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Russia and China plan to install a nuclear power plant on the Moon (intlmonitor.com)

submitted 8 months ago by Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world to c/nottheonion@lemmy.world

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If you think your commute is bad now..

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[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 6 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

A lot of people believe we can, yes. However there are a few technologies that still need to be developed, such as a reliable power source that can work during a long lunar night

solar won’t work, because night is too long
RTGs can’t scale up enough to power a base
Fission reactors as we have them so far generally rely on a liquid coolant and a lot of maintenance attention
Even assuming we’ll be able to mine ice, it’s not something we can rely on to power a base, and we haven’t yet figured out how

So, if we can develop a small fission reactor that never needs any attention, can work in lower gravity, no atmosphere, huge range of temperatures , and doesn’t have anything that can leak, boil, or freeze, that would be perfect

[–] Diplomjodler@feddit.de 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

My personal favourite is orbital solar. With no atmosphere, it should be doable. But of course it's just as hypothetical as all the other options at this point.

[–] intensely_human@lemm.ee 1 points 8 months ago

Then beam the energy to Luna? Or could we transfer batteries?

[–] lowleveldata@programming.dev 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

How do we get all the materials and tools for the constructions up there to begin with? And how do we supply the base with Oxygen, food, water, etc?

[–] AA5B@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Sure, there’s lots of questions needed to be answered

transportation is in progress. Everyone must have heard about Artemis andStarShip: one or both are planned to get you there, plus I believe SpaceX has a contract for a lander
maybe you heard the excitement over discovering ice. With sufficient power, the hope is they can make their own water, oxygen, rocket fuel
there have been quite a few experiments in ISS with growing plants. Hopefully they can grow at least some of their own