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Interesting. Very happy to have a reignited space enthusiasm across the globe, just curious if something has developed which is spiking the interest. As far as

Interesting. Very happy to have a reignited space enthusiasm across the globe, just curious if something has developed which is spiking the interest. As far as I understand landing on the moon doesn't contain a whole lot of ROI apart from the mission success itself.

michelb 3y ago
Pretty sure it's a race to land-grab, for future mining efforts and jumping-off points. Probably some science experiments as well. I guess it's a bit like Antarctica, but without the peace and commercial interests.
bozhark 3y ago
mining rights
- chmod775 3y ago
  There is no international treaty giving you mining rights for landing on the moon.
  - simplicio 3y ago
    Rather the opposite. Current international law forbids countries from claiming property rights on the Moon.
- goku12 3y ago
  What do you mine on the Moon? Moon's gravity may be 1/6th that of Earth's - but that is still a lot to overcome to bring back anything substantial. I keep hearing about Helium3 fusion. But we don't have any commercially viable fusion reactors around. There may be water - but it's likely going to take a lot of processing to extract. What else is there that we can't get on this planet and is worth the cost of lifting from the Moon?
  - neom 3y ago
    https://www.popsci.com/elements-mine-on-the-moon/ https://www.popsci.com/elements-mine-on-the-moon/
    - goku12 3y ago
      This article doesn't address the nuances - the energy requirements, processing of the ore, etc.
    - thombat 3y ago
      So nothing of immediate or direct use here on earth, just things that may be usable for further off-world construction or (in the case of He-3) might be an energy source someday.
      - hnben 3y ago
        isn't metal in orbit much more valuable than metal on earth? i.e. you can build plenty cheap satellites with it.
        hnbad 3y ago
        This assumes you can refine the ores "in orbit" and manufacture everything "in orbit". This in turn requires a ton of manufacturing on Earth and a lot of launches to move all this stuff off Earth. Not to mention all the supporting industry and infrastructure manufacturing normally has on Earth. Not to mention the R&D costs and staff logistics. This isn't a video game. You can't just click a button and have an autonomous satellite factory churning out satellites in space. Moving any amount of manufacturing or refining into space is a massive logistics undertaking we haven't even begun to explore. Just because Bezos has a vision of moving the working class off Earth or Musk made some off-the-cuff remarks to rile up his yes-men, that doesn't mean this is something that will happen soon, much less something that will be useful soon.
dotnet00 3y ago
Japan is, just like with the ISS partnership, a key member of the Artemis accords (IIRC they'll be getting to send their own astronauts to the Moon too, just like how they do to the ISS right now). Thus the increasing activity towards the Moon. I think at this point basically every major country with any sort of space-related industry that isn't Russia or China aligned has signed on and is working on things related to the Moon. Turns out that the only way to force the US to commit to a destination in space instead of switching between the Moon and Mars every administration was for NASA to turn it into a large international partnership such that it would hurt the next administration's standing to cancel the program.
- rsynnott 3y ago
  > was for NASA to turn it into a large international partnership such that it would hurt the next administration's standing to cancel the program. That's no guarantee. See Jupiter moon exploration - there were _two_ proposed NASA/ESA ones, both cancelled when NASA pulled out. ESA then did their own one (JUICE) and now NASA is doing a couple of its own, too.
- asdff 3y ago
  What are some of the overall interests for these recent moon missions? In the past it was for manned spy satellite and ICBM programs. Is there a similar national defense parallel being worked on with these efforts?
  - dotnet00 3y ago
    I think this time the emerging interest is that by leading the effort of and controlling most of the infrastructure for establishing a long term, potentially permanent presence on the Moon, the US can dictate the terms of these first realistic international agreements on the resource rights on foreign bodies. The next closest adversary who is a contender technology-wise for establishing a similar presence is China, so you can imagine that all the issues with them are involved too. Plus, to a smaller extent there's the idea behind Artemis that all this is a staging ground for our eventual trips to Mars (which, due to the mechanics of it, would have to be a long term thing), where of course the big interest is that it would be another monumental event in human history and politicians would very much like for that to be associated with their name (hell, part of Artemis' motivation was just that they promised to put boots on the Moon before the end of Trump's assumed second term, allowing him to claim to have been the one to oversee America's return to the Moon).
dahousecat 3y ago
NASA is planning to build a radio telescope: https://youtu.be/qdJ_gJ_kPEI?si=4MVsL8FtWtkZRI7e https://youtu.be/qdJ_gJ_kPEI?si=4MVsL8FtWtkZRI7e
dr-detroit 3y ago
[dead]

michelb 3y ago

Pretty sure it's a race to land-grab, for future mining efforts and jumping-off points. Probably some science experiments as well. I guess it's a bit like Antarctica, but without the peace and commercial interests.

bozhark 3y ago

mining rights

chmod775 3y ago
There is no international treaty giving you mining rights for landing on the moon.
- simplicio 3y ago
  Rather the opposite. Current international law forbids countries from claiming property rights on the Moon.
goku12 3y ago
What do you mine on the Moon? Moon's gravity may be 1/6th that of Earth's - but that is still a lot to overcome to bring back anything substantial. I keep hearing about Helium3 fusion. But we don't have any commercially viable fusion reactors around. There may be water - but it's likely going to take a lot of processing to extract. What else is there that we can't get on this planet and is worth the cost of lifting from the Moon?
- neom 3y ago
  https://www.popsci.com/elements-mine-on-the-moon/ https://www.popsci.com/elements-mine-on-the-moon/
  - goku12 3y ago
    This article doesn't address the nuances - the energy requirements, processing of the ore, etc.
  - thombat 3y ago
    So nothing of immediate or direct use here on earth, just things that may be usable for further off-world construction or (in the case of He-3) might be an energy source someday.
    - hnben 3y ago
      isn't metal in orbit much more valuable than metal on earth? i.e. you can build plenty cheap satellites with it.
      - hnbad 3y ago
        This assumes you can refine the ores "in orbit" and manufacture everything "in orbit". This in turn requires a ton of manufacturing on Earth and a lot of launches to move all this stuff off Earth. Not to mention all the supporting industry and infrastructure manufacturing normally has on Earth. Not to mention the R&D costs and staff logistics. This isn't a video game. You can't just click a button and have an autonomous satellite factory churning out satellites in space. Moving any amount of manufacturing or refining into space is a massive logistics undertaking we haven't even begun to explore. Just because Bezos has a vision of moving the working class off Earth or Musk made some off-the-cuff remarks to rile up his yes-men, that doesn't mean this is something that will happen soon, much less something that will be useful soon.

dotnet00 3y ago

Japan is, just like with the ISS partnership, a key member of the Artemis accords (IIRC they'll be getting to send their own astronauts to the Moon too, just like how they do to the ISS right now). Thus the increasing activity towards the Moon. I think at this point basically every major country with any sort of space-related industry that isn't Russia or China aligned has signed on and is working on things related to the Moon. Turns out that the only way to force the US to commit to a destination in space instead of switching between the Moon and Mars every administration was for NASA to turn it into a large international partnership such that it would hurt the next administration's standing to cancel the program.

rsynnott 3y ago
> was for NASA to turn it into a large international partnership such that it would hurt the next administration's standing to cancel the program. That's no guarantee. See Jupiter moon exploration - there were _two_ proposed NASA/ESA ones, both cancelled when NASA pulled out. ESA then did their own one (JUICE) and now NASA is doing a couple of its own, too.
asdff 3y ago
What are some of the overall interests for these recent moon missions? In the past it was for manned spy satellite and ICBM programs. Is there a similar national defense parallel being worked on with these efforts?
- dotnet00 3y ago
  I think this time the emerging interest is that by leading the effort of and controlling most of the infrastructure for establishing a long term, potentially permanent presence on the Moon, the US can dictate the terms of these first realistic international agreements on the resource rights on foreign bodies. The next closest adversary who is a contender technology-wise for establishing a similar presence is China, so you can imagine that all the issues with them are involved too. Plus, to a smaller extent there's the idea behind Artemis that all this is a staging ground for our eventual trips to Mars (which, due to the mechanics of it, would have to be a long term thing), where of course the big interest is that it would be another monumental event in human history and politicians would very much like for that to be associated with their name (hell, part of Artemis' motivation was just that they promised to put boots on the Moon before the end of Trump's assumed second term, allowing him to claim to have been the one to oversee America's return to the Moon).

dahousecat 3y ago

NASA is planning to build a radio telescope: https://youtu.be/qdJ_gJ_kPEI?si=4MVsL8FtWtkZRI7e https://youtu.be/qdJ_gJ_kPEI?si=4MVsL8FtWtkZRI7e

dr-detroit 3y ago

[dead]