Japan Plans Moon Base Built By Robots For Robots

An anonymous reader writes "The Japanese space agency, JAXA, has plans to build a base on the Moon by 2020. Not for humans, but for robots — and built by robots, too. A panel authorized by Japan's prime minister has drawn up preliminary plans for how humanoid and rover robots will begin surveying the moon by 2015, and then begin construction of a base near the south pole of the moon. The robots and the base will run on solar power, with total costs about $2.2 billion USD, according to the panel chaired by Waseda University President Katsuhiko Shirai. 'As currently envisioned, the robots that will land on the lunar surface in 2015 will be 660-pound behemoths equipped with rolling tank-like treads, solar panels, seismographs, high-def cameras, and a smattering of scientific instruments. They'll also have human-like arms for collecting rock samples that will be returned to Earth via rocket.'"

Comments

Just $2.2 Billion?

[timeOday]

Funding to the Space Shuttle has been around $5 billion per year for most of the last 30 years or so, and just keeping the program on operational life support was quoted at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_program">$2.5 billion per year in early 2009.

So if they deliver that entire program whose lifetime costs are only 2.2 Billion, I would be super impressed. In fact I would be impressed if we did it ourselves for 5 times that amount.

Re:Just $2.2 Billion?

[sqrt(2)]

I would imagine that the prices drop dramatically once you don't have to worry about sending humans up, keeping them alive, and returning them safely.

Re:Just $2.2 Billion?

[Gorobei]

On running the math a bit more: getting 1kg of payload mass to the moon with a soft landing is more like 1/1000 the cost of the round trip.

So, $2B for an automated moon-base is pretty reasonable.

Yes, I am a rocket scientist.

Re:Just $2.2 Billion?

[fizzup]

Yeah, you get less. But, man-oh-man, this seems like very high value. For comparison, here are some expenditures from groups that "can't afford" to go to the moon:

• Canada will spend half that amount on a meeting of 20 world leaders next month.
• South Africa will spend that much and half again on a soccer tournament.
• ThyssenKrupp will spend four times that amount on a steel mill.

It's such a small amount of money, I can't even believe it's true.

Re:Just $2.2 Billion?

[Gorobei]

Hey, I just do rockets. I can figure the cheapest way to get mass X to position Y with velocity Z.

Dust? Ask the guys who build targets (I think they are called civil engineers or something)

Look to see human exploration fans squirm...

[bradbury]

All I can say is "Its about time." The human body is not designed to operate in space, indeed almost all biological systems on Earth that reside under nice "shields" including the magnetic field, the atmosphere, the ozone layer or even the oceans and they were not designed (evolved) to withstand the hazards of space. Ignoring minor topics like micrometeorites and the lack of atmosphere one has the ongoing problem of radiation exposure. Humans for example have 150-200 genes in the genome (~1%) whose purpose is to repair DNA damage. It does not do so reliably (so radiation causes gradual genome decay). And although one may develop "shields" this makes activities by humans in space inherently more expensive than using the right "organism" [1]. Anyone aware of robotics research knows that the Japanese are pushing this forward at a very rapid pace. Presumably much faster than one can push forward human "evolution" [2].

Yes humans can engineer suits, habitats, shields, rovers, etc. which would allow humans to operate in such alien environments. But *why* do this? One has to remember that the "moon rocks" were brought back to Earth for analysis. We have to develop the remote robotics operations capabilities for exploration anyway [3]. Lets do it for the moon first.

If people want to go places to say "I have been there", then fine let them pay for it (as private citizens or organizations) -- just don't expect all the rest of us to pay for your expensive vacation. The robotic development of the moon could serve as a prelude for human colonies there (to preserve humanity from terrestrial impacts) or taking vacations there. The moon is close enough that round trip radio can be used to control or reprogram robots in the event of complex/unforseen situations (remember we reprogrammed the Galileo mission when it proved necessary). The "nightmare" scenario of robots evolving into autonomous entities (a new robotic species) only arises when one is dealing with situations where remote control and/or reprogramming are not possible and one has designed the robots both self-reproduction and intelligence enhancement capabilities -- and I think we are still quite some distance from those achievements.

1. References to using a hammer as a screwdriver apply when using humans in space. Astronauts require additional tools and training to work in space. Instead design the systems to be easily maintained and repaired by robots in space.
2. Ideally if one wanted humans to live in space one would use genetic engineering to produce humans which were radiation tolerant. This not only has benefits from a space exploration standpoint -- such humans would likely have reduced cancer rates as well. But such developments are at least a generation away.
3. I have yet to see a single proposal for a single human "submarine" or a human colony to explore the oceans of Europa to search for life or provide a humanity "safe room".

Re:and why, exactly?

[gzipped_tar]

I guess I'm from the 1st category "people who own America" according to your hierarchy. I'm Chinese.

Ohhhhhhhhh

[dreemernj]

We're whalers on the Moon, we carry a harpoon. But there ain't no whales so we tell tall tales and sing our whaling tune.

Re:Obligatory

[racasper]

Remember they are Japanese - these robots will probably look like adolescent schoolgirls.