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Russia Talks Moon Base With NASA, ESA
milbournosphere writes "Russia and NASA are reportedly in talks to create a base on the Moon. They're looking to create either a facility on the Moon itself or a permanent space station in orbit around the moon. 'We don't want man to just step on the Moon,' agency chief Vladimir Popovkin said in an interview with Vesti FM radio station. 'Today, we know enough about it. We know that there is water in its polar areas,' he added. 'We are now discussing how to begin [the Moon's] exploration with NASA and the European Space Agency.'"
Sounds like a good idea. Hopefully they can actually do something with this instead of endlessly talking about it, and sinking money into studys.
Twenty years later than it should have been on the table.
We should have had a base up there for years - an ideal place to serve as a jumping off point for science elsewhere in the solar system, even if the Moon itself is "barren".
With a moon base you have access to that water they mention, and perhaps enough sunlight to actually grow food (although the water seems to be in the wrong place for this). You have shelter by digging into the moon itself, and enough free raw materials to extract an atmosphere, make building materials, etc. You don't have to bring everything from earth. You have gravity as well, which makes for more comfortable living and building. None of that is available in moon orbit.
Although an orbiting moon base makes for a quicker return to earth vicinity, the value of "quick" makes it a fairly meaningless advantage. There is no point in putting a base in moon orbit unless you intend to frequently visit the moon surface. At which time you encounter the assent problem, the same problem you have with a moon base.
The major problem of a moon base, or simply visiting the moon, is the problem of fuel expenditures for lift off. For all the Buck Rogers si-fi we've written, we still can't carry enough fuel to get out of sight. Any system we have for getting off of the surface amounts to a zero-backup, Hail Mary. There is no plan B.
We (barely) got out of the moon program without the horror of stranding people there. Until a more realistic system for getting off the moon is built, putting a base there is just a disaster waiting to happen with our current technology.
Maybe it would be easier to build the often talked about space elevator on the moon.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
If we'd gone with the original plan for space exploration, we'dve had a (small) colony on the moon, an orbital transfer/construction station in HEO, and a manned landing or 3 on Mars by 1985. Problem was, there just wasn't any way to put a man on the moon by 1970 if we'd done it that way. Upside is, we'dve had a reuseable lunar lander, just refuel, preflight, and go. We went with Apollo instead because it was the quick and dirty solution.
Understanding the scope of the problem is the first step on the path to true panic.
I would think that the fastest (timeline) to having a large presence in orbit around the moon would be to boost ISS to lunar orbit, or possibly (stability?) a figure-8 orbit around earth and moon. That gives us a large, stable presence, in a relatively short time frame. ISS is nice, but it's not really doing anything super useful in LEO.
One of the reasons that the US doesn't have the supercollider and CERN does is that they reused all their old equipment. We had similar equipage, the Tevatron, but no, SSC had to be all brand new, and ended up being so great it was never built.
We have a large, manned habitat, already in orbit. Use it.
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
A) It's (relatively) not that big of a gravity well, and
B) It's pretty close to here for easy construction and resupply,
C) It's easier to protect it and its occupants from radiation and asteroids, and
D) There might be water available nearby, precluding the need to ship at least one thing up there constantly.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
Umm, no.
H2O density is 1.0 kg/l.
LH2/LOX density, in the ratio required to make water (8 kg LOX per kg LH2) is about 0.42 kg/l.
So you use over twice as much space, as opposed to getting "a huge savings".
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Of course neither country has a strong infrastructure to build such an endeavour (they act like they do but it all looks pretty dismal). However, far better than discussions on building up missile bases aimed at each other (i.e. ABM site in Poland, Russia countering that with additional missiles).
Another to consider is Russians are essential for USA space program (and other way around). NASA was created because the Russians launched first satellite. Apollo program was created because the Russians launched first man in space. Shuttle was created because Russians still flying spaceships. ISS was created because we partnered with Russians (Space Station Freedom never got off the ground because no Russians involved). VSE, Obamaspace, SLS, and derivatives going nowhere because it has nothing to do with the Russians. Well there is the USAF space command, maybe they're still countering the Russians.
So if you are going to do a big space program... don't forget the Russians. Of course some will say don't forget Russian spies but so what else is new. If you are a country you gotta deal with spies, like server owners have to deal with spyware.
mfwright@batnet.com
Why does everyone want to build a base inside a giant gravity well?
To stock it with moon babes in purple wigs and silver catsuits. Duh.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
To add to the other comments:
1) it's a lot easier to build a habitat on an existing ball of rock, than to ship materials into place in orbit (or at a langrangian point) to create a self-sustaining structure and habitat. In fact, there's some theories there might be lava tubes where underground habitats can be built. Don't forget, radiation is a big problem in space; inside the Van Allen belts, it's not so much of a problem (LEO is within those belts, and the ISS is at LEO). But out at one of the L points, there's nothing to protect you. There's nothing to protect you on the surface of the moon either, but there's plenty of building material right there, and it probably wouldn't be that hard to build an undeground structure and use the surface as a radiation shield.
2) it's already proven there's water on the moon. Water is a pretty important material for sustaining human life anywhere.
3) Humans need gravity or else they develop health problems very quickly, including massive bone loss. The ISS astronauts work out constantly to combat this, and it's still not enough. The moon only has 1/6 Earth's gravity, and it's unknown what the long-term effects of this will be, but it's certainly better than 0g.
Until we start build very large space stations with artificial gravity, the moon's gravity is probably a cost that's outweighed by the other benefits.
I think it's important to distinguish between at least two sets of people on this News for Nerds site who oppose manned missions and favour robotic probes instead. On one hand, perhaps there are people who aren't inclined to dream, see no romantic vision in man expanding into the cosmos, and may make a good argument that mankind can have a bold future without ever living the planet.
On the other hand, there's people who have read Ray Kurzweil's conjectures/ravings in The Singularity is Near and other books. This crowd doesn't lack dreams of humanity spreading through the galaxy. Rather, they might simply say that we should wait a few decades or a century until human beings will have supposedly overcome biological limitations that hamper spaceflight: radiation exposure, need for certain sustenance, limited lifespans that would force unrealistic generational starship designs, etc . That is, such people may figure that human beings will eventually be robotic probes, and once the two are the same, then we can really begin with longterm space exploration that is more than just a stunt.
If you spend too much time on the Moon, or in space for that matter, you could easily find yourself in a position where you're no longer able to stand the gravity of the Earth.
We understand zero/microgravity's effects on human beings pretty well. That said, the longest we've ever had a human on the Moon is 3 days--not really long enough to study anything. One of the things I wish we'd have been able to study on the ISS is the effect of various levels of gravity and their effect on humans. Unfortunately, that capability was cut.
Zero-G/Microgravity is not all that great for human beings. As I understand it, besides muscle issues (ie, not using them), there's also bone-loss. I believe these are dealt with on ISS via a combination of exercise and drugs. The problem is, we don't know how much gravity is necessary. Would 0.5G be enough? 0.25G? 0.16G (ie, lunar gravity)? Do we need gravity the whole time? Could we, for example, put beds in a 1G centrifuge so people get eight hours of 1G while they sleep but spend the rest of their time in Zero-G with no ill effects?
These are things that need to get figured out.
tl;dr: Robots first, mine the asteroids for building materials.
The proper plan is to start mining Near Earth Asteroids for supplies. Why NEO's? They take less velocity to reach than the Moon's surface for some of them, and all of the velocity can be done with highly efficient electric thrusters. The Moon is physically closer, but distance is not what costs in space, it's velocity and fuel. Haul back surface dust and rocks from your chosen asteroid with a solar powered tug, and have the extraction equipment in Earth orbit. Why here? it's close enough to be remote controlled by humans on the ground. Depending which asteroid and it's composition you can get: metals, glass, oxygen, fuel for more mining trips, carbon, silicon for solar panels, even water in some of them. Also sheer bulk rock gives you radiation shielding.
Once you learn to extract useful stuff, and build up a supply, you use that to build a habitat, including a greenhouse using the glass for windows and carbon to feed the plants. *Then* you start sending people. Until then you send the minimum crew you can get away with, possibly zero. With people up there and their life support taken care of long term, you can start building space elevators in Earth orbit and Lunar orbit out of the carbon you extract. Not the sci-fi one at Earth that goes all the way to the ground, that takes materials we can't make yet. You can reach 30% of the way to the ground in velocity terms at Earth, and all the way on the Moon, cause it's smaller. 30% in velocity means 50% in energy for a vehicle starting from the ground. You can now build single stage to orbit vehicles easily. At the moon you don't need vehicles at all as far as propulsion, just a pressure cabin. Now you can send people all the way from Earth to the Moon at reasonable cost. You can also send habitat parts made in orbit down to the Moon, and start building up your infrastructure there.
We already know a lot about mining and manufacturing on Earth. The main thing we have to learn is how to do it remotely, and possibly in zero gee (you can always spin things if you need gravity).
The usual assumption by people who have worked on it seriously (I'm one of them, retired from Boeing, did advanced space studies while there), is you set up a habitat module, which is your Space Station type pressurized cylinder, and then over that you place a quonset hut type arched structure, which you pile lunar regolith (surface rocks and dust) on top of for shielding. Depending what level of shielding you want, it needs to be around 1-3 meters. Given the Moon's gravity, that's equivalent to 16-50 cm on Earth, which is quite reasonable. Your airlock, antennas, and such would poke out of the lunar dirt.
The other thing burying your habitat does is protect it from landing craft. The rocket exhaust from them tends to throw any loose dust around at high velocity. Even if you pave the landing pad itself, there will be loose dust around that.
Oxygen is abundant on the moon in the rocks. You can make lots of water just by shipping in hydrogen and combining it with local oxygen. You could even make some power in the process.