“In my childhood,” recalls Wired Science Editor Eric Nieler, “my brother and I couldn't get enough of Cosmos 1999, a mid-70s TV show that mesmerized us with cool special effects, sweet Barbara Bane, who played alongside her real husband Martin Landau, and the depiction of the Moon as the main character of the 48-minute episodes. The premise was a little far-fetched: an explosion at the lunar base pushes the moon out of Earth's orbit and sends it on a journey across the galaxy. What was happening was only 15 years in the future.
In those years after the Apollo program, we expected NASA or some international space force to work on space bases in real life. More than four decades later, we are still waiting for our "lunar base Alpha", although this is not from lack of interest. Former astronauts, adventurous dreamers, or dreamy entrepreneurs, they all cherish the dream of a lunar colony. Today, thanks to the fusion of technology, money and political interests, this idea can go beyond science fiction closer to reality."
Further - from the first person.
50 years of space exploration and … no colonization
From my interviews with cosmologists, industry representatives and futurists, it has become known that there is an unofficial plan that is slowly being formed for the colonization of the moon. First, private space companies are looking for ways to lower launch costs. Right now, SpaceX says, each launch of a Falcon 9 rocket is costing it $ 62 million, while the more powerful Falcon Heavy costs $ 90 million. Satellite companies and others want a sort of bulk discount on space travel. SpaceX is delivering food and supplies to the International Space Station, hoping to start taking astronauts away by the end of 2019.
Then flying and orbiting platforms will appear. The Chinese plan to launch an orbiting space station by 2020, while NASA has approached private companies with a proposal to develop a lunar orbital gateway platform near the Moon by 2022. It can become a launch pad for NASA for future expeditions and settlements, both on the Moon and on Mars.
At the same time, private firms like Moon Express, as well as the Chinese, Indian and European space agencies are moving forward with robotic lander and rovers. The final step, proponents say, will be the continued presence of humans on the lunar surface. Perhaps, first there will be a government base, and then a private hotel on the moon.
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NASA's involvement with lunar plans is key to allowing private companies to build on the lunar surface, says Chris Levicki, CEO of Planetary Resources, a Redmond-based startup that plans to develop asteroids for rocket fuel and water.
Some argue that all of this could happen in the next 10 years. Others say it will be at least 20 years before the technology for routine lunar launches is developed and the cost is low enough to generate consumer demand.
And although it seems like everything is developing very slowly, one of the lunar experts likens this to the creation of colonies of the New World, which does not pass overnight. “There is a lag between discovery, exploration and exploitation,” says James W. Head, a planetary scientist at Brown University who began his career at NASA by selecting lunar landing sites for Apollo missions.
Where to begin?
Proponents of the lunar colonization believe that the lunar base will give us a better understanding of how to reach the far reaches of the solar system. It will also be fun to visit the moon at least once in your life. In addition, the Moon is much closer to Mars - it can be reached in three days, not nine months - so more people will fly there.
In addition, valuable resources can be mined on the moon.
Some researchers from China and Europe believe that its surface contains large reserves of helium-3, a rare element that can be used as a future source of energy to fuel rockets sent from Earth further into space. (The downside is that converting Helium-3 into something useful requires a tremendous amount of energy.) There is also frozen water in the polar regions of the moon: break it down into hydrogen and oxygen using electrolysis and get breathable air - another source of rocket fuel. It may not be soon, but the leaders of the European and Chinese lunar programs have already announced that they intend to explore these options in future lunar missions.
There is another good reason for creating colonies: our survival. James Head recalls that he was often told by Apollo commander John Young, who had flown into space during the Gemini, Apollo and shuttle missions, when he was asked if people needed to return to the Moon: “A single planet view will not survive … Leaving the planet is not a bad survival strategy. Sooner or later, she will be the only motivation to establish bases on the moon."
How will the lunar economy work?
For the lunar base to work, it needs an economic base. Among the US, an economy of "low Earth orbit" (LEO, for short) is already brewing, among those that put satellites into space, serve them and prepare to build places for people who will live and work in Earth orbit.
The IEO economy is growing. Since 2000, more than 180 startups have attracted more than 18.4 billion in investments, according to a May 2018 Bryce Space and Technology report. SpaceX, worth $ 28 billion, is a real giant of the commercial space industry, and the head of the corporation Elon Musk wants everything at once: launch a constellation of satellites in LEO, send people to the Moon and establish a base on Mars.
Musk has a history of missed deadlines. Whether it's Tesla's Model 3 deliveries or its ambitious space plans. But SpaceX's launch frequency of 28 rockets since early 2017 has made it one of the most successful space companies in the world.
It also found that using SpaceX's reusable rockets could dramatically lower launch costs. This could open the door to a new set of zero-gravity sites around the Earth and possibly the Moon. These privately-owned gas stations could eventually replace the International Space Station, a 20-year, $ 100 billion mission that is about to be completed.
Moving from a LEO economy to a lunar economy is a very real scenario, says Jeffrey Manber, CEO of Nanoracks, a Houston-based company that runs its own space laboratory on the ISS and launches 10-inch cubesats for commercial and university clients from the ISS.
Call Manber crazy, but a lot of what he talks about is already happening. Bigelow Aerospace, a space technology startup, built an inflatable work module for astronauts at the space station in 2016 and plans to put another one into orbit by 2022. The company is owned by Robert Bigelow, a billionaire founder who believes UFOs have visited Earth. Bigelow is one of several billionaires in the race for the moon, including Jeff Bezos and his Blue Origin, Musk and his SpaceX, Richard Branson and his Virgin Galactic.
Their fat wallets and the freedom from having to file quarterly earnings are helping to move technology forward by leaps and bounds. They are building rockets that can take Bigelow and Nanoracks to the moon. Only NASA in the Apollo era could burn as much fuel as Bezos, who recently announced that he was selling Amazon shares for a billion dollars a year to keep Blue Origin running.
Blue Origin is developing a Blue Moon lander that can carry cargo to the lunar surface for a future base, and the New Glenn rocket, which was successfully tested in July.
How realistic are the plans to establish colonies?
The economy of rocket launching could be a watershed in all of this, says writer Andy Weir. He wrote The Martian, a science fiction novel about an astronaut on Mars that was eventually filmed by Matt Damon. As a sequel, Weir wrote Artemis about the lunar colony. According to Weir's plan, Artemis will be built in the 2080s. He also believes that a real lunar base is possible too.
Weir has calculated what it takes to send tourists and tourists on a lunar vacation for $ 70,000. His rough estimate is that the cost of launching a rocket should drop from $ 4,635 per kilogram to $ 35 per kilogram. This is a significant decline, but it may not be long before the numbers converge.
Once this problem is solved, Weir believes, the natural resources of the moon will be enough to build a city.
But after all his research, Weir realized that the seabed, the polar regions of the Earth, and the Sahara were easier to colonize than the Moon. He notes that you need to take oxygen with you for breathing, protection from cosmic radiation and water with food.
China is already working on this. China plans to launch a lander and rover in December to the far side of the moon. The country's leaders have also talked about putting astronauts on the moon by 2036, and the White House is demanding that NASA return to the moon.
Head, a planetary scientist working with the Chinese, believes that the Chinese government will provide such a technology enterprise with any resources. The Chinese space program will not stop due to lack of funds like the American one. For China, putting people on the moon is the main task.
Ilya Khel