If we do return to the Moon

"Hop David" wrote in message
...


Dholmes wrote:
"Hop David" wrote in
message
...


Dholmes wrote:

what do we need to do before we send men back ?

A couple of things I came up with a

An orbiter to map the Moon in detail especially the poles. Many areas
of

the

Moon today are not mapped to 20 m resolution we can easily do 10m for

the

entire moon and 1-2m for selected portions.

A follow on to Prospector getting a better idea of where the hydrogen

is.

I am hoping ESA's SMART-1 will give helpful information:
http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/are...cfm?fareaid=10



Not a big fan of SMART-1 Japan's Selene and Lunar A interest me more.
Selene IMO sounds like a great probe:

http://moon.nasda.go.jp/en/selene/outline/inst.html



Is there a launch date set for Selene?


NASA's site says 2005 but I see nothing on the Selene site.

JRS: In article , seen in
news:sci.space.policy, Steen Eiler Jørgensen
posted at Sun, 16 Nov 2003 14:29:58 :-

There is no way you can grow plants for any practical purpose (e.g. food)
with artificial light. To grow 1 acre (10000 m²) you would need 14 MW
power - which means at least a nuclear fission reactor, which Greenpeace
would never allow to be launched from Earth.

10000m^2 is a hectare, not an acre, which is 4840 square yards; 1 ha =
2.471 acres. Stick to SI units; let those who only understand Imperial
units make their own mistakes. Granted, Danish acres might be bigger
than ours.

You can halve that power, since plants are used to night and day; and
reduce it further, to allow for angle-of-incidence and for clouds.

You can halve it again, if power can be stored until night and the
plants can use real sunlight or light from solar power during the lit
fortnight.

--
© John Stockton, Surrey, UK. / ©
Web URL:http://www.merlyn.demon.co.uk/ - FAQish topics, acronyms, & links.
Correct = 4-line sig. separator as above, a line precisely "-- " (SoRFC1036)
Do not Mail News to me. Before a reply, quote with "" or " " (SoRFC1036)

Last time I checked with hydroponics it took to grow the vast majority of
the required food less then 10 kw per person .
So 14 MW supplemented with some real light plus a little meat and luxuries
from Earth would support 2000+ people.
I do not see a Lunar base approaching 2000 people for a long time.

I heard they grow canabis plants under grow lights in Canada, so they can't be
spotted from the air. If it can be done on the Earth, it can be done on the
Moon.

Tom

Dholmes wrote:


There is no way you can grow plants for any practical purpose (e.g. food)
with artificial light. To grow 1 acre (10000 m²) you would need 14 MW
power - which means at least a nuclear fission reactor, which Greenpeace
would never allow to be launched from Earth.


Last time I checked with hydroponics it took to grow the vast majority of
the required food less then 10 kw per person .

Yeah, his figures are off by a factor or three. People grow huge farms of
illegal drugs inside their houses with heatlamps and hydroponics.

Dr John Stockton wrote:

10000m^2 is a hectare, not an acre, which is 4840 square yards; 1 ha =
2.471 acres. Stick to SI units; let those who only understand
Imperial units make their own mistakes. Granted, Danish acres might
be bigger than ours.

Oops. I'm sorry - my mistake. I thought 'acre' was english for 'hektar'.
Thanks for clearing this up. And no - Danish acres aren't bigger than yours
;-)

You can halve that power, since plants are used to night and day; and
reduce it further, to allow for angle-of-incidence and for clouds.

Well, true.

You can halve it again, if power can be stored until night and the
plants can use real sunlight or light from solar power during the lit
fortnight.

Well, in principle, you're right. *If* you can store that much energy
without much loss for 14 days, *then* it's not an energy issue any longer.
But still, technically, t's just a lot easier on Mars

--
Steen Eiler Jørgensen
"Time has resumed its shape. All is as it was before.
Many such journeys are possible. Let me be your gateway."

IIRR, the RCMP caught a C. sativa grower using artificial lighting to grow
the C. sativa (marijuana, for those in Rio Linda).

A Suggestion: invite the grower to work for HM's Canadian Space Commission
in re artificial lighting for agricultural purposes. At the end of the
project, he receives monetary compensation and a Royal Pardon, Canada being
one of the Dominions under the Westminister Act of 1927 and granted
semi-independence under the later legislation on both sides the Pond.

--
Leonard C Robinson
"The Historian Remembers, and speculates on what might have been.
"The Visionary Remembers, and speculates on what may yet be."