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Return to the Moon: Exploration, Enterprise, and Energy in the Human Settlement of Space
Former NASA Astronaut Harrison Schmitt advocates a private, investor-based approach to returning humans to the Moon―to extract Helium 3 for energy production, to use the Moon as a platform for science and manufacturing, and to establish permanent human colonies there in a kind of stepping stone community on the way to deeper space. With governments playing a supporting role―just as they have in the development of modern commercial aeronautics and agricultural production―Schmitt believes that a fundamentally private enterprise is the only type of organization capable of sustaining such an effort and, eventually, even making it pay off.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published November 16, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 4, 2019
In this fascinating, well-researched, and challenging book, Apollo 17 moonwalker and “geologist-in-residence” Jack Schmitt lays out his vision for our return to the moon. Going in, I suppose I expected this book to be more about the technical challenges or scientific promise of such an endeavor, so I was surprised that so much of his thesis concerns economic and governmental issues.
In particular, while he points to certain aspects of the government program that sent him and his colleagues to the moon 50 years ago as ideal (such as the boldness of its youthful workforce), he makes a case for private exploration. He devotes an entire chapter to a sort of quantitative comparison between various modes of public-private partnership, from full state control to investor-driven private enterprise, and through some dubious rankings and weightings, tries to show the private sector as the clear winner. For me this was the most challenging aspect of the book, and it was difficult to read it as anything other than political bias. However, he makes such great qualitative arguments for private exploration in other passages that I can see his point.
The economic justification of a lunar return, in all its gory detail, presented a second unexpected and somewhat difficult aspect for me. Of course this dovetails with his argument for private enterprise, and provides a better basis for long-term space exploration than sheer curiosity, as it engages many more sectors of society than just the scientific community. The “nucleus” of his proposal is mining the moon for Helium-3, a possibly excellent fusion material which constitutes a small percentage of the solar wind and gets embedded in the lunar soil. He goes into some detail about how this might be done, while also concerning himself with how a company would finance itself while it ramps up production to self-sustaining levels. The payoff, of course, is potentially limitless, cheap energy that is decoupled from environmental and international conflict problems.
Schmitt’s passion for human space exploration shines through in a few areas. Clearly he doesn’t think much of those who say robots can do it all. Beyond the tired “which way is better for science?” question, Schmitt argues there are economic and social justifications for humans in space, and even suggests our future may depend on it:
“Apollo bent our evolutionary path into the future. The psychological, technological, and survival bonds holding humans to the Earth have been broken. This new evolutionary potential in the Universe now permits us to live on the Moon and Mars. Generations alive today can determine if humankind will take advantage of this new status. Will we begin the settlement of the Solar System and provide for a ‘new birth of freedom’ beyond the Earth? Placing the doubts behind us, let’s continue the millennial adventure that began in 1969 and go where we have gone before, and then beyond. We owe the future of humankind another walk on the Moon!”
In particular, while he points to certain aspects of the government program that sent him and his colleagues to the moon 50 years ago as ideal (such as the boldness of its youthful workforce), he makes a case for private exploration. He devotes an entire chapter to a sort of quantitative comparison between various modes of public-private partnership, from full state control to investor-driven private enterprise, and through some dubious rankings and weightings, tries to show the private sector as the clear winner. For me this was the most challenging aspect of the book, and it was difficult to read it as anything other than political bias. However, he makes such great qualitative arguments for private exploration in other passages that I can see his point.
The economic justification of a lunar return, in all its gory detail, presented a second unexpected and somewhat difficult aspect for me. Of course this dovetails with his argument for private enterprise, and provides a better basis for long-term space exploration than sheer curiosity, as it engages many more sectors of society than just the scientific community. The “nucleus” of his proposal is mining the moon for Helium-3, a possibly excellent fusion material which constitutes a small percentage of the solar wind and gets embedded in the lunar soil. He goes into some detail about how this might be done, while also concerning himself with how a company would finance itself while it ramps up production to self-sustaining levels. The payoff, of course, is potentially limitless, cheap energy that is decoupled from environmental and international conflict problems.
Schmitt’s passion for human space exploration shines through in a few areas. Clearly he doesn’t think much of those who say robots can do it all. Beyond the tired “which way is better for science?” question, Schmitt argues there are economic and social justifications for humans in space, and even suggests our future may depend on it:
“Apollo bent our evolutionary path into the future. The psychological, technological, and survival bonds holding humans to the Earth have been broken. This new evolutionary potential in the Universe now permits us to live on the Moon and Mars. Generations alive today can determine if humankind will take advantage of this new status. Will we begin the settlement of the Solar System and provide for a ‘new birth of freedom’ beyond the Earth? Placing the doubts behind us, let’s continue the millennial adventure that began in 1969 and go where we have gone before, and then beyond. We owe the future of humankind another walk on the Moon!”
April 6, 2012
The major complaint I have with Return To The Moon is that the author's line of reasoning cannot be taken seriously as policy proposals between now and 2050, which is how he presents it. But if you pretend that he's talking about the 22nd century instead of the 21st, and if you ignore the alarmist chicken-little sham science in the first few chapters about how we are only decades away from running out of fossil fuels, the later chapters are at least plausible. It's otherwise well organized and easy to read, with a topic I find very interesting. Several of the chapters are quite good on Lunar geology and 3-He mining considerations, though others are unavoidably a tad dry (managerial lessons of the Apollo missions for example).
What I mean by sham science:
First, he exaggerates current population growth and ignores the fact that the rate of growth is slowing, settling on an estimate of population in 2050 of 12 billion that is well above the highest UN projections. Second, he picks a growth in worldwide per capita energy consumption that is over 2.5x faster than historical trends which have held steady for over 200 years. Upon what does he base this extraordinary growth? The laudable goal of ending world poverty, but since when does anyone think that ending poverty is the world's actual mid-century goal? Aah, if only wishes were ponies. Third, he combines these crazy overestimates of growth with a serious underestimate of actual fossil fuel reserves to give the desired alarmist "result": that fossil fuels will be exhausted by mid-century. Then he proceeds to the contrived conclusion: that as a solution we'll be mining 3He from the Lunar landscape as the answer to Earth's energy crisis. Nevermind that mid-century research goals of ITER and other fusion facilities are aiming for economically feasibility of the much easier D-T reaction, rather than providing a serious source of worldwide energy. So the author just hand-waves over how we jump from demonstration of D-T fusion to fully developed D-3He fusion and mining of Lunar regolith to solve the world's problems in the next couple of decades. That's awfully optimistic for a field of science that has spent the last 50 years being "at least another 20 years away".
What I mean by sham science:
First, he exaggerates current population growth and ignores the fact that the rate of growth is slowing, settling on an estimate of population in 2050 of 12 billion that is well above the highest UN projections. Second, he picks a growth in worldwide per capita energy consumption that is over 2.5x faster than historical trends which have held steady for over 200 years. Upon what does he base this extraordinary growth? The laudable goal of ending world poverty, but since when does anyone think that ending poverty is the world's actual mid-century goal? Aah, if only wishes were ponies. Third, he combines these crazy overestimates of growth with a serious underestimate of actual fossil fuel reserves to give the desired alarmist "result": that fossil fuels will be exhausted by mid-century. Then he proceeds to the contrived conclusion: that as a solution we'll be mining 3He from the Lunar landscape as the answer to Earth's energy crisis. Nevermind that mid-century research goals of ITER and other fusion facilities are aiming for economically feasibility of the much easier D-T reaction, rather than providing a serious source of worldwide energy. So the author just hand-waves over how we jump from demonstration of D-T fusion to fully developed D-3He fusion and mining of Lunar regolith to solve the world's problems in the next couple of decades. That's awfully optimistic for a field of science that has spent the last 50 years being "at least another 20 years away".
July 30, 2014
Return to the Moon is a long-form proposal for a new manned lunar program, with the primary goal of mining the isotope Helium-3.
The book is written by Harrison H. "Jack" Schmitt, who was lunar module pilot on Apollo 17 in 1972. To this date, he is the only professional scientist to have walked on the moon.
Return to the Moon is presented as a series of papers tied into the major theme of putting humans on the moon in search of Helium-3. The writing is fairly academic and is probably not meant for a general audience of space enthusiasts.
Proponents believe Helium-3 has potential to revolutionize the energy industry as a fuel for clean, safe and prodigious nuclear power generation. While Helium-3 is quite rare on earth, it may be abundant on the moon. Schmitt has become a leading advocate for prospecting lunar Helium-3 for research and development, and this book is a culmination of his efforts.
Schmitt believes a project to mine lunar Helium-3 would pay for itself many times over with the expected revenue the project generates.
Where I tend to disagree slightly with Schmitt's proposal is where such a project might fit on the spectrum between fully public and fully private. Schmitt's bias is toward fully private. In his view, a private venture would not be tied with the sort of red tape that slows publicly-funded projects.
And while that's probably true, it puts the book too far ahead of even today's reality, even as the climate is shifting--slowly--toward privately-funded launches and mission operations. Schmitt's thesis is rigidly pro-business, and I think his case would be better served by accommodating the current realities of public funding, while looking ahead to the winds of change toward private enterprise.
The book is written by Harrison H. "Jack" Schmitt, who was lunar module pilot on Apollo 17 in 1972. To this date, he is the only professional scientist to have walked on the moon.
Return to the Moon is presented as a series of papers tied into the major theme of putting humans on the moon in search of Helium-3. The writing is fairly academic and is probably not meant for a general audience of space enthusiasts.
Proponents believe Helium-3 has potential to revolutionize the energy industry as a fuel for clean, safe and prodigious nuclear power generation. While Helium-3 is quite rare on earth, it may be abundant on the moon. Schmitt has become a leading advocate for prospecting lunar Helium-3 for research and development, and this book is a culmination of his efforts.
Schmitt believes a project to mine lunar Helium-3 would pay for itself many times over with the expected revenue the project generates.
Where I tend to disagree slightly with Schmitt's proposal is where such a project might fit on the spectrum between fully public and fully private. Schmitt's bias is toward fully private. In his view, a private venture would not be tied with the sort of red tape that slows publicly-funded projects.
And while that's probably true, it puts the book too far ahead of even today's reality, even as the climate is shifting--slowly--toward privately-funded launches and mission operations. Schmitt's thesis is rigidly pro-business, and I think his case would be better served by accommodating the current realities of public funding, while looking ahead to the winds of change toward private enterprise.
December 8, 2008
Very, very informative book. It covered every aspect of a potential return to the moon.
It was extremely dry though. It reads like a 328 page grant proposal. For example, the sections were labeled outline style(i.e. 3.3.2 Deuterium-tritium fusion) and instead of a conclusion, the last chapter was titled "Implications".
It is a wonderful reference, or a must have if you happen to suffer insomnia.
It was extremely dry though. It reads like a 328 page grant proposal. For example, the sections were labeled outline style(i.e. 3.3.2 Deuterium-tritium fusion) and instead of a conclusion, the last chapter was titled "Implications".
It is a wonderful reference, or a must have if you happen to suffer insomnia.
April 29, 2013
A fascinating book by an Apollo astronaut who has a Ph.D. in geology, served a term in the US Senate, and who has a good grasp of business and economics. The main purpose of the book is to sell his idea about using lunar helium-3 for clean fusion power, and his arguments are compelling. The book also has interesting anecdotes about the Apollo program and good lessons about people management.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews