The Trump administration is prioritizing getting a nuclear reaction on the moon by the end of the decade in a bid to beat Russia and China.
“We’re in a race to the moon, in a race with China to the moon. And to have a base on the moon, we need energy. And some of the key locations on the moon, we’re going to get solar power, but this fission technology is critically important, and so we’ve spent hundreds of million [of] dollars studying,” Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said at a press conference this week. Duffy doubles as the acting administrator of NASA.
In a directive dated July 31, Duffy outlined how Russia and China are working on a joint effort to put a reactor on the moon by the mid-2030s and would likely set up a “keep out” zone once that’s accomplished that could potentially hurt the American presence on the moon.
“If it is possible to colonize the moon, it will be colonized, and if it is possible to militarize it, it will be militarized. The only question is: Who gets it first? Both Russia and China would not hesitate to do so. A human presence on the moon requires an energy supply, and nuclear energy is the obvious solution,” explained Eugene Kontorovich, a senior research fellow in the Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom at The Heritage Foundation.
Building a reactor on the moon has the benefit of providing plentiful energy for lunar colonists without the emissions and inefficiencies of fossil fuels.
“With one pellet of nuclear fuel that’s about the size of your fingertip or in a pencil eraser, that equals one ton of coal, 150 gallons of oil, or 17,000 cubic feet of natural gas,” Jack Spencer, senior research fellow for Energy and Environmental Policy at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal.
Being able to carry a large amount of energy at a relatively light weight is important for any space mission when a spaceship journey could cost tens of thousands of dollars per pound, and mission difficulties could lead to astronauts being stranded in space.
The reactor will need to be able to produce 100 kilowatts or “the same amount of energy a 2,000-square-foot home uses every 3.5 days,” Duffy said.
“[Y]ou don’t have any issues with burning, because there’s no burning. It’s fission that takes place. So, it’s just a good energy source to use. You wouldn’t have, you know, you wouldn’t need massive fuel supply chains from Earth to the moon,” Spencer said.
The race to put a permanent settlement on the moon is just the latest development in the competition between the world’s great powers. Russian and Chinese military activity in the Arctic has become more frequent, according to Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy. The two great powers are also expanding their presence on the opposite end of the globe in Antarctica. The continent is a potential hotbed for maritime activities and resource extraction.
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