Re: The Economic Development of the Moon

On 4 Nov, 21:11, "Mark R. Whittington" <mwhitti...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Andrew Smith, the author of Moondust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to
Earth, recently published a polemic in the British newspaper The
Guardian, entitled Plundering the Moon, that argued against the
economic development of the Moon. Apparently the idea of mining Helium
3, an isotope found on the Moon but not on the Earth (at least in
nature) disturbs Mr. Smith from an environmentalist standpoint. Even a
cursory examination of the issue makes one wonder why.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/434721/the_economic_developm...

Imagine this scenario: 2020, and NASA's first six month long mission
is prospecting. They visit aan old impact site, and find some metal
fragments with 10% platinum group metals. A quick analysis of the site
provides an estimate of 1,000 tons of PGMs mixed in with about 10
million tons of copper, iron, nickel and related metals scattered over
a few km2.

What would happen then?

Earth prices might fall somewhat, but I suspect lunar exploration
might speed up somewhat.
.

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