Bad News: New Study Suggests Water Will Make Large Moon Colonies Impossible
This render shows a modestly-sized outpost; that may be around the size limit.Credit: NASA
In science, and in science fiction, we tend to assume that anything is possible given enough time, money, and human attention. But that might not always be true. A new study published in Frontiers in Space Technology presents evidence that permanent, meaningfully large human settlements on the Moon might be impossible.
The main reason is water.
The researchers reviewed several possible problems for lunar colonies and found that they shouldn't be deal-breakers; power, for instance, should be no problem given the abundance of sunlight. The study suggests that the rims of large craters where the interior is permanently shaded should be good spots to collect solar energy.
The bigger problem is the water ice contained within those craters. These deposits should hold roughly a billion tons of water, which certainly sounds like a lot. However,...
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