NASA and Astrobotic Investigating Ice Hunting Mission to the Moon

Zothecula writes, quoting Gizmodo "While the Moon may or may not contain life forms, precious metals or even green cheese, recent satellite missions have indicated that it does nonetheless contain something that could prove quite valuable — water ice. NASA has estimated that at least 650 million tons (600 million tonnes) of the stuff could be deposited in craters near the Moon's north pole alone. If mined, it could conceivably serve as a source of life support for future lunar bases, or it could be used to produce fuel for spacecraft stopping at a "lunar gas station." Before any mining can happen, however, we need to learn more about the ice. That's why NASA has contracted Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic Technology to determine if its Polaris rover robot could be used for ice prospecting."

Comments

Re:Impressive

[Anonymous Coward]

650 millions tons is a lot when you consider that a lunar facility would be recycling most of the water, this gives a nice starting point without having to haul it out of our gravity well.

This then leaves a lot of extra for use by space craft for various reasons. It's a lot cheaper to lift the water or by products from the moon then it is from the Earth!

Re:Impressive

[Sparticus789]

I don't believe that NASA is planning on moving 6 billion people to the moon. 650 million tons of ice is plenty for a few hundred person colony or refueling station. Plus I doubt that they would be watering lawns, taking long bubble baths, or washing their cars. So if each person uses 90 tons of ice, and assuming no recycling, then: 650,000,000 tons of ice / 90 tons of eater per American per year = 7,222,222.222 years of water for one person for one year. One hundred people can live on the moon for 72,222 years or so.