Wilbur Ross has been appointed by the Space Council, led by Mike Pence, to deregulate and Privatize space industry in America. As part of their goals they wish to turn the Moon into a gas station for future missions. Mining fuels on the moon and selling them to spacecraft for mars and asteroid mining flights.
Mike Pence's vision for space is being executed by a massive deregulation move across all areas of space and space facility usage. This marks the beginning of full privatization of space and away from socialist NASA government control.
As a physicist and engineer who's looked at the problem, that's the most idiotic idea ever. You can't make fuel on the moon - almost no carbon or water. And if you have to truck fuel up there, what kind of jackassery is it to drop it on the bottom of a 6.4 km/s gravity well that doesn't even have an atmosphere?! No, LEO and OR MARS. People are retards. They eat stupid ideas like this up and think they're "scientist"
Gavin Morris
Moon base is useful for other reasons. Best to say it's for fuel though, if you get the point.
Jordan Collins
No, that will CAUSE global warming on the moon? Stupid corporations
Well, yeah... if you want to drop bombs on people it's a nice high ground.
Gavin Stewart
Why don't we build instead a very large space station linked to Earth with a space elevator so we can turn it into space docks, build spaceship there and launching them without burning 95% of their fuel to fight Earth gravity ?
Ayden Williams
It can be a harsh mistress
Angel Perez
You think this hasn't been done already? Why did we go to the moon in the first place?
Jace Mitchell
Space elevators are not possible on earth even with a hypothetical carbon nanotube material. You might be able to do it on Mars.
Blake Nguyen
>Why did we go to the moon in the first place? Von Braun used it as a development program for a Mars Mission. The moon is short of water and carbon, and since humans are a carbon based life form made mostly of water, the moon is a dumb place to put a human colony.
Cameron Ortiz
Strange that there are only 11 Congressmen with science or engineering degrees out of a total of 435.
Colton Cox
why not possible on earth? not saying you're wrong, just haven't heard why it cat be done one earth. wind?
Jackson Hernandez
Then scratch the space elevator, a space station is still less stupid than a moon base. What do you get with the moon ? Mild gravity ? Rock ? It's useless.
Better build a huge space station like in Valerian intro and build ships there. How to bring materials there ? With cheap re-usable rockets like the Falcon Heavy.
Daniel Moore
That's why the privatization of space is so horrible. POC won't be represented enough whereas a government controlled space program can have black women of color in charge.
Elijah Cox
There's water here and there that could be used to make fuel. Low gravity well with no atmosphere makes getting shit off the ground easier. You could even make a space elevator using existing materials.
I honestly think more attention should be focused on the Moon personally, instead of Mars. Mature technologies needed for a Mars mission on the Moon, that will bleed to other space exploration areas in the meantime as a bonus. Also if something goes wrong they at least have a chance of survival (days away), rather than being doomed.
Brayden Watson
Heh. My favorite book.
Benjamin Harris
I did the math with different engineering materials. You're talking something, even with the best materials, is absurdly huge. Didn't even get to wind... wind isn't going to matter once you get a couple of miles up. You got 36,000 km to go.
Jayden Smith
You’re sort of right; there is some water that’s accessible with only a few dozen hurdles to get it. Remember, though, this is the federal government. They can throw billions at a moonbase because moonbase.
Joshua Jackson
it's like i'm reading some flunky academic from the turn of the century explain why heavier than air flight is impossible.
Joshua Ramirez
Agreed... the moon makes no sense. What a space station buys you is that you don't need a super heavy lift vehicle. But why do I need a space station if all I want is to store fuel? Maybe just something that would assemble it all the tanks to engines, but that could be a robot now.
Michael Russell
I thought PoC were being used to motivate white people to get off Earth and colonize Mars.
Sebastian Sanders
Helium-3 deposits for when fusion reactors become viable.
Aaron Anderson
When you say "here", you mean the moon? it has very little water. You'd be better off with a long rail gun than a space elevator on the moon. Even from the moon, to reach escape orbit would be 2.3 km/s. Why? You want to go to Mars anyway. You have water and carbon on Mars. Mars can support a self sustaining colony (any colony put on the moon will die without Earth support). The technology for the moon is different than for Mars. The moon is a dead end, unless you want to drop rocks and atomic bombs on humans.
Aiden Ward
Didn't international laws prevent anyone from claiming ownership or the moon or it's resources?
Luke Anderson
>But why do I need a space station if all I want is to store fuel?
cost ofc. less weight means less money spent sending something to orbit. a "space station" in this sense could just be nothing more than a series of interconnected fuel tanks with no crew.
Actually the moon is rich in hydrogen and oxygen. Which is easily extracted from basically cooking the soil at 1000 degrees celsius. Moon has abundant He3 for fusion power. Basically unlimited cheap energy. With gravity only 1/6 of the earth it's really easy to build spacecraft, fuel, launch them. Way easier then assembling them in orbit with micro gravity makes any loose screw potential bullet.
Kevin Bailey
They also supposedly outlawed the militarization of space, and that's going out the window as we speak.
Ethan Rodriguez
Maybe. Send your international cops to the moon to fucking arrest me. It wouldn't be a "space station" as much as it would be fuel tanks that can be strapped together on a support structure and connected to a rocket engine.
Justin Murphy
I think its first come first served at this point.
I dont want them fucking with the moon though, they're gonna hollow it out and fuck up our tides. And that will fuck up a bunch of shit
Jason Martin
>Actually the moon is rich in hydrogen and oxygen. Oxygen, yes, in the form of metal oxides. hydrogen ... of fuck no. Yes, they discovered a scant amount of water, but not enough to make it practical to mine and recover.
Jacob Morris
>needing carbon for rocket fuel
God damn, you are dumb. All you need is water for oxygen and hydrogen, which the moon has.
t. Aerospace Engineer
Henry Harris
i'd rather see your math and what materials you used for your calculations. here: niac.usra.edu/files/studies/final_report/355Bogar.pdf boeing came up with this shit 20 years ago. are you going to tell me they didn't know what they were doing?
Owen Sanders
You say that like its a bad thing.
Jonathan Carter
You can make fuel from carbon and water or just water. But there is very little water on the moon, you'd have to spend energy to gather it, extract it, break it down into hydrogen and oxygen (okay... solar... you'll have to truck that up there) and then store the liquid hydrogen - which is going to be a pain in the ass. A space tether is not a space elevator, user. A space elevator goes to the ground, A space tether doesn't - you send a hypersonic aircraft or rocket to chase and dock with the tether. It has a lot of other problems
Hudson Green
You realize gas stations dont make their own fuel right? Its transported their for distrbution
Jaxon Roberts
>turn Moon into Gas Station this has been planned for more than 20 years. at least it's been understood that it was necessary before we go any farther than the moon.
Justin Brooks
you stockpile it there, moron.
Josiah Russell
Also friendly reminder space is pushed so hard because the second we start fucking with space history on Earth will more or less stay unquestioned. We have so much left here to do, its not time to go
Joshua Mitchell
What if we made a lunar rail gun, that could be used to accelerate and launch space craft? Fuck fuel if we can get them up to a crazy high velocity before launching them
Grayson Thomas
>what is H3
Michael Barnes
>ywn follow Pence into battle during the Space Crusades >ywn take back Mars from the jews >ywn fight for the Galatic Byzantine Empire
Brayden Richardson
Physicist here - it wouldn't be on the surface or producing fuel in-situ, they'd be little more than fuel storage and automated refueling stations. The idea would be to have a series of orbital refueling depots at low orbit, geostrationary orbit, the L1, L2, L4 points, lunar-stationary orbit, low lunar orbit, etc that can quickly and effectively refuel ships for long-range exploration missions to Mars, the belts, or beyond.
The point of having surface bases is to make it easier to support a manned presence that can maintain these orbital facilities.
Easton Robinson
I thought to moon was ripped away from earth in 1999 and is traveling through space with our moonbases crew meeting aliens. and shit.
Mason Jenkins
The space elevator thing is true yeah it's kind of pointless, but I'm just saying you could mature more self-sustaining closed system technologies on the moon, and use it as a sort of proving ground. And there's enough water there to make plenty of fuel. We could start bringing icy asteroids into lunar orbit for further harvesting and make a lunar orbit space station for fueling trips further out. Also on the far side of the moon you could install optical/radio telescopes for unparalleled observations on the dark side.
Who knows what other things could also be developed as the technologies used for this endeavor matured. Perhaps novel manufacturing methods in a free vacuum? Helium 3 harvesting? Rare materials?
I just don't think it's a terrible idea, and I think it's better to use resources on the moon rather than some pie-in-the-sky trip to Mars that is better served by robotics.
Noah Bailey
Do you happen to be retarded?
Benjamin Collins
Not sure what you point is... Most people would put the gas stations along the way where they want to go. It's a plus if you can make the gas near the gas station. Attached in a map. EVERYWHERE you want to go that is not in Earth orbit is on the other side of Mars. The mineral rich asteroid belt, for example. You can EASILY make fuel on Mars, and store it. The moon? Not so easy and it's not only out of the way, it doesn't get you that much closer to Mars. You need to think in terms of delta velocity and not distance. The car analogy is a bad one.
Hunter Bailey
>pain in the ass It was also a pain in the ass to sail across the Atlantic.
Justin Lee
Using the moon as a gas station is a waste of money, time and resources. Delta V wise, the moon is as far away as Mars, and everything you want is either on Mars, or the other side of mars. The science is on mars, the materials are on Mars, and Mars is the gateway. The moon is a useless rock.
Gabriel Wright
>Delta V wise, the moon is as far away as Mars care to unpack this?
Carson Gonzalez
Hi user! Perhaps some reading material.
Mason Cox
i got pics douche.
Nathan Johnson
>the moon is out of the way if we only go to mars
Carson Reyes
>you'd have to spend energy to gather it, extract it, break it down into hydrogen and oxygen
What about compared to the energy required to escape the Earth's gravity well? I haven't done the math, but it might work out that gravity cost far exceeds the moon fuel harvesting / processing cost, therefore a moonbase is economical.
Tyler Wood
Nass did a mission and determined the moon is covered in fuel materials
Connor Taylor
>Mining fuels on the moon lol wut, the moon is an artificial construct. there's nothing to "mine"
Juan Evans
>I did the math Show it then faggot
Brody Scott
every bit of fuel you lift from the moon cost you 2.3 km/sec to put there, and another 2.3 km/sec to get off of there. If you're going to store it there, it's idiocy. Just store it in LEO. If you're going to make it there... somehow... you may as well make it on Mars. The delta v to Mars and Lunar surface is not all that different.
Jaxson Stewart
a simple yes would suffice.
Jace Sullivan
FUCK YOU WE MOON BASE NOW!
Jose Ross
you mean He3? That's an isotope of helium that you can probably find on the moon. You mean tritium? An unstable isotope of hydrogen that can't be in any abundance on the moon because it has a half life of only 12 years. It decays into He3
Earth to Mars Transfer >Option 1 - Direct >Total delta-V = 13.8 km/s >Option 2 - Refuel in Lunar Orbit >Total delta-V = 16.1 km/s
So you get a completely full tank in exchange for an extra 2.3 km/s of delta-V before entering Mars transfer. That means more fuel for longer burns or more burns which means much much more flexibility for longer trips.
Grayson Howard
Meant he3 half life 3 confirmed
Xavier Williams
I agree the moon is only suited to storing fuel. How would a lunar base support "orbital facilities"? Is this the whole human need for gravity thing? Why do I need humans to store fuel? I don't need humans for satellite station keeping.
Jace Lewis
It was a television series... "Space 1999". user is not retarded, but a tongue in cheek old fag.
Noah Martinez
>If you're going to store it there, it's idiocy. Just store it in LEO. LEO is cheaper in terms of delta-V cost, but you've also got to keep in mind the cost of maintenance. Lunar orbit requires almost no effort to maintain, whereas LEO requires constant corrective burns due to atmospheric drag.
You can drop a couple hundred tons of fuel in lunar orbit and just leave it there indefinitely, in LEO you'd burn tons of fuel a year keeping it up.
Gavin King
The people who crossed the Atlantic believe they could farm crops and raise livestock. You can't do that on the moon. You used a false analogy
Jaxson Hughes
The moon has no atmosphere, has fuel, and has a much lower escape velocity than the earth. It would be a great base.
Landon Barnes
ah he was only pretending to be retarded. Smart move
Christian Foster
Perfect. I've been advocating this for years.
Levi Kelly
There are no gays on the moon.
Wyatt Adams
>The people who crossed the Atlantic believe they could farm crops and raise livestock. Hydroponic farms nigger, also the first settlers expected to still be resupply ed. You are a keyboard scholar who thinks they know more than all the experts.
Tyler Wright
Well as a 300+ IQ astromagnetofulidynamic engineering PHD, I think you're full of shit.
Fake qualifications don't impress anyone on anonymous image boards.
Brayden Allen
First colonial settlers expected to be resupplied.
Henry Wright
What? You're full of shit, with carbon nanotubes they're absolutely doable on Earth. The real problem is that right now we can't produce long strands of them, and may not be able to do so for a very long times. You're talking out of your ass, just like the "no water on the moon" horseshit.
Jayden Cooper
Yeah well I'm a 6'4 chef at wendys with a 9 inch dick making 30k a year
Ayden Lewis
Go back to the picture of delta v... Arrows mean that you get a freebee (aerobreaking) when you go that direction. To go to the Lunar surface from LEO is 4.1 + 0.7 + 1.6 = 6.4 km/s to go to Mars Surface from LEO is 2.5 + 0.7 + 0.6 = 3.8 km/s. Mars is closer in terms of what you can reach with a rocket. Delta V determines HOW MUCH IT COST in momentum (or energy) to get there. To get the energy/mass, it goes as the square of delta V - So its 41 energy units for the moon, and 14.4 for Mars.
Justin Scott
>Very little water
Compared to earth yes, but there is still trillions of tons, more than we could ever use in craters that get no sun.
The moon, being in a vacuum, makes solar panels extremely cheap to make. The regolith itself can be turned into solar panels and manufacturing can be done out in the open. Google it.
Isaac Collins
That's nice. Mars, however, is closer delta V wise. Infact, as Zubrin pointed out, if you insist on being a retard (not his words) and using the moon as a gas station you'd be better off making the fuel on Mars and shipping it to the moon.
Matthew Campbell
Ah who am I kidding I can't claim to understand this. But neato on you.
Harnessing the power of all the helium-3 to shock every faggot through time.
MIKE "ORBITAL DROP SHOCK TROOPER" PENCE
Aaron Martinez
Now it's lunar orbit? That makes no sense at all. Station keeping is far less than 4.8 km/s from LEO to LO
Brody Bennett
That the moon has no atmosphere means no atmospheric braking and is why it cost you 1.6 delta v up and down, user.
Dylan Diaz
Saying "nigger" does not make your bad analogy fallacy any better, user.
Easton White
Your "muh areobreak" doesn't work as well when taking off from mars.
3.8 (a bit more than that because anything with a decent mass will have to slow down with thrusters, parachutes aren't enough) + 6.4 (a bit more than that because taking off the Martian atmosphere will make you lose energy)
vs
6.4 + 2.4
Jayden Russell
>with carbon nanotubes they're absolutely doable on Earth. The real problem is that right now we can't produce long strands of them, Damn it leaf, now there's coffee all over my screen. Absolutely doable with unobtainium. You really went there.. And the economics of it, the size of the damn thing.. you haven't a clue.
Luis Murphy
>Mike Pence kek
Gavin Long
Super... Now, where's the fusion reactor that burns helium 3 to make it worthwhile?
Justin Campbell
Zubrin's a romantic faggot that's eternally butthurt about getting shut down over the years.
Jayden Lopez
So you shift the goal post from "impossible even with carbon nanotubes" to "nanotubes are unobtanium", which is almost what I said in my own comment. and "it will be ridiculously expensive" which has nothing to do with whether or not you can do it, but rather when, and if it's better than other alternatives. kek Id rather go for "short-bus scholar".
Nathaniel Rivera
Kewl. You put your fuel on the moon and saved 1.4 km/s. Where are you going to go after you fueled up on the moon? Oh yeah, next stop, mars. Yeah... that's a mistake.
Ethan Smith
If theres fuel on the moon doesnt that prove abiogenisis? Doesnt that prove the fact there is a virtually limitless supply of oil here on earth? Questions.
Hunter Jackson
But the cost of getting things off mars is higher as you have more gravity + atmosphere to push through
Zachary Robinson
theres shitloads of oil on earth, you just gotta dig deeper
Hunter Kelly
a moon base as a stepping-stone to anything is a retarded idea and probitively money- and problem-intensive
easier to just go directly to mars and establish a base there
