
NASA Budgets for a Trip to the Moon - Ankaios
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/11/science/nasa-budget-moon.html
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TeMPOraL
Mars vs. Moon debates are getting ridiculous these days. _Why not both?_

Thanks to NewSpace, getting out there is only going to become cheaper; we can,
as civilization, afford both. Let ESA and NASA and China race to the Moon.
SpaceX wants to go to Mars. If _either_ succeeds in the next decade, we all
win. The knowledge and experience gained is reusable for either, it goes into
the same pool. And if we keep fighting over which destination is better, we
won't get to any.

~~~
xupybd
> Why not both?

Because it costs too much right now. SpaceX is providing NASA with rockets,
I'm not sure they'll have a sustainable business model to get to Mars. I hope
they do find a way but until costs come way down it's going to be tough.

~~~
nine_k
There is no sustainable business model to go to Mars. Unlike LEO, GEO, or
maybe even Moon, there's no business opportunity on Mars.

The only way to go there is to accumulate resources from real business, and to
improve efficiency.

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craftyguy
> The Trump administration is also looking to trim the budget of NASA’s earth
> science directorate

> The nearly $1.8 billion budget for that part of NASA would be about 6.5
> percent lower than what was enacted for fiscal year 2017

Donald seems to be stuck in the Cold War. I've not heard of one good reason
for him wanting to send Americans back to the Moon other than "prestige."
There are much more valuable scientific targets than the Moon that we could be
targeting, and it's very upsetting that he seems to be using NASA to enhance
his own image (e.g. deep cuts in areas where NASA needs budget increases..)

~~~
gnarbarian
How about a moon base we could use as a base camp for missions to the outer
solar system or mars?

H3 mining is another thought.

Edit: other ideas

* Autonomous vehicles sent ahead of time to build habitats for people.

* Large underground bases dug into the bedrock positioned at the poles collecting solar energy.

* Long tracks to launch things into space/earth electromagnetically.

* Mining of ice which could get split into H and O for propellant.

* Mining of other materials to be used on site or sent back to earth.

* Attempt to get people to be self sufficient on another world, even if it took a hundred years.

* Depot for deep space asteroid mining ships/drones to drop off their cargo and refuel/repair without having to drop all the way down to Earth.

~~~
TaylorAlexander
I guess that feels a little like England setting up a base in Greenland as a
supply depot to stop at before crossing the Atlantic to the new world. There’s
way more stuff at their home base so it’s hard to see how adding a far off
stop in a desolate place will help.

~~~
gnarbarian
I'm thinking more long term. Things I'd like to see:

* Autonomous vehicles sent ahead of time to build habitats for people.

* Large underground bases dug into the bedrock positioned at the poles collecting solar energy.

* Long tracks to launch things into space/earth electromagnetically.

* Mining of ice which could get split into H and O for propellant.

* Mining of other materials to be used on site or sent back to earth.

* Attempt to get people to be self sufficient on another world, even if it took a hundred years.

* Depot for deep space asteroid mining ships/drones to drop off their cargo and refuel/repair without having to drop all the way down to Earth.

~~~
jcranmer
Pretty much everything on your list is not possible with our current
technology. More importantly, it's feasible to develop this technology on
Earth.

The problem with going to the moon (or anywhere else in the solar system) is
that the _only_ thing we can do right now is science experiments. And there's
a lot more impactful science that can be done for far cheaper than sending
people outside of our gravity well. If you want to do anything else, then you
have to develop a lot of technology to get to the point. But the space bugs
want to see humans go to space, and they generally don't want to see effort
being expended on the research to let humans do anything useful because it's
not space research.

~~~
gnarbarian
Aside from H3 I'd argue everything on that list is within our grasp if we
tried to do so.

~~~
jcranmer
If you define it as "building infrastructure on the Moon to do so," no, it is
not available with current technology. Where are you going to get your acids
for refining, for example, if you can't scavenge from old piles of organic
goop?

~~~
gnarbarian
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refining_(metallurgy)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Refining_\(metallurgy\))

>The repeated application of such fire-refining processes was capable of
producing copper that was 99.25% pure.

Copper and iron can be refined reasonably enough using heat. Maybe it's
possible to "pitch" metallic ore into very close and highly a eccentric orbit
around the sun to help melt it down before "catching" it on the other side.

Perhaps acids could be brought up and recycled?

[https://www.space.com/13247-moon-map-lunar-
titanium.html](https://www.space.com/13247-moon-map-lunar-titanium.html)

Titanium might be more difficult.

[https://titaniumprocessingcenter.com/titanium-extraction-
and...](https://titaniumprocessingcenter.com/titanium-extraction-and-
refining/)

Seems like asteroid mining would be pretty straight forward on the surface of
the moon. The lack of erosion is capable of showing us exactly where they are.

Like I said it might take a hundred years before we can be totally self
sufficient on the moon, but I think it's possible long term.

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blackmagevivi9
This is just embarrassing, especially for the United States as a whole. The
Trump administration should be ashamed for cutting important research and
nominating a climate change denier as the head honcho.

Although building a moon base would be cool. It could increase our reach for
manned missions. Sort of a first/last pit stop before a long journey.

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Havoc
To boldly go where we've never gone before...except in 1969.

