POLL: Importance of Water on the Moon?

[doublehelix]

A trio of spacecraft that flew by or around the moon found what scientists are calling "unambiguous evidence" that water on the lunar surface. The studies include data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft – which flew by the moon en route to Saturn – as well as the repurposed Deep Impact probe and India’s Chandrayaan-1 lunar orbiter. The research is detailed in the Sept. 25 issue of the journal Science.

http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/0 ... overy.html

[Bugs99]

I would have to say that this may be the game changer for NASA. We all have heard for years of the possibility, but in politics possibilities don't get you budget increases. You need facts!

[bbfreakDude]

I'm sorry but it annoys me when people mention India’s Chandrayaan-1 lunar orbiter without also mentioning NASA's involvement with the Moon Mineralogy Mapper payload, not that the scientific data isn't shared between the partner countries but props need to fully go to the folks at NASA.

Sure there were hints of water, but before you go to the moon to live there you need more than just hints and this finally gives us confirmation of sorts. That it comes just 14 days from LCROSS's impact with the moon, only highlights the importance of LCROSS's mission.

[Geoduck2]

It MAY be. It MIGHT be. It COULD be.

Until we know the quantities, purity, and where it's all speculation. At this point it's an interesting bit of information but thatis all.

[Booban]

Ok, so it's significant because it will be cheaper to produce oxygen and fuel in space compared to launching it from Earth.

Will it really be cheaper? Is it a simple process or do you need some kind of factory to produce significant quantities?

There are costs for gathering, processing, maintenance of machinery, personnel, storage and safety costs of handling such explosive substances in space. Maybe it is cheaper to have all these costs on Earth rather than constantly shipping up workers and spare machine parts?

What is it's significance as a fuel source? I thought we were divided between using Solar or nuclear energy. Now hydrogen is better? Is this specific space ship fuel? Do we have 'hydrogen engines' now already? Someone please explain.

[MeteorWayne]

Yes we have hydrogen engines. Ever hear of the Space Shuttle? It's main engines use hydrogen and oxygen as propellant which are combined to create water and release energy.

[kc5tja]

And what, pray tell, do we intend on doing with this water when we get there? Drink it? Hardly -- there's not enough in any single location to satisfy even one human being's daily intake. You literally have to mine it out of the regolith. Not a profitable use of resources if you ask me.

So, OK, there's water there. Big deal. It will neither affect our ability nor desirability to establish a permanent presence on the moon -- we were going there with or without water anyway.

Knowing that water in large, easily accessible quantities is necessary for human sustenance, trace findings of water will have zero impact on the need for water recycling systems. And, if you're going to live on the moon permanently, it's probably a good idea to set up a farm or two there as well, so the astronauts actually have real vegetables to eat and all. If that's the case, it'll almost certainly be hydroponic or aeroponic, and THAT means lots more water to be consumed and recycled. Again, the moon just isn't going to have that kind of resource readily available.

I think people are ascribing entirely too much importance to this find.

[MeteorWayne]

Perhaps you should wait and see how much water is actually there?

[Booban]

Yes we have hydrogen engines. Ever hear of the Space Shuttle? It's main engines use hydrogen and oxygen as propellant which are combined to create water and release energy.

Oh.

That sounds exactly like futuristic hydrogen fuel cars that Bush was trying to help research. I did not know the technology was the same as the shuttle's.

[MeteorWayne]

That's a little different. That's using hydrogen and oxygen in a Fuel cell to create water, but the energy is released a slower in the form of electricity, not heat. The Space Shuttle also has fuel cells to provide electricity....in fact that goes way back. The Apollo capsules used the same general type of fuel cells.

[Sour]

It's very cool to find proof and all.... but until someone comes up with a plan and funding to actually DO something with it then it's just more useless trivia

[GarthBock]

The news media is making a big leap here. With water on the moon that means we can have a moon base because we can extract oxygen and hydrogen and that means we can make rocket fuel making the moon a jumping off point to the planets. .....Whoa. First of all we dont know the quantity or quality. Second, if it is good and there is some that is easily obtainable then water will end up like oil on Earth. Exploiting a limited resource like that will end up depleting it. We have not learned anything.

[JROYB]

The water may be present, but developing practical methods of extracting useful quantities of it are still a ways off. Production of useful quantities of liquid hydrogen and LOX on Luna is still science fiction.

[Eddie_42]

Where is the "This doesn't mean a thing" option.

As the prior poster noted, its highly limited. It's only at a concentration of 32oz per Ton of rock, I don't know about you folks..but moving and processing 1 ton of rock for 4 glasses of water seems like a poor option. There is no current processing facility to make this happen, and it will be 20yrs or more before a human stays on the moon for more then 1 week.

[MeteorWayne]

Anyone interested about the actual data about moon water, should probably watch the NASA News Conference at 2 PM EDT today. I started a thread on it in this forum.

[HollyCow]

The levels of water are so low it is going to be a long time before we will have the infrastructure on the moon to take advantage of it. By then we probably will have other ways to supply our water needs on the moon.

[MeteorWayne]

Holly Cow, Welcome to Space.com

Like what?

[charlesw6954]

Anyone remember of the Urine recycle thing on ISS???? We can recycle the urine aka drinking water on our lunar base. We also can recycle the CO2 on our lunar base. We will not need tons and tons of oxygen to breathe or drinking water. What we have on ISS makes it very efficient. The only wasted water would be the hydrogen and oxygen that is used in the rockets.

[TC_sc]

From the article it also seems there are larger concentrations of water at the poles, just as had been suspected. It's only there it seems we will have enough to make any effort worthwhile. We still need to know those levels before any real debate can take place about building an outpost on the moon.

Just a little more water on the moon and we can rekindle the war...err... debate about nuclear vs solar on the moon

[BinaryNuts]

Maybe this poll should be restated as "Importance of Quantity of Water on the Moon". There is water everywhere in the universe just not all in one place like our oceans.