Commercial activities resulting from a lunar base
Abstract
This paper discusses projects resulting from a lunar base which may be undertaken commercially. The resources available at all stages of lunar development are considered, from base inception through to the establishment of a permanent cis-lunar infrastructure. Due to the large expense required to establish a lunar base, the program must begin as a government effort. However, to sustain a human presence off Earth, a program must provide participating nations with direct and measurable social and economic benefits. For a lunar base, these projects may begin as commercially funded experiments or small scale demonstrators, gradually evolving into large-scale projects with global application once base self sufficiency has been attained and an effective cis-lunar infrastructure established. established.
- Publication:
-
Journal of the British Interplanetary Society
- Pub Date:
- December 1994
- Bibcode:
- 1994JBIS...47..549O
- Keywords:
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- Lunar Bases;
- Space Commercialization;
- Space Industrialization;
- Space Manufacturing;
- Exobiology;
- Fuel Production;
- Fusion Reactors;
- Helium Isotopes;
- Lunar Mining;
- Oxygen Production;
- Solar Generators;
- Ground Support Systems and Facilities (Space)