Alot of media about why China wants to get to the Moon, and the US also talks of chemical, minerals and gases that could be extracted from the Moon. My question is: could these mining operations potential alter the gravitational relationship between Moon and Earth? Could the ocean's tides be effected?
2007-10-26 18:07:35 · 5 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
The simple answer is that we will never be mining the moon for a very trivial reason: the moon is part of earth's crust and upper mantle. There is nothing there which we can't find just as well here.
The only element that can be found on the moon that we don't have on earth is 3He. Its main use is in ultra-low temperature refridgerators and we could use a couple hundred pounds of it. Its potential use in fusion power plants is hampered by the problem that nobody in fusion research has any clue how to make a fusion reactor with 3He. In layman's terms that is called "a pipe dream".
The reason why China is going to the moon is mainly national prestige. It's the same reason why the US went to the moon. The added advantage is that a civil space program allows a nation to develop complex technical problem solving and system design strategies which go beyond military and civilian applications. It worked for the US. It will work for China. And finally we should not forget that aerospace is an integrated industry. The US is subsidizing its aerospace industry with its space program. So is China...
There are no special minerals on the moon nor do there have to be. It is a perfectly acceptable goal for a large nation which is poised to take global leadership to show that it can go there. And it does not have to bring trench digging equipment just for the fact that there are nothing but stones on the moon.
2007-10-26 18:25:38 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
It'll be a long time before we manage to remove enough of the moon to have an effect.
The main reason that we'll be mining the moon is to get materials for construction in space since it'll probably be cheaper to get them from the moon then to blast them up from Earth, asteroid mining might be a useful Platinum source for Earth though (He3 just doesn't look all that promising as a fusion fuel though).
2007-10-27 01:42:19 · answer #2 · answered by bestonnet_00 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
No more than the Earth's gravity is effected by current mining.
2007-10-27 01:10:42 · answer #3 · answered by Bellicosa 5 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Probably not any more than the moon's slow retreat from our orbit... it gets farther away every year.
Edit: Actually it constantly gets farther away, but it's typically described in inches per year or whatever.
2007-10-27 01:10:38 · answer #4 · answered by Crypt 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
None. The bloody thing's enormous.
2007-10-27 01:21:05 · answer #5 · answered by Choose a bloody best answer. It's not hard. 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋