much more sense to put solar collectors in orbit of Earth. That way, they could potentially get round-the-clock exposure to sunlight, and they'd be much much closer than anything on the Moon.
The concern there is the effects of microwave beams piercing the atmosphere. It'd also be a bit funny watching birds and such fly through the beams. Instantly microwaved. The beams would have a constant air of fresh BBQ smell around them.
Then there's also the worry of a mistargeted beam.