Did you know that the US could run on just 25 tons of helium-3, a rare kind of helium, for a whole year?
Nevertheless, the meagre amount of helium that Earth’s atmosphere receives from the activity in its core is insufficient to supply our needs for energy.
Thus, mining the moon is the only way we can obtain this high-energy fuel.
It may surprise you to learn that Interlune, a business, has already funded $15 million toward the objective of retrieving helium-3 from the moon and delivering it to Earth.
Rob Meyerson, a former president of Blue Origin, and Harrison Schmitt, a member of the Apollo-17 crew, formed Interlune.
It wants to be the first private space company to extract natural resources from the moon for use in industry. The business is currently developing a robotic lander mission to identify the concentration of helium-3 at certain moon locations. High-energy Helium-3 particles are produced when two photons, a neutron, and two electrons come together during the Sun’s nuclear fusion process. The solar winds transport them to several planets from the sun. Most of these particles are prevented from entering Earth by the magnetosphere, our planet’s magnetic shield, as they arrive from the solar winds.
Nevertheless, some of the charged Helium-3 particles are still able to enter through the magnetic poles and help create the beautiful auroras.
Small amounts of helium-3 are also formed on Earth as a result of the tritium that is broken down by nuclear reactor activity. It is still produced in very small quantities.
For example, some sources state that the Earth’s atmosphere can only contain 300 grams of helium-3 annually, while others assert that about two kilograms of this gas escape from the core.
Conversely, because the moon lacks an atmosphere and a magnetic shield, the solar winds cannot pass through it.
As a result, a lot of high-energy particles are constantly striking its surface, which makes the planet a rich supply of helium-3. A report states that there are around 1,100,000 metric tonnes (or 1.2 million tons) of helium-3 on the moon.
“Helium-3 on the moon is worth $4 billion per ton. It’s the most valuable thing in space,” Gerald Kulcinski, director of the Fusion Technology Institute at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, told the sources.
Just one uncommon form of helium has the potential to create a multibillion dollar enterprise and deliver a plentiful supply of renewable energy.
According to a recent press release from Interlune, helium-3 from the moon can foster the development of numerous sectors and industries, including nuclear fusion, quantum computing, and medical imaging.
“Access to the ample cache of Helium-3 and other precious natural resources on the Moon and beyond will unlock or accelerate technological advancements currently hindered by lack of supply,” Alexis Ohanian, one of the investors in Interlune, said.
They assert that they have the technologies necessary to complete this work carefully and sustainably.
“For the first time in history, harvesting natural resources from the Moon is technologically and economically feasible,” Meyerson added.
