Posted on 11/04/2014 11:07:16 AM PST by BenLurkin
Yesterday, Metzger outlined the rationale for establishing a base in the first place, while today he focuses on the cost.
UT: Your 2012 paper specifically talks about how much development is needed on the Moon to make the industry “self-sustaining and expanding”, but left out the cost of getting the technology ready and of their ongoing operation. Why did you leave this assessment until later? How can we get a complete picture of the costs?
PM: As we stated at the start of the paper, our analysis was very crude and was intended only to garner interest in the topic so that others might join us in doing a more complete, more realistic analysis. The interest has grown faster than I expected, so maybe we will start to see these analyses happening now including cost estimates. Previous analyses talked about building entire factories and sending them into space. The main contribution of our initial paper was to point out that there is this bootstrapping strategy that has not been discussed previously, and we argued that it makes more sense. It will result in a much smaller mass of hardware launched into space, and it will allow us to get started right away so that we can figure out how to make the equipment work as we go along.
(Excerpt) Read more at universetoday.com ...
The questions come to mind: Whose money? and Why? There isn't anything in space that is worth the cost of getting it.
Lot of materials on the Moon.
I thought that all this would have happened by now.
Just use an Illudium Q-36 explosive space modulator to do the foundation work.
It will have to be private enterprise. Govt will ‘nationalize’ it for the UN and thus hose it. Assuming we survive long enough, we have to go there eventually.
[ Building A Space Base, Part 2: How Much Money Would It Take?
The questions come to mind: Whose money? and Why? There isn’t anything in space that is worth the cost of getting it. ]
How about the cost of getting away FROM something horrible on earth, like planetary socialism..?
The higher the taxes and regulations, the more living on the harsh airless moon will look like virtual paradise...
Space will be colonized by Political Refugees....
[ Lot of materials on the Moon.
I thought that all this would have happened by now. ]
Tele-Robotics + 3D Printing = “Seed Factory”
Send “seed factory” to the moon and operate it remotely for a few years to build and establish base, THEN send people to mostly finished moon base!
Part 2
I have to agree with you, as much as I’d like to see a moon base.
Too many problems to overcome with present technology:
- radiation
- meteorites
- water
- air
- transportation costs
To claim that mining would justify the costs is not credible.
the logic here seems to be the same as “it’s easy, all we need to do is put a bell on the cat”.
Yep rocks. Divide the dollar cost of the Apollo program by the weight of rocks returned, and you'll have the cost per pound of moon rocks no different in intrinsic value that any you just pick up off the ground.
government is a plague that humans carry with them. There is a large fraction who think that someone else owes them a living and government is the instrument that they use to extort what they falsely believe to be their due.
Can't argue with that, BUT it is the cost of getting it that's the killer.
There isn’t anything in space that is worth the cost of getting it.
Freedom only really exists on a frontier and we are
rapidly running out of those here on earth.
Then we'd better damn well do something about it here and now because running off to Mars or the moon isn't an option.
It’s the only option we DO have.
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