News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by excalibur on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @02:56PM (#17812633)
Likely, but the ice-mining scheme will be much easier to pull off, and will therefore be possible sooner, and is therefore more likely to be the primary means by which these resources are exploited.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by zipwitch on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @03:01PM (#17812678)
To save mass (and thus cost) they'll probably dehydrate the water before shipping it back to Earth. Their target market won't care.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by excalibur on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @03:03PM (#17812704)
Or they could sell it in different concentrations. You can get 1% moonwater for $1000/bottle, or 99% moonwater for $100K/bottle.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by toast0 on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @05:24PM (#17813979)
I think you could do better selling it homeopathic. 1x10^-12 is way more expensive!
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by glandium on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @07:06PM (#17814682)
10^-12 is only a 6C dilution. The dilution advocated by Hahnemann is 30C, which is 10^-60. Oscillococcinum is at 200C (10^-400).
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by rzzzt on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @03:20PM (#17812827)
They could also split it up, and ship the gases in compressed form.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by Symmetry on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @05:14PM (#17813901)
Because oxygen and especially hydrogen are such a pain to store compared to water some rocket designs contemplate just leaving all the fuel mass as water and only splitting it into its parts as needed before firing.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by accrual on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @10:54PM (#17815900)
Water is also effective at blocking radiation [0][1], making it especially useful when stored around the spacecraft occupants.

[0] https://www.quora.com/Can-we-use-water-or-ice-as-radiation-s...

[1] https://www.nasa.gov/pdf/284275main_Radiation_HS_Mod3.pdf (page 4)

Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by dmurray on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @08:35PM (#17815157)
Don't you need an energy source to turn the water into its parts? That's the energy you recoup when you burn the hydrogen. Or did I miss the joke?
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by GW150914 on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @08:41PM (#17815200)
Presumably this would be done with a small nuclear reactor powering an electrolysis system, in which case it’s feasible. Your savings are in complexity and weight because containing a mass of water is trivial, and naturally dense compared to H or O. As an extra feature you need water anyway, it can be used as a coolant, and you need oxygen which you’re now generating as a byproduct. Presumably for cruising you’d use the nuclear reactor to power an ion drive and only use the Water splitter as needed for maneuvering, launches, and landing.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by Nomentatus on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @10:19PM (#17815753)
South pole - perfect place for constant solar power. Just raise it up a little bit.
Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by Coincoin on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @03:11PM (#17812759)
On the other hand, they also believe in homeopathy, so you would only need 1 litre of moon water to produce billions.

edit: excalibur beat me to it.

Re:Ice confirmed at the Moon’s poles by garmaine on Tuesday August 21, 2018 @08:34PM (#17815151)
Let the wealthy pay tons of money to go work the ice mines in the moon for a few weeks at a time while it has its novelty. Kill 2 birds with one stone.