“Been There, Never Done This!”
The motto of the International Lunar Resarch Park (ILRP)… as seen on my delegate nameplate from the exploratory workshop at NASA this week.
The ILRP is a permanent moon base.
The primary economic case is for a remote fuel depot, generated from lunar water in-situ with robotically assembled nuclear power plants. Given the recently discovered water reserves on the moon, they could be extracted from the regolith and broken down into O2 and H2 by electolysis. Fuel and water extracted on the moon, away from the Earth’s gravity well, can be much more inexpensive than launching it from Earth.
Many other science possibilities in the brainstorm, such as a polar deep-field mirror made from liquid in a crater (no atmosphere to interrupt a perfect surface).
Couple salient comments:
“The technology risk to get there is not significant. Mining and extraction is a risk.”
“The Chinese are going to Mars. That is for sure.”
“20.4 million tourists visit space attractions (KSC, NASM, etc.) each year, more than the 17 million that go to the Magic Kingdom.”
More fun images and links below…
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