That and solar. Have a few Small modular reactors. I think the other thing is energy storage. Batteries are heavy and wear out. Would be nice to have something that can be used long term.
this post was submitted on 04 Apr 2024
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I would bet that one of the long-term solutions are gonna be locally produced (that is, on the moon) kinetic storage devices like flywheels and weight shafts. You can store a shocking amount of energy in a big old rock lifted up on a cable by a couple hundred meters.
Kinda hard to do that when the moon is only 1/6g. You'd have to raise the same object 6 times higher to get an equivalent amount of potential energy storage than you would on Earth.
Or make the object 6 times heavier.
Big thing + any motion whatsoever = a surprising amount of energy. And we can capture that energy. Or use energy to move the thing to a higher potential, and thus store said energy for use later. It’s just physics.
Of course you'd need even larger equipment to be able to handle it. One way or another things have to scale. For sure solar or nuclear power are the more practical options for now.
I thought we were talking about long-term energy storage.
Kinetic storage devices are WAY simpler and WAY longer lasting. A big lunar rock suspended in a vertical shaft a couple hundred meters deep is probably going to have a higher MTBF than even the most advanced batteries or capacitors.
The greatest value the moon potentially holds is raw iron that hasn't been exposed to Earth's terrestrial radiation since we started refining radioactive material.
Of course the first thing they want to do is send refined radioactive material to the moon.
The most colossally stupid thing we could do as a species with space exploration is take our completely short sighted disregard for the environment around us and export that to the moon and other planets. Our hubris in not thinking ahead of the consequences of our actions for short term gain and profits is going to kill our entire species.
The steel contamination problem comes from nuclear bomb tests, not just the refining of radioactive materials. So long as no one nukes the moon, we're fine.
Plus, the contamination occurs from the air used when the steel is made, so unless you can find a way to run a blast furnace in a vacuum there's no way to make uncontaminated steel even if you brought iron ore from the moon
Can someone explain why this is a problem?
Please use small words as I am dumb.
I'm not an expert by any means, but aparently there is an extremely lucrative market for pre ww2 scrap steel.
Because that iron was made into steel before nuclear bombs and nuclear meltdowns started on earth, the steel emits lower baseline radiation.
That steel is vital for particularly sensitive electronics, mainly stuff like sensors for electron microscopes and medical devices.
Because we have so severely raised ambient radiation in the atmosphere by refining radioactive material and blowing it up, disbursing it into the atmosphere, we can't make steel that is suitable for these applications anymore. We depend on repurposing pre nuclear age steel, which is running out. Fast.
The moon has a shit ton of iron that is exposed to solar radiation, but has not been exposed to refined terrestrial radiation.
If we bring refined radioactive material to the moon, we are likely to contaminate the iron there too.
Hope that helped.
We can still make radiation free metals. It’s just way more expensive than recovery of pre WW2 metals.
Bringing a nuclear reactor to the moon wont contaminate the iron there unless you detonate the reactor near the surface and even then it will only contaminate the iron directly below the blast. The reason steel on earth is contaminated is because we use air that is contaminated with radionuclides in the manufacture of steel. No air on the moon means no contamination.
Also the radiation has fallen pretty much back to background levels since we stopped atmospheric testing so modern steel is generally radiation free. Only the most sensitive steels need to be low background steel. Another 50 years or so and we should be back to baseline.
More specifically I think it's pre-WW2 scrap steel from underwater.
Anything exposed to the atmosphere received some radiation but scrap steel from sunken ship are not contaminated.