if God intended man to be a spacefaring
species he would have given us a moon
this quote is by craft Araki in 1984 and
I like the way he stirs the words around
from an earlier quote something about
flying and I like to use it to set the
mood for why the moon oh the moon it’s
close it’s only a quarter of a million
miles away but it’s close its face
vernacular it’s three days away using
proven propulsion for human transport
hydrogen and oxygen and this allows for
resupply and there’s multiple launch
windows every month so you can have a
trickle of parts and supplies going to
whatever your installation is on the
moon and we all know that when you go
into space you have all this equipment
that keeps you alive and all of that
equipment is serial number zero zero one
and every once in a while the engineers
might design something to brakes and so
it’s good to have spare parts we’re
learning this on the International Space
Station after 18 years it’s a well-honed
machine but we’re still learning it when
we go to another planetary surface if
it’s closed like the moon we can get
spare parts the moon it’s interesting
it’s a planetary sized body it has the
surface area nearly equal to the
combined continent of North and South
America lots of places to live
early Earth history has been obliterated
on
earth due to geologic processes however
the moon being in the same vicinity as
the earth has preserved the early
history of Earth in the solar system and
its climate so we can go to the moon to
learn about earth and then the moon is a
natural laboratory it has it has a
stable surface it has no atmosphere it
has it has fractional gravity fractional
gravity to do scientific investigations
where you could look at physical
processes you can look at life processes
and if this is planet Earth we know a
lot about life on Earth and physical
processes by definition the gravity is
one and then we have the International
Space Station and it has microgravity
that’s one millionth of the gravity on
earth it’s close enough to zero to
actually call a zero you know it’s
technically not zero we refer to it as
zero gravity and we have been learning
over the last 18 years a lot about life
processes and physical processes on the
International Space Station and we’re
continuing to learn more Earth Space
Station we know almost nothing in
between the gravity levels so returning
to the moon at one-sixth gravity will
allow us to study the physical sciences
and the life sciences in a fractional
gravity environment the moon is a
destination worthy in its own right the
moon it’s useful besides just places to
live it’s useful for its resources and
we call this in situ resource
utilization it’s something engineers
think up but basically what it is is you
don’t need to carry everything for a
sustained presence on another planet
with you from mother earth particularly
fades that you need by the thousands if
not tens of thousands of tons not pounds
tons fades like bricks cement mortar
glass powder for 3d printing were 3d
printing with lunar regolith simulant at
the Kennedy Space Center really needs
stop so these are Said’s that you need
bulk materials simply for their physical
properties or their chemical properties
like rocket propellant we have learned
rather recently something we didn’t know
during the Apollo days we have learned
that there’s water on the moon it’s in
the polar regions inside of craters that
are so deep the light of the Sun never
shines there and it gets cold and water
gets trapped there over time and we know
that there’s vast quantities of water in
the form of ice and frost in these
craters in the poles on the moon and
there’s solar energy on the moon near
the poles around the rims of these
craters you have near continuous solar
energy so you have this beautiful
juxtaposition of energy and resources
right next to each other this involves
using chemistry to win these resources
and rocket scientists or rocket
engineers if you mentioned chemistry
they typically hide under the desk
because if they like chemistry they
become us they want to be aerospace
mechanical engineers and so the kind of
chemistry we’re talking about to make
these bricks and mortar and cement and
and rocket fuel by taking the water and
you could make the best rocket propelled
we currently have for human transport
hydrogen and oxygen and these require
basic chemistry chemistry that is
something 19th century industrial
chemistry would do the chemistry we’re
talking about is 1850 kind of chemistry
and many of these processes smelting
melting sintering the Romans could have
done so there will be challenges in
using these resources on the moon
because of the fractional gravity
environment we will be learning we’ll
need all those spare parts but the
chemistry is understood now the low
gravity of the Moon has other utility
between beef besides its scientific
utility and I like to use this to get
into the tyranny of the rocket equation
oh and I want to point out I’ve got the
latest NASA computer generated fonts
these fonts are so good they make it
look like your slides are hand written
now the rocket equation it’s a momentum
balance done on a rocket first
formulated by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky
Russian scientist and involves two two
inputs the magnitude of the gravity
field that you are negotiating in and
the type of rocket propellant that you
have chosen and you plug these into the
rocket equation turn the crank and out
comes the percent of your rocket that
has to be propellant and you must abide
by this or your rocket will be
repossessed by the planet from whence it
came let’s do this let’s do this now for
planet Earth going into what we call
low-earth orbit well gravity okay it is
what it is
take it or leave it type up for pound
let’s choose the most energetic
propellant we have for human transport
that extends a maximum you can get from
chemistry you plug that into the rocket
equation you turn the crank and your
that means everything you think of as a
rocket is 10 to 15% all that stuff that
sits on the launch pad that you see 10
to 15% the actual usable payload that
goes into orbit is about one and a half
percent Wow let’s compare this to other
vehicles earthly vehicles that we are
used to seeing let’s look at land and
see vehicles cars trucks trades boats
ships these fades are three to eight
percent propellant and made outta
billets of Steel they are incredibly
robust now move to aviation ok cargo
planes thirty to forty percent
propellant these are truly
lightweight structures they are made out
of aluminum and epoxy graphite
composites
they are designed by engineers you have
to roll your engineering Nichols around
in order to make these airframes and to
make them work but in spite of that our
aviation industry on earth is robust
routine and reusable airplanes reusable
rockets leaving earth 85 to 90 percent
so not even in the same class in fact
Rockets are closer to explosive devices
than any vehicles that we are used to
using Rockets are on the edge of our
engineering ability to even make and pay
for so let’s apply the rocket equation
to the moon Oh a rocket going from the
surface of the moon into orbit 40%
propellant and that’s compliments of the
moon having 1/6 of gravity of Earth 40%
notice rockets on the moon are akin to
the same structures that we use in
aviation industry on earth so rockets on
the moon will be routine robust and
reusable we could take resources that we
win from the lunar environment and we
can move them from point to point on the
lunar surface we can put them into orbit
around the moon particularly rocket
propellant so we could fill up our
rockets and go elsewhere now oh I love
this picture this is a picture out of
one of the windows and space station and
we are somewhere over China looking past
the Himalayas into India and if you know
where to look in this picture Mount
Everest is right there it’s the big
mountain sticking up you could all see
it
it’s really in there now I like to use
this to illustrate a concept of the
frontier imagine now that you’re a
rookie astronaut you’re going up to the
space station and you know that dozens
of astronauts have looked out this
window and these dozens of astronauts
before you have taken tens of thousands
maybe hundreds of thousands of pictures
and you could get yourself in the Warped
mindset that why should I even bother to
take a picture because it’s already been
done but then you need to realize that
you are in a frontier and there’s always
new discoveries to be made oftentimes
just by changing the way you make the
observation so take this window many
have been there before I’m gonna take
the camera and set it up a little
differently at wall set it up for
nighttime it’s the same planet the same
windows it’s a view but now you’re
making a new observation but wait
there’s more change the settings again
and look at that wow this is a 30-minute
time exposure is it that cool you can
see a lot of natural phenomena lagea in
here that escapes your eye unless you
make a time exposure so when you are in
a frontier the very concept of
been-there-done-that does not apply
exploration is not a bucket list where
you simply check off places that you
have been the real benefit by a society
that has that explores the real benefit
is having a sustained presence in the
frontier and those societies with a
sustained presence get to define the
cultural and political rules of
engagement so why the moon the moon is
the next logical step it’s close it’s
interesting it’s useful we could take
the resources
the moon and use them to explore
anywhere else we want in the solar
system now I took the rocket equation
and I worked at backwards and I
increased the size of Earth which
increases its gravity and its input into
the rocket equation and I wanted to see
how much larger earth would have to be
before it would not be possible to
launch a rocket into space with any
usable payload and my numbers turned out
ten to fifteen percent so think about
that if earth were just a little bit
bigger we might be a species a single
planet species we might not even be able
to leave the planet and this is all
compliments of the tyranny from the
rocket equation and fortunately Earth is
just small enough so that we can escape
and contaminate the rest of the solar
system they could let us out of the
petri dish of Earth and to help break
the tyranny of this rocket equation you
could either develop a system that
doesn’t use rockets ooh that would be
neat nobody’s been smart enough to do
that yet but maybe somebody out here
will figure out a way to do this or you
can go to other planetary surfaces that
have reduced gravity and get the
resources you need there the resources
that you need by the thousands of tons
or the tens of thousands of tons so you
don’t have to take all that stuff from
Planet Earth
thank you [Applause]
species he would have given us a moon
this quote is by craft Araki in 1984 and
I like the way he stirs the words around
from an earlier quote something about
flying and I like to use it to set the
mood for why the moon oh the moon it’s
close it’s only a quarter of a million
miles away but it’s close its face
vernacular it’s three days away using
proven propulsion for human transport
hydrogen and oxygen and this allows for
resupply and there’s multiple launch
windows every month so you can have a
trickle of parts and supplies going to
whatever your installation is on the
moon and we all know that when you go
into space you have all this equipment
that keeps you alive and all of that
equipment is serial number zero zero one
and every once in a while the engineers
might design something to brakes and so
it’s good to have spare parts we’re
learning this on the International Space
Station after 18 years it’s a well-honed
machine but we’re still learning it when
we go to another planetary surface if
it’s closed like the moon we can get
spare parts the moon it’s interesting
it’s a planetary sized body it has the
surface area nearly equal to the
combined continent of North and South
America lots of places to live
early Earth history has been obliterated
on
earth due to geologic processes however
the moon being in the same vicinity as
the earth has preserved the early
history of Earth in the solar system and
its climate so we can go to the moon to
learn about earth and then the moon is a
natural laboratory it has it has a
stable surface it has no atmosphere it
has it has fractional gravity fractional
gravity to do scientific investigations
where you could look at physical
processes you can look at life processes
and if this is planet Earth we know a
lot about life on Earth and physical
processes by definition the gravity is
one and then we have the International
Space Station and it has microgravity
that’s one millionth of the gravity on
earth it’s close enough to zero to
actually call a zero you know it’s
technically not zero we refer to it as
zero gravity and we have been learning
over the last 18 years a lot about life
processes and physical processes on the
International Space Station and we’re
continuing to learn more Earth Space
Station we know almost nothing in
between the gravity levels so returning
to the moon at one-sixth gravity will
allow us to study the physical sciences
and the life sciences in a fractional
gravity environment the moon is a
destination worthy in its own right the
moon it’s useful besides just places to
live it’s useful for its resources and
we call this in situ resource
utilization it’s something engineers
think up but basically what it is is you
don’t need to carry everything for a
sustained presence on another planet
with you from mother earth particularly
fades that you need by the thousands if
not tens of thousands of tons not pounds
tons fades like bricks cement mortar
glass powder for 3d printing were 3d
printing with lunar regolith simulant at
the Kennedy Space Center really needs
stop so these are Said’s that you need
bulk materials simply for their physical
properties or their chemical properties
like rocket propellant we have learned
rather recently something we didn’t know
during the Apollo days we have learned
that there’s water on the moon it’s in
the polar regions inside of craters that
are so deep the light of the Sun never
shines there and it gets cold and water
gets trapped there over time and we know
that there’s vast quantities of water in
the form of ice and frost in these
craters in the poles on the moon and
there’s solar energy on the moon near
the poles around the rims of these
craters you have near continuous solar
energy so you have this beautiful
juxtaposition of energy and resources
right next to each other this involves
using chemistry to win these resources
and rocket scientists or rocket
engineers if you mentioned chemistry
they typically hide under the desk
because if they like chemistry they
become us they want to be aerospace
mechanical engineers and so the kind of
chemistry we’re talking about to make
these bricks and mortar and cement and
and rocket fuel by taking the water and
you could make the best rocket propelled
we currently have for human transport
hydrogen and oxygen and these require
basic chemistry chemistry that is
something 19th century industrial
chemistry would do the chemistry we’re
talking about is 1850 kind of chemistry
and many of these processes smelting
melting sintering the Romans could have
done so there will be challenges in
using these resources on the moon
because of the fractional gravity
environment we will be learning we’ll
need all those spare parts but the
chemistry is understood now the low
gravity of the Moon has other utility
between beef besides its scientific
utility and I like to use this to get
into the tyranny of the rocket equation
oh and I want to point out I’ve got the
latest NASA computer generated fonts
these fonts are so good they make it
look like your slides are hand written
now the rocket equation it’s a momentum
balance done on a rocket first
formulated by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky
Russian scientist and involves two two
inputs the magnitude of the gravity
field that you are negotiating in and
the type of rocket propellant that you
have chosen and you plug these into the
rocket equation turn the crank and out
comes the percent of your rocket that
has to be propellant and you must abide
by this or your rocket will be
repossessed by the planet from whence it
came let’s do this let’s do this now for
planet Earth going into what we call
low-earth orbit well gravity okay it is
what it is
take it or leave it type up for pound
let’s choose the most energetic
propellant we have for human transport
that extends a maximum you can get from
chemistry you plug that into the rocket
equation you turn the crank and your
that means everything you think of as a
rocket is 10 to 15% all that stuff that
sits on the launch pad that you see 10
to 15% the actual usable payload that
goes into orbit is about one and a half
percent Wow let’s compare this to other
vehicles earthly vehicles that we are
used to seeing let’s look at land and
see vehicles cars trucks trades boats
ships these fades are three to eight
percent propellant and made outta
billets of Steel they are incredibly
robust now move to aviation ok cargo
planes thirty to forty percent
propellant these are truly
lightweight structures they are made out
of aluminum and epoxy graphite
composites
they are designed by engineers you have
to roll your engineering Nichols around
in order to make these airframes and to
make them work but in spite of that our
aviation industry on earth is robust
routine and reusable airplanes reusable
rockets leaving earth 85 to 90 percent
so not even in the same class in fact
Rockets are closer to explosive devices
than any vehicles that we are used to
using Rockets are on the edge of our
engineering ability to even make and pay
for so let’s apply the rocket equation
to the moon Oh a rocket going from the
surface of the moon into orbit 40%
propellant and that’s compliments of the
moon having 1/6 of gravity of Earth 40%
notice rockets on the moon are akin to
the same structures that we use in
aviation industry on earth so rockets on
the moon will be routine robust and
reusable we could take resources that we
win from the lunar environment and we
can move them from point to point on the
lunar surface we can put them into orbit
around the moon particularly rocket
propellant so we could fill up our
rockets and go elsewhere now oh I love
this picture this is a picture out of
one of the windows and space station and
we are somewhere over China looking past
the Himalayas into India and if you know
where to look in this picture Mount
Everest is right there it’s the big
mountain sticking up you could all see
it
it’s really in there now I like to use
this to illustrate a concept of the
frontier imagine now that you’re a
rookie astronaut you’re going up to the
space station and you know that dozens
of astronauts have looked out this
window and these dozens of astronauts
before you have taken tens of thousands
maybe hundreds of thousands of pictures
and you could get yourself in the Warped
mindset that why should I even bother to
take a picture because it’s already been
done but then you need to realize that
you are in a frontier and there’s always
new discoveries to be made oftentimes
just by changing the way you make the
observation so take this window many
have been there before I’m gonna take
the camera and set it up a little
differently at wall set it up for
nighttime it’s the same planet the same
windows it’s a view but now you’re
making a new observation but wait
there’s more change the settings again
and look at that wow this is a 30-minute
time exposure is it that cool you can
see a lot of natural phenomena lagea in
here that escapes your eye unless you
make a time exposure so when you are in
a frontier the very concept of
been-there-done-that does not apply
exploration is not a bucket list where
you simply check off places that you
have been the real benefit by a society
that has that explores the real benefit
is having a sustained presence in the
frontier and those societies with a
sustained presence get to define the
cultural and political rules of
engagement so why the moon the moon is
the next logical step it’s close it’s
interesting it’s useful we could take
the resources
the moon and use them to explore
anywhere else we want in the solar
system now I took the rocket equation
and I worked at backwards and I
increased the size of Earth which
increases its gravity and its input into
the rocket equation and I wanted to see
how much larger earth would have to be
before it would not be possible to
launch a rocket into space with any
usable payload and my numbers turned out
ten to fifteen percent so think about
that if earth were just a little bit
bigger we might be a species a single
planet species we might not even be able
to leave the planet and this is all
compliments of the tyranny from the
rocket equation and fortunately Earth is
just small enough so that we can escape
and contaminate the rest of the solar
system they could let us out of the
petri dish of Earth and to help break
the tyranny of this rocket equation you
could either develop a system that
doesn’t use rockets ooh that would be
neat nobody’s been smart enough to do
that yet but maybe somebody out here
will figure out a way to do this or you
can go to other planetary surfaces that
have reduced gravity and get the
resources you need there the resources
that you need by the thousands of tons
or the tens of thousands of tons so you
don’t have to take all that stuff from
Planet Earth
thank you [Applause]
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