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ReturnOfSeq t1_itd1kqt wrote

Now we’re going to find out if those international agreements not to mine the moon are worth anything. My guess is, of course they’re fucking not

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lughnasadh OP t1_itdawy3 wrote

>>international agreements not to mine the moon

There is no real economic reason to mine the moon.

The fusion reactors that would use it's Helium-3 haven't been invented yet, and even when they are, many people doubt mining the moon's Helium-3 could ever economically compete with obtaining it from Earth.

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Takakikun t1_itf30sn wrote

The mining is mostly for water, not for Helium initially.

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Ayeager77 t1_itdzgnx wrote

Funny. I was thinking this reminds me of that show.

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watchwatcheswatchest t1_itexfc0 wrote

There is no generally recognized treaty not to mine the Moon. The Outer Space Treaty says you cant own land on the Moon, but the UN Hague space resources working group has specifically worked on what is and isn’t appropriate for Lunar economic activity.

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Airy_mtn t1_itd5bes wrote

Hopefully they establish a "if you pack it in, pack it out" policy.

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Spacemanspalds t1_itd8esa wrote

If we mine the moon I wonder if we could ever manage to transfer enough mass to negatively affect our gravitational agreement with the moon and tides.

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hell-yeah-man t1_itdh0gt wrote

I’m no physics expert so if someone knows better definitely reply, but I doubt we could (almost) ever affect our gravitational alignment without mining an absolute shitload off the moon. There would of course be small effects, measured mostly from precise math, but to affect everything in a way that would be problematic would involve removing a HUGE chunk from the moon. Like, bigger than we can fathom chunk.

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Spacemanspalds t1_itdhedv wrote

Oh I'm thinking thousands of years of daily transits. But was just thinking.

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hell-yeah-man t1_itdpehm wrote

Well with some weak google searches I got ~90 tons extracted per year from the earth in total, should be recent but didn’t check too closely. And with the moon having a mass of about 8.1^19 tons it would take us about 2 quadrillion years to mine it all, but to affect earth it would be way less so my guess with no background knowledge is 1/30th the moons weight. To remove would probably take about 68 trillion years, I don’t feel like accounting for optimization of the industry and such, but I still doubt we can do it in any timeframe that we can affect.

Edit: you would also have to account for the moons orbit in how you moved the materials from the planet. But sorry for the long reply lol, had fun with some guesses.

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mdog73 t1_itfvhm6 wrote

At that point we could just move the moon closer to earth to counteract the weaker pull if necessary.

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viber_in_training t1_itgyjeu wrote

I would guess that 100 years ago people would say we would need to burn a SHIT TON of fossil fuel to actually affect Earth's climate

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hell-yeah-man t1_iti35k8 wrote

Oh no doubt, in a further comment I guessed without including that. Technological growth would definitely have a huge effect.

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justin107d t1_itdiw3r wrote

If the earth increases in mass enough would the earth move away from the sun and cool the planet?

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Spacemanspalds t1_itds6y0 wrote

I would think so(i dont know. But idk if the new orbit would be elliptical or if we would spiral out due to such a change.

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mdog73 t1_itfvlmm wrote

We gain many 1000's of tons of mass a year as it is.

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VikKarabin t1_itiypm9 wrote

what's that, dust?..

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mdog73 t1_itjhn2n wrote

yeah, anything falling to earth, not just dust but stuff that burns up in the atmosphere. That same amount of mass is still added to earth.

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VikKarabin t1_itlbmg5 wrote

wow I googled it, it says 40000 tons a year. Thanks!

I felt it was maybe a ton or two.

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namek0 t1_itgrr2l wrote

That like the boy scouts "leave only footprints" policy?

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cecilmeyer t1_itdd5ix wrote

We can only hope. Instead of wasting money on weapons and war maybe humanity will start using its resources for something productive.

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deathentry t1_itdzvzi wrote

Yeh except plutonium-238 to power space equipment was made during nuclear weapons manufacturing.. https://www.planetary.org/articles/plutonium-power-for-space-missions.

0

Zren8989 t1_itfh8mi wrote

Nothing to say it wouldn't have been invented in another discipline if not for war.

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deathentry t1_itfyh0e wrote

Unlikely they would have gotten the funding for it as they only make 1.5kg a year currently..

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Frogmarsh t1_itdtght wrote

What economic return are they securing here? I don’t see what is being gained commercially and find it weird that it isn’t described in the article.

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YaAbsolyutnoNikto t1_itffcsj wrote

Due to the lower gravitational pull of the moon compared to earth, launching rockets there consumes a lot less energy.

In other words, it is cheaper and easier to have rockets flying around. It also means that rockets can carry more cargo for the same amount of fuel.

So, this all means that mining for resources in asteroids, planets, etc. can be much more easily done.

This is great because we do need resources. Some of them are scarce on earth. Others require us to destroy ecosystems to get them (like diamonds, lithium, etc.).

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anglesideside1 t1_itg1vtw wrote

If this is the best reason, then how do I short this company? Are they publicly traded?

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YaAbsolyutnoNikto t1_itg6d51 wrote

No idea. But they’re not the only ones.

As far as I know, spacex and a company in luxembourg are also working on it.

Anyway, why would you want to short it?

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anglesideside1 t1_itg784e wrote

Seems like a money pit, and until there’s an actual hard cost imposed to destroying ecosystems (I’m not talking about socialized costs associated with climate change), then it’ll be cheaper to mine whatever minerals here.

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dantemp t1_itk9o4y wrote

Asteroid mining will definitely become a major industry. The question isn't if, the question is when. You might be right that the first few attempt fail but only because we'd have to work out the kinks, not because having an infinite resource that nobody has a claim on is a bad idea.

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TheMouseUGaveACookie t1_itgyfog wrote

I agree. Reminds me of the NFT real estate market…will they start selling ownership of little trinkets that are sent to/dropped on the moon? lol

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GeetchNixon t1_itd2188 wrote

For eons, humans have stared up in wonder at the beautiful moon gracing our night skies. We’ve used it to measure the passage of time based on how much of its surface was lit up each night, and predict the tides. It’s helped us to foresee solar eclipses, and determine our position in the cosmos. But now, courtesy of a bizarre profit-driven mindvirus that has most of humanity captivated, we look up at the moon and wonder how to make a buck off of it. Seems shallow.

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Haquestions4 t1_ite2id8 wrote

Nice text. Misses the point, but nice text. For eons we killed trees to get warmth during the night and winter. Now we look at a rock.

Seems like an improvement to me.

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lughnasadh OP t1_itcsmng wrote

Submission Statement

Astrobiotic and Intuitive Machines are the two others aiming to launch in 2023.

If all these companies succeed it will mean landing payloads on the moon will be as cheap as 10's of millions of $/€, perhaps as time goes on at the lower end of that estimate. I can see lots of takers for these missions. Academic institutions across the globe must be a market worth hundreds of millions a year at these prices. Not to mention the world's different space agencies sub-contracting out missions.

I wonder how a commercial lunar economy can take off on its own? It strikes me that governments will have to seed the first billions. But how many - 10's or 100's of billions?

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BillHicksScream t1_itd5uaf wrote

Since most of it will be selling access to research & development programs, its still going to be government funded forever, not to mention paying for all the brains. The "industry" will be exploration & problem solving, maybe sell viles of moon dust. The number one outcome (edit: besides science knowledge) will be "Nope, does not work" since its mostly unknowns.

Hopefully this is just bad PR:

  • At ispace, we’ve turned our attention to the Moon. By taking advantage of lunar water resources, we can develop the space infrastructure needed to enrich our daily lives on earth, as well as expand our living sphere into space. Also, by making the Earth and Moon one system, a new economy with space infrastructure at its core will support human life, making sustainability a reality. This result is our ultimate goal, and our search for water on the Moon is the first step to achieving that goal.

Space is not Earth. None of the rules or examples apply. Think about any accident in Earth: cleanup & investigation is easier when we can just walk around and pick up the parts.

The wealth & development from The Age of Exploration was thanks to free & cheap resources with high survival rates. Fish, rainwater & air to breath abound, while wind + ocean power are free, a hole in the boat can be fixed & the man overboard! can swim.

But there is no "limping into port" in Space.

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Zren8989 t1_itfhd6j wrote

Not even on aux power and just inertia? Or is space not frictionless?

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BillHicksScream t1_itgdzjm wrote

That's just a metaphor for the the massive barriers and dangers of space. A hole in a sea ship vs a space ship? Huge difference.

If a ship starts slowly sinking just off shore, recovery of people & goods is easy. In Space its almost impossible.

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watchwatcheswatchest t1_iteyea6 wrote

The Lunar economy will start when there is an established value chain and customer. iSpace is making landers and rovers. I hope they succeed, though its not guaranteed; the last two tries by governments to land on the Moon failed. iSpace has not made any inroads with other space resource tech development such as water harvesting and oxygen extraction near term, maybe He3 and metals long term. Each of those resources require multiple stages of extraction and processing to make them useful. Until all of it is in place there is no economy. Allegories such as selling picks to gold miners in the gold rush are extremely weak because of how much VC / government money it takes to do it.

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static1053 t1_itdfk15 wrote

So all those people that bought property on the moon in the 90s are actually going to make.....money?

Wonder if any are still alive lol.

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notahouseflipper t1_itdyo9e wrote

I own a square foot in Ireland. You may call me, m’lord. I waiting for their property values to skyrocket.

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Ayeager77 t1_itdzbw2 wrote

Things are starting to feel like the show For All Mankind.

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DJanomaly t1_itgz0yh wrote

I just started watching that a few weeks ago and this was my first thought as well!

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Thismonday t1_itebxqc wrote

iSpace really ! Could you ever imagine having a brains to create a lunar lander but all you could come up with for a company name was iSpace . This is why people question if we ever really went to the moon .

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Takakikun t1_itf2vdh wrote

Just an FYI… it’s actually “ispace” with a little “s”. The one with a big “S” as in “iSpace” is a Chinese startup launch provider.

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fringecar t1_itd8biy wrote

Wait they just announced they are landing on the moon, and they are doing it next month?

Doesn't this stuff take years and billions of dollars? Have my news apps been feeding me garbage and I'm clueless about a ton of cool shit just because the US isn't doing it?

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supapuerco t1_itdydcf wrote

They’re not launching it, SpaceX is. So it's US launch capability. ispace made the lander and hired out the launch. Which is still cool!

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axecrazyorc t1_itdbpns wrote

I mean. Yeah, if you’re American. Most of our news would rather we forget other countries exist until we’re at war with them. Can’t have us comparing them to the US realizing we’re getting shit and expected to be thankful.

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parkalag t1_itdnb7k wrote

I mean it’s not crewed. It’s not easy but certainly not a billion dollar endeavor if you do it correctly. They’re also not the first to try. Just next in line to be the first to succeed

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JustJeff88 t1_itec2xy wrote

How exciting. Massive companies going to the moon because they've fucked up the earth so much. Also, spending billions to go to the moon instead of using that wealth and labour to actually address problems on this planet.

Yeah, this is not laudable.

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lostoneY t1_itfxh83 wrote

Ah great. As if one economy wasn't enough. And we have way too many people here thinking it's a good idea

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FuturologyBot t1_itcx91m wrote

The following submission statement was provided by /u/lughnasadh:

Submission Statement

Astrobiotic and Intuitive Machines are the two others aiming to launch in 2023.

If all these companies succeed it will mean landing payloads on the moon will be as cheap as 10's of millions of $/€, perhaps as time goes on at the lower end of that estimate. I can see lots of takers for these missions. Academic institutions across the globe must be a market worth hundreds of millions a year at these prices. Not to mention the world's different space agencies sub-contracting out missions.

I wonder how a commercial lunar economy can take off on its own? It strikes me that governments will have to seed the first billions. But how many - 10's or 100's of billions?

Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/yatny5/next_month_japanese_company_ispace_will_become/itcsmng/

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ios_static t1_itd4vbs wrote

I just googled if people or countries can buy or claim land on the moon. Good read

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Pythagoras_314 t1_itdof1k wrote

It’s likely part of the Artemis mission being done by NASA. The idea is to pre-stage a bunch of stuff on the moon (including a hub orbiting the moon that the lander leaves from/returns to) instead of including it all in the lander like the Apollo missions did.

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Black_RL t1_ite27qw wrote

Hope so, it’s right there.

Also, you can do whatever you like there, it’s not like you’re going to kill any species.

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Raspberries-Are-Evil t1_ite8khd wrote

How does “iSpace” not get sued by Apple?

Please dont remove this for being too short- its a serious question. Hopefully its now long enough to remain.

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internet_spy t1_itefqam wrote

Ispace is coming back to earth with lunar titanium to start making gumdam suits for the war

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Kaiju_zero t1_iteq7rb wrote

Ok Amazon workers.. get out now. You think you had to pee in a bottle on a 12 hour route.. imagine the expected next day delivery to the moon.

Invest in diaper stocks, now.

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Firm_Masterpiece_343 t1_itew3zd wrote

Commercialism of the moon could be profitable with all the chemicals that could be found in a natural vacuum environment. Plus a limited atmosphere, and no life equals a no limit on testing.

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millank24 t1_itfrcqu wrote

Bro imma be mad if so many buildings pop up on the moon we won’t get any moon light.

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Jaster_Rogue t1_itfxg44 wrote

In about 2 years Ritsuko City will be built on the moon and then begins the golden age of Star Piloting!

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adityabalaraman t1_itg117f wrote

This feels like the first step in the "let's dump all our trash on the moon" strategy

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Easy_Explanation4409 t1_itdaw20 wrote

Is the goal to pollute and destroy all land we can access?

−1

RandomOtter32 t1_itdckpb wrote

Honest question: Does pollution even matter if there's no ecosystem or atmosphere or even liquid water to impact? Wouldn't any industrial population be super localized and isolated?

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DickNixon11 t1_itdbdtj wrote

We can’t pollute the moon because the moon is an airless world

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