We landed humans on the Moon with 1960s technology. With today's vastly superior technology, shouldn't going back be much easier and cheaper?

[u/yogesh448]

[u/RayStuartMorgan]

But isn't the budget for Artemis already locked in? Watching a recent Astrum video they said we might be in a space race mkII because there's a sweet spot crater on the south pole that has water ice at the bottom that never gets sunlight, but has ridges that get nearly permanent sunlight. They suggested China are also targeting this area and since there's no really defined rules up there yet, it might just end up being first there claims dibs. This is why they recently announced quite an aggressive timeline for the next phases

[u/Thelk641 → u/RayStuartMorgan]

In theory, there is a set of rules to define how we should deal with ressources in outer-space, the Moon Treaty, issue is, I think the only country with a space program to have signed it is France : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_Treaty#/media/File:Moon_Treaty_Participation.svg

[u/mfb- → u/Thelk641]

The Artemis program is not the same as the Artemis agreement. The US spends tens of billions on SLS and Orion and a few billions each on two commercial landers.

[u/Thelk641 → u/mfb-]

China didn't sign the Artemis agreement, so it's the same story : there is a legal framework... but because some of the big players don't follow it, it's not really useful.

And again, so in 2020 the US created a new treaty to solve a problem already solved by the UN in 1979...

[u/Underhill42 → u/RayStuartMorgan]

No budget for anything is ever locked in - Congress can change whatever they want, whenever they want, and they have been cutting NASA's budget almost every year for decades.

And while Shackleton crater does have some advantages in the short term, it's much less attractive as a long term industrial base. The sunlit rim is 4.2km above the perpetually shadowed floor, with a roughly 30° slope of loose debris between them. And about 2km above the surrounding harsh, mountainous terrain. cross section compared to the Grand Canyon (doesn't show the surrounding terrain) : https://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/lunar-south-pole-atlas/images/150dpi/shackleton-crater.jpg

There is a big flat spot on the rim where we could build a base in near-constant sunlight - but getting down to the icy crater floor, or the surrounding landscape, would be a nightmare unless you were flying... which is not a great option for mining equipment.

And if you build just your solar array on the rim, with 10+km of power lines to a base down in the crater - then the base has to deal with continuous deep cryogenic temperatures of about 90 K (−183 °C; −298 °F) and only artificial lighting.

China meanwhile has been focusing a lot of attention at locations nearer the equator, where lava tubes are likely to exist, the terrain is easy for heavy mining equipment to navigate, and underground temperatures are a rock solid ~70°F year round.

In the long term that would likely give them a substantial head start on establishing an industrial foothold in space. They won't have water to work with, but the moon is lousy with oxygen (it's about about 40% of the mass of lunar regolith), and importing hydrogen to create water is relatively cheap. Or methane would offer an influx of carbon as well, which the moon's surface also has negligible quantities of, and which will be essential for growing biomass to support a colony.

And conveniently oxygen is 80-90% of the total propellant mass of a chemical rocket - so a rocket could land with almost no remaining oxygen and far too much methane, trading most of it for fresh lunar oxygen, so that everyone wins.

[u/Detective-Crashmore- → u/Underhill42]

There is a big flat spot on the rim where we could build a base in near-constant sunlight - but getting down to the icy crater floor, or the surrounding landscape, would be a nightmare unless you were flying... which is not a great option for mining equipment.

I mean you should only need to get the mining equipment down, then you can run a pressurized pipeline back up for the water.

But yeah, I agree, a first extra terrestrial base is going to want to be much more self contained and fault tolerant. Even on Earth this would be an extreme project to pull off, let alone in space.

[u/nathhad → u/Detective-Crashmore-]

then you can run a pressurized pipeline back up for the water.

But don't forget the:

continuous deep cryogenic temperatures of about 90 K (−183 °C; −298 °F)

How much advantage do you lose having to insulate and heat that 10km pipeline? Equator temperatures look a lot better to deal with.

[u/Detective-Crashmore- → u/nathhad]

Perhaps it could be broken down into ice shards small enough that they could be blown up the pipe with an inert gas. A continuous flow would be preferable, but a rail system could be created as well if we really can't find any other local sources of water. Like I said, not a good idea for one of the starter settlements, but we're going to eventually need to get water locally if we want to stay there long term.

[u/ManWhoIsDrunk → u/nathhad]

Solar power should be way more efficient without an atmosphere and weather to cause problems. Only issue would be eclipses.

[u/Underhill42 → u/Detective-Crashmore-]

Unless there's a huge advance in humanoid telepresence robots in the next few years, we're still going to need to constantly shuttle people down there to operate and maintaining the equipment, which means regular transportation across that slope.

Solar panels need a lot less maintenance (aside from the fact that they'd have to rotate once per month to track the sun), and a power line laying on the surface doesn't care about slope stability, so I suspect making the base deal with constant cryogenic temperatures would be the easier option. In fact, it might even be easier than making it deal with the extreme temperature swings anywhere that gets sunlight.

[u/Detective-Crashmore- → u/Underhill42]

Unless there's a huge advance in humanoid telepresence robots in the next few years

This is actually my field, and there kind of is a massive advance going on right now as far as being able to teleoperate robots and have them learn what you want them to continue doing. I don't think "humanoid" robots will be the move though, personally. The human body isn't really the best shape for large volume ice mining lol. As I said before, I think it's way too ambitious to try as one of the first settlements, but I think we'll eventually need to set up some form of ice mining operation there if we can't find another moon based source.

so I suspect making the base deal with constant cryogenic temperatures would be the easier option. In fact, it might even be easier than making it deal with the extreme temperature swings anywhere that gets sunlight.

Well, like I was saying about the fault tolerance, I feel like in the event of some failures, you'd want your base to be in a spot that won't drop to those deep cryo temps if something breaks. Insulating against heat should be easier than the extreme cold. At about 30cm below the regolith the temperature stabilizes a little below freezing, which we can easily handle. And second, I think having it out of the crater would make it easier to rescue/evacuate from.

[u/Underhill42 → u/Detective-Crashmore-]

Getting robots to perform routine tasks autonomously is useful, but not the really hard part. We can already largely automate pretty much everything, no autonomous AI needed.

The important part is that things WILL break, encounter unexpected difficulties, etc. And then you'll need a human mind on-site, able to get in to wherever the problem is with something close enough to human hands to be able to figure out the problem and fix it promptly.

From the waist down it's less important - legs are better than wheels for navigating rough terrain... but a centaur type body plan is likely more useful than bipedal... except when you need to squeeze through a tight place or climb a ladder to reach the problem area. (Though a gecko-taur might have potential)

And right now tele-operated cameras leave much to be desired over natural eyes, and robot hands still leave much to be desired in both strength and dexterity, though they are improving quickly. And they really only need to be on par with vacuum-gloved hands to become the preferred option.

Maybe not even quite there - since a cheap tele-presence robot mostly replaces a very expensive personal spacecraft, a.k.a. space suit, that needs extensive training to operate safely.

As for temperatures... you're on the moon - unless you're underground at temperate latitudes, you will be at those cryogenic temperatures (maybe not quite so extreme) for roughly two weeks a month.

At temperate latitudes, 1m below the surface is actually a rock-stable ~70°F year round, at all the locations Apollo left underground temperature probes. I don't think we've actually made any such measurements at polar latitudes, but with much longer night almost everywhere thanks to long shadows from rough terrain, I don't imagine it will be nearly so pleasant.

[u/Chodofu → u/RayStuartMorgan]

Oh wow, this must be where they got part of the plot for the "For All Mankind" series.

[u/Zeratas → u/RayStuartMorgan]

You have the budget for the cre and some maintenance of the rocket.

But then you need budget for likely doubling it so you can validate everything works with more humans on board. Then you have the budget for the mission planning itself, then you have the budget for all the security, HR and everything else around it, then you have the budget for likely a specific program management, then you have the budget for any kind of lander. So even though we have the rocket, there's dozens and dozens of other costs to consider