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Newt promises a permanent moonbase by the end of his second term

RenaissanceBiker said:
That seems to be an existing demand.
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If uncertainty in future He3 availability leads to NOT PLANNING experiments in these temperature ranges, then it is a potential demand, not an existing demand. That's more the way I understand the matter.

Some He3 production can be ramped up from nuclear reactors over a period of ten years of so. That's going to be the exact opposite of "cheap", if it is done.

RenaissanceBiker said:
...Since you have conceded the China Moon base point I will take my leave. Newt's Moon base campaign promise has been shown to be foolishly short-sighted. I'm not disputing that Mankind should build one sometime in the future, just that 8 years is far too severe a time restraint to put on such an endeavor.
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Actually you have it completely reversed, in claiming some concession that was never made, but which is convenient to your argument or seems to be. I have the impression that you haven't understood my point or little of it.

So here's a reiteration with some clarifications.

It'd be pretty smart to set up an X-type-prize for a moonbase in 8 years capable of he3 pilot plant level production, said moonbase being robotized/humanized to an extent to be determined by the competitors for the prize.

Earlier in the thread I noted the huge economic impacts of this type of a plan.

The next part of this is that if such a scheme wasn't palatable to the potential competitors, then it would be reissued for another 8 years, with other modifications determined by market conditions.

What this means in turn is not that your comments are not valid, but that they are only valid in shaping the prize amount, time frame and rules.
 
Darth Rotor said:
If I understand this discussion correctly, we are still about thirty years away from getting workable nuclear fusion, and about ten to fifteen years away from a Moonbase (per Phil P) if someone makes that a fiscal priority.

Seems to me smarter to develop fusion fueled by stuff we can find on the earth, to keep cost down.

Why does fuel need to be moondust?
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You understand correctly.

ITER is planned to run through three regimes of operation; p-D, D-D, and D-T. Nowhere in the plan is 3He. All of those fuels can be found on Earth (the T we need to make, but we make quite a lot of it that we capture in carbon filters and treat as waste, and fusion will make the stuff too.)

MHaze might as well be telling us to go to the moon because then we can find the Philosopher's Stone for all the sense he is making.
 
mhaze said:
If uncertainty in future He3 availability leads to NOT PLANNING experiments in these temperature ranges, then it is a potential demand, not an existing demand. That's more the way I understand the matter.

Some He3 production can be ramped up from nuclear reactors over a period of ten years of so. That's going to be the exact opposite of "cheap", if it is done.
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Note that once again, we see mhaze favouring massive government intervention in a market imply because some Republican has made it part of their platform. This continues with the pattern where mhaze will support any form of market intervention as long as it’s proposed by Republicans and oppose any form of action to remove externalities from a market when it’s proposed by Democrats.
 
lomiller said:
Note that once again, we see mhaze favouring massive government intervention in a market imply because some Republican has made it part of their platform. This continues with the pattern where mhaze will support any form of market intervention as long as it’s proposed by Republicans and oppose any form of action to remove externalities from a market when it’s proposed by Democrats.
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WHERE is the "massive government intervention in a market" that you claim I favor?

HINT: This is a test of third grade level reading comprehension, so it's okay if you fail. But I'd like to see you succeed.
 
mhaze said:
WHERE is the "massive government intervention in a market" that you claim I favor?
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You want to create a massive subsidy for the production of He3 (or you simply want nationalized production of He3 so it can be handed out as a subsidy to a preferred industry) in an attempt to make an otherwise unattractive business appealing to investors. Both forms are subsidies and therefore market interventions and as others have pointed out both are bad business decisions that would do nothing but waste massive amounts of taxpayer money.
 
Bill Thompson said:
Did he specify which moon?
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No, but he didn’t specific when he thought his second term would end either. Maybe he’s been watching futurama and figured that if Nixon could get elected as a head in a jar so could he.
 
lomiller said:
mhaze said:
WHERE is the "massive government intervention in a market" that you claim I favor?
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You want to create a massive subsidy for the production of He3 (or you simply want nationalized production of He3 so it can be handed out as a subsidy to a preferred industry) in an attempt to make an otherwise unattractive business appealing to investors. Both forms are subsidies and therefore market interventions and as others have pointed out both are bad business decisions that would do nothing but waste massive amounts of taxpayer money.
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And then there was this gem from a recent thread on conservatives and climate change:
mhaze said:
The US makes energy independence a national security matter, allowing squashing dissent and legal challenges to nuclear power plants by presidential executive order. Bonds are issued for funding of nuclear plants, to the order of a minimum of $100B per year for twenty years. New designs are put into production by US Government funding, including thorium reactors. A minimum of twenty reactors per year for ten years.
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mhaze LOVES Big Government when it serves his agenda.
 
mhaze said:
WHERE is the "massive government intervention in a market" that you claim I favor?
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Could it have something to do with the fact that the topic is Newt's promise that he would do this if he were elected president? Sounds like he's talking about a massive government intervention. (Despite the fact that his tax proposal would cut federal revenues by more than a trillion dollars in the first year alone.)

Either you're defending this proposal or you're going off the topic of this thread.

If Newt's not talking about a government program, then why can't he establish a permanent moon base without being elected president?

ETA: And if you want to quibble about a "massive government program" to establish a permanent moon base as opposed to a non-massive government program, I would again point out the astronomical cost of getting payloads out of Earth's gravity well. For it to happen within 8 years would be a massive program. And if it's something he's promising to accomplish as president, then it's a massive government program.
 
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All that just to defend something stupid Newt Gingrich said. Seems more expedient to simply say "Yeah, that was kind of stupid thing for Newt Gingrich to say".
 
lomiller said:
You want to create a massive subsidy for the production of He3 (or you simply want nationalized production of He3 so it can be handed out as a subsidy to a preferred industry) in an attempt to make an otherwise unattractive business appealing to investors. Both forms are subsidies and therefore market interventions and as others have pointed out both are bad business decisions that would do nothing but waste massive amounts of taxpayer money.
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Clearly you are lying again. If not, please point to my posts in this thread which show you are not lying.
 
JoeTheJuggler said:
And that's assuming it's even there in such abundance as to matter.
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There is undoubtedly SOME there.

People seem to think that the polar cold traps are the best place to look, but they would be wrong.

You have to look at the lunar equator, specifically the maria, where you get most of the solar wind flux, and the soil is able to capture it.

This is, of course, far from the water you need, which is at the cold traps.

They speak of going down meters and meters for the stuff, but you'll find most of it in the first inch or two of the surface. The deeper material is not because it penetrates that far but because meteoric action has turned the soil over.

The total size of the resource is estimated to be half a billion tons, and coincidently the moon's area is about half a billion square km.

So, there is really no concept of a mine, as in deposits of the stuff, you strip off the first few feet of the soil and process it and keep moving. Eventually your mine "mouth" to refinery is quite a distance, and you will have to consider things like railroads to transport the ore.

Sorry, not in my lifetime (which is a lamentably short horizon) and even if you live to 100 not in yours.

You'd need an actual civilization on the moon to support any significant amount of mining.
 
BenBurch said:
And worse; It is a total waste of money. If successful you gain access to a resource (3He) we have no planned use for.
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Yes but the Chinese are increasing the misery of their people to get that resource so we have no choice but to do even more than them to get it first!!!
 
mhaze said:
Clearly you are lying again. If not, please point to my posts in this thread which show you are not lying.
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Wait, I've found my own post which likely indicates you are not lying this time.

WHERE is the "massive government intervention in a market" that you claim I favor?

HINT: This is a test of third grade level reading comprehension, so it's okay if you fail. But I'd like to see you succeed.

So you've failed your third grade reading comprehension test.

What? I thought, Lomiller, you were an ATYPICAL liberal.

Guess not. ;)
 
mhaze said:
WHERE is the "massive government intervention in a market" that you claim I favor?
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That'd be the massively expensive moon base you are foolishly trying to argue for...

You did read the thread title before you started posting right? :boggled:
 
mhaze said:
Clearly you are lying again. If not, please point to my posts in this thread which show you are not lying.
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Goalpost shift noted.

Your predilection for Big Government is a matter of record:
mhaze said:
The US makes energy independence a national security matter, allowing squashing dissent and legal challenges to nuclear power plants by presidential executive order. Bonds are issued for funding of nuclear plants, to the order of a minimum of $100B per year for twenty years. New designs are put into production by US Government funding, including thorium reactors. A minimum of twenty reactors per year for ten years.
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