Colonization of the Moon

NASAconcept art of an envisionedlunar mining facility

Colonization of the Moonis a processor concept employed by some proposals forroboticor humanexploitationand settlement endeavours on theMoon.Often used as a synonym for its more specific element of settling the Moon (the establishing and expanding oflunar habitation), lunar orspace colonizationas a whole has become contested for perpetuatingcolonialismandits exploitive logic in space.

Laying claim to the Moon has been declared illegal through internationalspace lawand no state has made such claims,despite having a range of probes and artificial remains on the Moon.

While a range of proposals for missions of lunar colonization, exploitation or permanent exploration have been raised, current projects for establishing permanent crewed presence on the Moon are not for colonizing the Moon, but rather focus on buildingmoonbasesfor exploration and to a lesser extent for exploitation oflunar resources.

The commercialization of the Moon is a contentious issue for national and international lunar regulation and laws (such as theMoon treaty).

History

Further information:Exploration of the Moon,Moon § Human presence,andSpace colonization

Colonization of the Moon has been imagined as early as the first half of the 17th century byJohn WilkinsinA Discourse Concerning a New Planet.

A picture of the completedLunar Flag Assembly.The USSR and the US engaged in dropping pennantsand raising flags on the Moon while not laying any claims over it, in accordance with the Outer Space Treaty.

Colonization of the Moon as a material process has been taking place since the first artificial objects reached the Moon after 1959.Lunalanders scattered pennants of theSoviet Unionon the Moon, andU.S. flagswere symbolically planted at their landing sites by theApollo astronauts,but no nation claims ownership of any part of the Moon's surface.Russia, China, India, and the U.S. are party to the 1967Outer Space Treaty,which defines the Moon and all outer space as the "province of all mankind",restricting the use of the Moon to peaceful purposes and explicitly banning military installations andweapons of mass destructionfrom the Moon.

The landing of U.S. astronauts was seen as a precedent for the superiority of thefree-marketsocioeconomicmodel of the U.S., and in this case as the successful model forspace flight,explorationand ultimatelyhuman presencein the form of colonization. In the 1970s the word and goal of colonization was discouraged byNASAand funds as well as focus shifted away from the Moon and particularly toMars.But the U.S. eventually nevertheless opposed the 1979Moon Agreementwhich aimed to restrict the exploitation of the Moon andits resources.Subsequently, the treaty has been signed and ratified by only 18 nations, as of January 2020,none of which engage in self-launchedhuman space exploration.

After U.S. missions in the 1990s suggested the presence oflunar waterice, its actual discovery in the soil at thelunar polesbyChandrayaan-1(ISRO) in 2008–2009 renewed interest in the Moon.A range ofmoonbaseshave been proposed by states and public actors. Currently the U.S.-led internationalArtemis programseeks to establish with private contractors a state run orbital lunar way-station in the late 2020s, and China proposed with Russia the so-calledInternational Lunar Research Stationto be established in the 2030s and aim for anEarth-Moon Space Economic Zoneto develop by 2050.

Current proposals mainly have the goal of exploration, but such proposals and projects have increasingly aimed for enabling exploitation or commercialization of the Moon. This move to exploitation has been criticized ascolonialistand contrasted by proposals for conservation (e.g. by the organizationFor All Moonkind),collaborativestewardship(e.g. by the organizationOpen Lunar Foundation,chaired byChris Hadfield)and theDeclaration of the Rights of the Moon,drawing on the concept of theRights of Naturefor a legal personality of non-human entities in space.

Missions

Further information:MoonbaseandSpace advocacy

Far from being a colony, the temporaryTranquility Baseof the first crewed mission to the Moon in 1969, as well as its successor camps of the Apollo missions, has been the closest to a colony on the Moon so far.

Before and since then a permanenthuman presencethrough colonization of the Moon has been pursued and advocated for by a range of civil actors andspace advocacygroups. But most importantly different countries have been putting forward concepts and plans for not only new crewed expeditions, but also formoonbases.

The pursued purpose of such moonbases is broad, but is mostly forspace exploration,but also for exploiting and commercializing the Moon and advocating for a lunar and cis-lunar infrastructure, economy and settled society.

The most advanced contemporary missions share this spectrum of purpose, between exploration and exploitation. For example, the leadingArtemis programandInternational Lunar Research Stationprojects, while focusing on exploration, they do both mention prospecting for lunar resource extraction forin-situ resource utilizationas an objective,in the case of the American policy including that the Artemis program should furthermore enable resource commercialization and private enterprise.

These bases are planned to be crewed, but only eventually permanently. Commercial proposals though have suggested building and use of moonbases for tourism and possibly settlement.

Law

This section is an excerpt fromMoon § Legal status.[edit]

AlthoughLunalanders scattered pennants of theSoviet Unionon the Moon, andU.S. flagswere symbolically planted at their landing sites by theApollo astronauts,no nation claims ownership of any part of the Moon's surface.Likewise noprivate ownership of parts of the Moon, or as a whole,is considered credible.

The 1967Outer Space Treatydefines the Moon and all outer space as the "province of all mankind".It restricts the use of the Moon to peaceful purposes, explicitly banning military installations andweapons of mass destruction.A majority of countries are parties of this treaty. The 1979Moon Agreementwas created to elaborate, and restrict the exploitation of theMoon's resourcesby any single nation, leaving it to a yet unspecified international regulatory regime.As of January 2020, it has been signed and ratified by 18 nations,none of which havehuman spaceflightcapabilities.

Since 2020, countries have joined the U.S. in theirArtemis Accords,which are challenging the treaty. The U.S. has furthermore emphasized in a presidentialexecutive order( "Encouraging International Support for the Recovery and Use of Space Resources." ) that "the United States does not view outer space as a 'global commons'"and calls the Moon Agreement" a failed attempt at constraining free enterprise. "

With Australia signing and ratifying both the Moon Treaty in 1986 as well as the Artemis Accords in 2020, there has been a discussion if they can be harmonized.In this light anImplementation Agreementfor the Moon Treaty has been advocated for, as a way to compensate for the shortcomings of the Moon Treaty and to harmonize it with other laws and agreements such as the Artemis Accords, allowing it to be more widely accepted.

In the face of such increasing commercial and national interest, particularly prospecting territories, U.S. lawmakers have introduced in late 2020 specific regulation for the conservation of historic landing sitesand interest groups have argued for making such sitesWorld Heritage Sitesand zones of scientific value protected zones, all of which add to the legal availability and territorialization of the Moon.

In 2021, theDeclaration of the Rights of the Moonwas created by a group of "lawyers, space archaeologists and concerned citizens", drawing on precedents in theRights of Naturemovement and the concept of legal personality for non-human entities in space.

Economic prospecting and development

Main articles:Lunar habitation,Lunar resources,Space-based economy,andCommercial use of space

For long-term sustainability, a space colony should be close to self-sufficient.Miningandrefiningthe Moon's materials on-site – for use both on the Moon and elsewhere in the Solar System – could provide an advantage over deliveries from Earth, as they can be launched into space at a much lower energy cost than from Earth. It is possible that large amounts of cargo would need to be launched into space for interplanetary exploration in the 21st century, and the lower cost of providing goods from the Moon might be attractive.

Space-based materials processing

In the long term, the Moon will likely play an important role in supplying space-based construction facilities with raw materials.Microgravity in space allows for the processing of materials in ways impossible or difficult on Earth, such as"foaming" metals,where a gas is injected into a molten metal, and then the metal isannealedslowly. On Earth, gas bubbles may rise or fall due to their relative density to air, but in azero gravityenvironment this does not happen. Theannealingprocess requires large amounts of energy, as a material is kept very hot for an extended period of time (allowing the molecular structure to realign), and this too may be more efficient in space, as the vacuum drastically reduces all heat transfer except throughradiative heat loss.

Exporting material to Earth

Exporting material to Earth in trade from the Moon is problematic due to the cost of transportation, which would vary greatly if the Moon is industrially developed. One suggested trade commodity ishelium-3(³He) which is carried by thesolar windand accumulated on the Moon's surface over billions of years, but occurs only rarely on Earth.Helium-3 might be present in thelunar regolithin quantities of 0.01 ppm to 0.05 ppm (depending on soil). In 2006 it had a market price of about $1,500 per gram ($1.5M per kilogram), more than 120 times the value per unit weight ofgoldand over eight times the value ofrhodium.

In the future³He harvested from the Moon may have a role as a fuel inthermonuclearfusion reactors.It should require about 100 metric tons (220,000 lb) of helium-3 to produce the electricity that Earth uses in a year and there should be enough on the Moon to provide that much for 10,000 years.

In 2024, an American startup called Interlune announced plans to mine Helium on the Moon for export to Earth. The first mission plans to use NASA’sCommercial Lunar Payload Servicesprogram to arrive on the moon.

Exporting propellant obtained from lunar water

To reduce the cost of transport, the Moon could storepropellants produced from lunar waterat one or severaldepotsbetween the Earth and the Moon, to resupply rockets or satellites in Earth orbit.

Lunar water ice

Main article:Lunar water

Video of the lunar south pole, showing areas of permanent shadow over several months (severallunar days)

Lunar scientists had discussed the possibility of water repositories for decades. They are now increasingly "confident that the decades-long debate is over" a report says. "The Moon, in fact, has water in all sorts of places; not just locked up inminerals,but scattered throughout the broken-upsurface,and, potentially, in blocks or sheets of ice at depth. "The results from theChandrayaanmission are also "offering a wide array of watery signals."

It is estimated there is at least 600 million tons of ice at the north pole in sheets of relatively pure ice at least a couple of meters thick.

Solar power satellites

Gerard K. O'Neill,noting the problem of high launch costs in the early 1970s, proposed buildingSolar Power Satellitesin orbit with materials from the Moon.Launch costs from the Moon would vary significantly if the Moon is industrially developed. This proposal was based on the contemporary estimates of future launch costs of the Space Shuttle.

On 30 April 1979, the Final Report "Lunar Resources Utilization for Space Construction" by General Dynamics Convair Division under NASA contract, NAS9-15560 concluded that the use of lunar resources would be cheaper than terrestrial materials for a system comprising as few as thirty Solar Power Satellites of 10 GW capacity each.

In 1980, when NASA's launch cost estimates for the Space Shuttle were grossly optimistic, O'Neill et al. published another route to manufacturing using lunar materials with much lower startup costs.This 1980s SPS concept relied less on human presence in space and more on partially self-replicating systems on the lunar surface undertelepresencecontrol of workers stationed on Earth.

See also

• Aurora programme
• Colonization of Mars
• Human outpost
• In situ resource utilization
• Lunar Explorers Society
• Lunar Gateway
• Lunarcrete
• Lunarcy!
• Moon in fiction
• Moon landing
• Moon Society
• National Space Society
• NewSpace
• Planetary defense
• Planetary habitability
• Space architecture
• Space Frontier Foundation
• NASA lunar outpost concepts
• DARPA lunar programs
• Coordinated Lunar Time

References

Notes

General references

• Peter Eckart (2006).The Lunar Base Handbook, 2nd edition.McGraw-Hill. p. 820.ISBN978-0-07-329444-5.
• Wendell Mendell, ed. (1986).Lunar bases and space activities of the 21st century.Lunar and Planetary Institute. p. 865.ISBN978-0-942862-02-7.
• G. Jeffrey Taylor (December 23, 2004)."Cosmochemistry and Human Exploration".Planetary Science Research Discoveries.
• G. Jeffrey Taylor (November 21, 2000)."Mining the Moon, Mars, and Asteroids".Planetary Science Research Discoveries.

Further reading

• Resource Utilization Concepts for MoonMars;ByIris Fleischer, Olivia Haider, Morten W. Hansen, Robert Peckyno, Daniel Rosenberg and Robert E. Guinness; 30 September 2003; IAC Bremen, 2003 (29 Sept – 03 Oct 2003) and MoonMars Workshop (26–28 Sept 2003, Bremen). Accessed on 18 January 2010.
• Erik Seedhouse (2009).Lunar Outpost: The Challenges of Establishing Human Settlements on the Moon.Springer.ISBN978-0-387-09746-6.Publisher's book page.
• Madhu Thangavelu; Schrunk, David G.; Burton Sharpe; Bonnie L. Cooper (2008).The Moon: resources, future development, and settlement(2nd ed.). Springer.ISBN978-0-387-36055-3.

External links

• Nozette S, et al. (November 1996)."The Clementine bistatic radar experiment".Science.274(5292): 1495–8.Bibcode:1996Sci...274.1495N.doi:10.1126/science.274.5292.1495.hdl:2060/19970023672.PMID8929403.
• NASA Ames Research CenterEureka! Ice found at Lunar Poles.Retrieved December 18, 2004.
• Cornell NewsArecibo radar shows no evidence of thick ice at lunar poles (...).Retrieved December 18, 2004.
• NASA Johnson Space CentreLiftoff! Moon Base Alpha.Last checked January 20, 2005.
• Encyclopedia AstronauticaSubcategory: – Manned – Lunar rover.Retrieved December 20, 2004.
• The vision for space explorationArchivedFebruary 11, 2021, at theWayback Machine,NASA.
• How Stuff Works – What if we lived on the moon?Retrieved 15 March 2007.
• Wiki devoted to the return to the Moon –Lunarpedia.
• OpenLuna FoundationOpenLuna.org.
• Elements of a south polar lunar settlement[1].
• Building a lunar base with 3D printing(ESA).
• Moon Storage: One Small Space For Man, One Giant Space For MankindMoon Storage Infographic.Retrieved September 1, 2014.
• Researchers are ramping up plans for living on the Moon.