Moon gas may solve Earth's energy crisis

[Dover]

Moon gas may solve Earth's energy crisis

A potential gas source found on the moon's surface could hold the key to meeting future energy demands as the earth's fossil fuels dry up in the coming decades, scientists say.

Mineral samples from the moon contain abundant quantities of helium 3, a variant of the gas used in lasers and refrigerators.

"When compared to the earth the moon has a tremendous amount of helium 3," Lawrence Taylor, a director of the US Planetary Geosciences Institute, said.

"When helium 3 combines with deuterium (an isotope of hydrogen) the fusion reaction proceeds at a very high temperature and it can produce awesome amounts of energy.

"Just 25 tonnes of helium, which can be transported on a space shuttle, is enough to provide electricity for the US for one full year."..cont'd

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200411/s1252715.htm

Helium 3 is deposited on the lunar surface by solar winds and would have to be extracted from moon soil and rocks.

To extract helium 3 gas the rocks have to be heated above 800 degrees Celsius.

Dr Taylor says 200 million tonnes of lunar soil would produce one tonne of helium.

Only 10 kilograms of helium are available on earth.

Indian President APJ Abdul Kalam has told the International Conference on Exploration and Utilisation of the Moon that the barren planet held about 1 million tonnes of helium 3.

"The moon contains 10 times more energy in the form of helium 3 than all the fossil fuels on the earth," Mr Kalam said.

[Ian David]

1. It only works for nuclear fusion

This is great news, once we manage to learn how to generate electricity from nuclear fusion.

We can create fusion reactors now, but we still don't know how to get more energy out than we put into it.

Unless there's a sudden breakthrough, we're talking 50-100 years from now.

[phantom power]

2. I think we're closer than that, now. The next ITER reactor is

expected to produce electricity, although it will still be a research reactor.

Hot-fusion research kind of fell off the public radar after the cold-fusion debacle, but progress has been steady. I get the impression that they are limited more by funding now, than anything else. (Of course, a fusion researcher might be expected to say that, regardless)

[Ediacara]

3. What a bogus title.....

In any case, this is a strip miner's dream. Strip off 200M tonnes of soil, bake it (I guess IN a reactor fueled by this helium), and then send it home.

I am curious what the cost of this would be, it's almost as if you're spending more energy than you're potentially getting.

PLUS, the surface of the Moon will never look the same....

Why not just go with the standard fusion model of smashing deuterium together? Heck, you'll probably end up with a crap-load of helium 3 as a waste product from that sort of reaction...

[phantom power]

4. With our current tech, there is no way this is affordable. But,

you could use solar mirrors to bake the rock.

One good bit of news: It takes about 1/20 the energy to get out of moon's gravity well as earth. So, if you did get a mining station there, it would be much cheaper moving stuff from moon to earth, than the other direction.

[NickB79]

5. 5 BILLION tons of lunar soil per year, JUST for the US?

200 million tons of lunar soil yielding one ton of H3 means we'd have to process 5 billion tons per year to get the 25 tons needed to power the US for one year. How much would we have to process to supply the rest of the world? I'm sure China, Europe and Russia wouldn't be too happy being left out of this (plus, we'd need their help anyway to fund this thing).

The logistics of this idea are staggeringly poor, IMO.