[X] My Assistant

[RNeuhaus]

Russia is planning to mine a rare fuel on the moon by 2020 with a permanent base and a heavy-cargo transport link, a Russian space official said Wednesday.

"We are planning to build a permanent base on the moon by 2015 and by 2020 we can begin the industrial-scale delivery... of the rare isotope Helium-3," Nikolai Sevastyanov, head of the Energia space corporation, was quoted by Itar-Tass news agency as saying at an academic conference.

The International Space Station (ISS) would play a key role in the project and a regular transport relay to the moon would be established with the help of the planned Clipper spaceship and the Parom, a space capsule intended to tug heavy cargo containers around space, Sevastyanov said.

Helium-3 is a non-radioactive isotope of helium that can be used in nuclear fusion.

Rare on earth but plentiful on the moon, it is seen by some experts as an ideal fuel because it is powerful, non-polluting and generates almost no radioactive by-product.

Our future new kind of fuel that might replace to plutonium or uranium. That would be a future very feasible busineess.

Rodolfo

[RNeuhaus]

More details about Moon mining:

Moonscam: Russians try to sell the Moon for foreign cash

Interesting themes from the article:

1) Hellium has incredible source energy for kilogram unit:

Sevastianov, the recently-appointed head of the Energia Rocket and Space Corporation (the firm that builds and operates all of Russia’s human space vehicles), claimed that one ton of helium-3 could produce as much energy as 14 million tons of oil. “Ten tons of helium-3 would be enough to meet the yearly energy needs of Russia,” he added. “There are practically no reserves of helium on the Earth. On the Moon, there are between 1 million and 500 million tons, according to various estimates,” he said, enough for the entire planet’s energy needs for a thousand years.

2) But, the fusion energy for electrical power is still far:

The story continued with commendable caution: “Not everyone is sold on the promise of helium-3: A workable fusion reactor is still decades away, and researchers say that the technology for using helium-3 is more difficult than the technology for other potential fusion fuels that would be more abundant on Earth.

3) The idea is very old and it is from Western

The concept of mining helium-3 from lunar dirt is not original with Russia, and has been discussed at length in the Western space literature. This is underscored by an embarrassing slip-up: not even the artwork released in Russia to show “a typical Moon base” is original. It too has been ripped off from Western sources, often apparently in violation of international copyright laws.

4) However, it says that mining Hellium in Moon is much easier and cheaper:

“It is much easier to develop resources on the Moon than to produce oil on the Earth,” Galimov continued. Space geologist Erik Galimov, a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, added that immediate steps must be taken to explore potential mining sites. “We should start geological survey, make maps of blocs exposed to the Sun, and design experimental installations if we want to start the production of helium-3 on the Moon in 15–20 years,” he said.

“There is nothing difficult from the engineer’s point of view in the production of helium-3,” he continued. “It is only a matter of investments.”

He calculates that an area of 10–15 square kilometers with the depth of three meters will be enough for producing one ton of helium-3. Engineers will have to remove and purify three meters of sand, enrich helium-3, and liquidify it for the delivery to the Earth.

Rodolfo

[David]

not even the artwork released in Russia to show “a typical Moon base” is original. It too has been ripped off from Western sources, often apparently in violation of international copyright laws.

If Oberg knows that the Russian picture is "ripped off" then he ought to be able to identify the source. (He doesn't.) If he doesn't know what the source is, then he has no basis for accusing the Russians of ripping it off. Either he's sloppy, or he's making unsupportable accusations -- I don't know which.

I have read a good deal of Oberg's stuff, and he has done some good work in putting together the history of the space program, but he clearly hates the Russians with a virulent passion (for, I gather, political reasons) and views anything they do with a jaundiced eye. Many of his criticisms are doubtless spot on, and certainly the Helium-3 proposal sounds like something that is, at best, decades ahead of its time; but Oberg has a tendency to get very cranky-sounding on subjects he's passionate about, and this makes it harder to take him as seriously as he'd like.

[gpurcell]

If Oberg knows that the Russian picture is "ripped off" then he ought to be able to identify the source.  (He doesn't.)  If he doesn't know what the source is, then he has no basis for accusing the Russians of ripping it off.  Either he's sloppy, or he's making unsupportable accusations -- I don't know which.

One Moon base concept shown on the Komsomolskaya Pravda website on January 27 (http://www.kp.ru/upimg/photo/57527.jpg) was carefully labeled in Russian, showing the helium-3 refinery and the storage and transshipment equipment. But within three hours space observer Rusty Barton had posted on an Internet space policy newsgroup the URL of the original artwork by Roger Arno (http://www.challenger.org/pacct/Images/LunarBase-fs.jpg), with the notice: “copyright 1996-97, California Institute of Technology. All rights reserved. Further reproduction is prohibited.”