| Considering the danger represented by the climate | | | | powering spacecrafts. |
| changes and the global warming phenomena scientists | | | | Commercially unfeasible |
| and businessmen worldwide started to look for | | | | Man on Moon |
| alternative energy sources. Besides the wind power | | | | The US goverment and some European countries as |
| or the nuclear energy is has been recently taken into | | | | well have studied the energy potential of the Moon. |
| consideration a new power generating substance: | | | | And yet it is highly unlikely that any government or |
| helium 3. | | | | group of states will spend the money necessary to |
| What exactly is helium 3? Helium 3, an isotope of | | | | go to the Moon and establish a base on it to support |
| helium, a gas used to inflate balloons, has a nucleus | | | | scientific research or the construction of the first |
| with two protons and one neutron. The solar wind, | | | | production facilities. Hopefully the next few years will |
| the rapid stream of charged particles emitted by the | | | | witness a media campaign to support the enterprise |
| Sun, strikes the planets and their sattelites in the | | | | in the context of the global warming and the lack of |
| solar system and thus helium 3 is deposited in the | | | | terrestrial resources. Human society is straining to |
| superficial soil (also called regolith). As the Moon's | | | | keep pace with its ever increasing energy demands |
| atmosphere is not very dense this flow of particles | | | | which are expected to increase eightfold by 2050 as |
| easily penetrates the gas layer and reaches the | | | | the population swells toward 12 billion. The moon and |
| ground. Over millions and billions of years that adds | | | | its resources just may be the answer. |
| up. But for its denser protective gases layers the | | | | At the moment the most important aspect that |
| Earth would have been under the direct action of the | | | | prevent the exploitation of the lunar resources is the |
| Sun too thus being contaminated by toxic products. | | | | money. The long term investors have to consider |
| Louie Alvarez and Robert Cornog discovered helium 3 | | | | spending a lot of it for 10 to 15 tears before any |
| in 1939 but it was only 1957 when it drew the | | | | adequate return of investment. Companies in the field |
| attention of researchers. It has been estimated that | | | | of energy production are reluctant to consider |
| only a few hundreds pounds exist on Earth, most the | | | | investing in such an enterprise. The other element |
| by-product of nuclear-weapon production. Experts | | | | that encourages skepticism is the lack of appropriate |
| estimate that there are about 1 million tons of helium | | | | technologies. The fact is that once applied for |
| 3 on the Moon, enough to provide the world with | | | | economical purposes - not only in labs - and used on |
| power for thousands of years from now on. The | | | | large scale these technologies become very |
| equivalent of a single space shuttle load (25 tons) | | | | expensive. Both proponents and skeptics have to |
| could supply the entire United States' energy needs | | | | consider that for example to produce 70 tons of |
| for a year, according to Apollo 17 astronaut and | | | | helium 3 one million tons of lunar soil would need to |
| Harrison Schmitt. | | | | be heated to 800° C to liberate the gas. |
| The advocates of this energy source support the | | | | If successful the researchers' efforts to find new |
| idea of building reactors based on the reaction of | | | | alternative resources on the Moon could pay off the |
| deuterium and helium 3 even in the middle of a big | | | | interested investors but as we said before nobody is |
| city. It is said that the fusion reaction using this gas is | | | | prepared to invest money in soap balloons and the |
| very efficient and it releases very little radioactive | | | | Moon in the sky. |
| by-products. This gas could also be used for | | | | |