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To: Lokibob

I'd say it's very unlikely that He-3 is on the moon. Certainly more rare on the moon than on Earth.


18 posted on 12/27/2005 7:09:44 PM PST by Brilliant
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To: Brilliant

From the first article I Googled:

Some He3 is available on Earth. It is a by-product of the maintenance of nuclear weapons, which would supply us with about 300 kg of He3 and could continue to produce about 15 kg per year. The total supply in the U.S. strategic reserves of helium is about 29 kg, and another 187 kg is mixed up with the natural gas we have stored; these sources are not renewable at any significant rate.

In their 1988 paper, Kulcinski, et al. (see ref note below), estimate a total of 1,100,000 metric tonnes of He3 have been deposited by the solar wind in the lunar regolith. Since the regolith has been stirred up by collisions with meteorites, we'll probably find He3 down to depths of several meters.

The highest concentrations are in the lunar maria; about half the He3 is deposited in the 20% of the lunar surface covered by the maria.

To extract He3 from the lunar soil, we heat the dust to about 600 degrees C.

We get most of the other volatiles out at the same time, so we'll be heating up the rocks anyway.


20 posted on 12/27/2005 7:16:43 PM PST by Lokibob (Spelling and typos are copyrighted. Please do not use.)
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To: Brilliant

"I'd say it's very unlikely that He-3 is on the moon. Certainly more rare on the moon than on Earth."

wrong.

Try a little research first:

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/helium3_000630.html

"Scientists estimate there are about1 million tons of helium 3 on the moon, enough to power the world for thousandsof years. The equivalent of a single space shuttle load or roughly 25 tonscould supply the entire United States' energy needs for a year, accordingto Apollo17 astronaut and FTI researcher Harrison Schmitt."


33 posted on 12/27/2005 9:58:38 PM PST by flashbunny (To err is human. But to really screw something up, have the government try to fix it.)
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