Race to the Moon for Nuclear Fuel
wired.com
On his campaign swing through Florida's Space Coast, Republican Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich expressed his vision for an American return to the moon, much to the delight of his political enemies. But Gingrich knows something that many do not -- that American's future rests heavily on finding a cheap, plentiful supply of clean alternative energy. One that does not require dealing with tin horn dictators or murderous regimes. That energy may well be on the moon's surface in the form of Helium-3.
"Nestled among [NASA's] 200-point mission goals is a proposal to mine the moon for fuel used in fusion reactors -- futuristic power plants that have been demonstrated in proof-of-concept but are likely decades away from commercial deployment.
Helium-3 is considered a safe, environmentally friendly fuel candidate for these generators, and while it is scarce on Earth it is plentiful on the moon. As a result, scientists have begun to consider the practicality of mining lunar Helium-3 as a replacement for fossil fuels.
"After four-and-half-billion years, there should be large amounts of helium-3 on the moon," said Gerald Kulcinski, a professor who leads the Fusion Technology Institute at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Last year NASA administrator Mike Griffin named Kulcinski to lead a number of committees reporting to NASA's influential NASA Advisory Council, its preeminent civilian leadership arm.
The Council is chaired by Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Hagan "Jack" Schmitt, a leading proponent of mining the moon for helium 3. Schmitt, who holds the distance record for driving a NASA rover on the moon (22 miles through the Taurus-Littrow valley), is also a former U.S. senator (R-New Mexico)."
But any plans for the USA to find a clean, reliable and plentiful supply of Helium-3 (plentiful on the moon's surface, but extremely rare on Earth) have been hobbled by Obama's zero-funding of NASA. Evidently, the money was diverted to his friends in the solar power industry who took billions then declared bankruptcy.
Even if the USA is out of the running, this has not stopped the Russians of the cash-rich Chinese (you know, the ones Obama indentured us to, to the tune of ga-billions of dollars?)
Lab experiments suggest that future fusion reactors could use helium-3 gathered from the moon.
technologyreview.com
"At the 21st century's start, few would have predicted that by 2007, a second race for the moon would be under way. Yet the signs are that this is now the case. Furthermore, in today's moon race, unlike the one that took place between the United States and the U.S.S.R. in the 1960s, a full roster of 21st-century global powers, including China and India, are competing. Even more surprising is that one reason for much of the interest appears to be plans to mine helium-3--purportedly an ideal fuel for fusion reactors but almost unavailable on Earth--from the moon's surface."
...
"Russia claims that the aim of any lunar program of its own--for what it's worth, the rocket corporation Energia recently started blustering, Soviet-style, that it will build a permanent moon base by 2015-2020--will be extracting He3.
The Chinese, too, apparently believe that helium-3 from the moon can enable fusion plants on Earth. This fall, the People's Republic expects to orbit a satellite around the moon and then land an unmanned vehicle there in 2011."
It would not be the first time the US invented a technology, only to allow it to languish, and then get thrashed by her enemies, who wasted not time in developing the technology.
For instance, the Americans pioneered successful heavier-than-air flight in 1904. Yet, a short dozen years later was caught flat-footed by German WWI Fokkers that easily outclassed anything Americans had in the air. In order to have a fighting chance of the skies of France and Belgium, we had to buy aircraft from the French and British.
So, while Jon Stewart sniggers up his sleeve at the concept of an American return to the moon, what he is really saying is that he has no clue about the race for HELIUM-3 and its vital importance to America's future.
HELIUM-3
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Helium-3
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