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This article does not cover what I consider to be two key issues: - how to boost the mass of something like a shielded nuclear reactor to the moon? - how to e
by zabzonk 4y ago
This article does not cover what I consider to be two key issues:
- how to boost the mass of something like a shielded nuclear reactor to the moon?
- how to extract the heat energy from the reactor? turbines (more mass)?
- jandrese 4y agoMaybe reduce the shielding requirement by burying it in regolith with only the heat exchangers exposed?
- thinkingemote 4y agoalso wondering the same. Most nuclear reactors including those in submarines (which rolls royce make) are basically steam engines.
- TheRealPomax 4y agoIf we had those answers already, there wouldn't be a project to fund to find out those answers.
- kurthr 4y agoWhen all you have is a hammer, nothing looks like low cost continuous solar power with direct conversion to electricity at the poles.
- Reason077 4y agoI guess they aren't planning to build the moon-base at the poles, which could provide access to continuous solar power nearby. The rest of the moon has long (+/- 14 day) lunar nights, and getting enough batteries or whatever to the moon to last that long is likely to be impractical/expensive.
- kurthr 4y agoBecause it's too cold there? Probably too much water ice on the poles to be interesting. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/26/science/moon-ice-water.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/26/science/moon-ice-water.ht... oops https://web.archive.org/web/20201101003308/https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/26/science/moon-ice-water.html https://web.archive.org/web/20201101003308/https://www.nytim...
- Reason077 4y agoIt's certainly very cold deep in the polar craters, which are in permanent darkness. But in the sunlit areas it's relatively mild. There's far less variation than in equatorial regions, which have to deal with huge variance between day and night temperatures.