5 ms·
Interesting!l, havent ever thought about that! What is the heat conductivity though ? If it is low, you might have to sink too many heat transfer channels, not
by m4rtink 4y ago
Interesting!l, havent ever thought about that!
What is the heat conductivity though ? If it is low, you might have to sink too many heat transfer channels, not to mention with possibly ending up with a hot "bubble" that would no longer provide a temperature gradient.
- krasin 4y agoUnder the layer of regolith, Moon crust is mostly basalt ([1]), which has about 1.6 W/mK thermal conductivity ([2]). Not great, not terrible. We all know how cold it is to stand on a stone floor - unlike wood or plastics, it keeps sucking that heat off. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_structure_of_the_Moon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_structure_of_the_Moon 2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_thermal_conductivities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_thermal_conductivities
- sanp 4y agoNice Chernobyl reference!
- iancmceachern 4y agoYour forgetting about radiation. You don't need to conduct it all away, there are 3 modes of heat transfer, conduction, convection and radiation. In this case it's the radiation they'd rely on.
- deepsun 4y agoSunlit surface of the Moon can reach 127 C. Don't know what type of reactor they choose, but it obviously won't work for boiling type of reactors. UPDATE: I forgot about not-water coolants. Molten salt or liquid metal reactors can work at 500 C, so would radiate anyway, right.
- iancmceachern 4y agoRadiation doesn't need a temperature gradient anyway