BBC Focus Magazine

[King Random]

Did any of you see the recent documentary about whether we really need the Moon?

It's VERY interesting!

[Shadowwolf]

Can't say I did but I've encountered similar investigations on the moons presence. From what I recall I think we would miss it now were it to vanish but were it never there, the difference may not be all that huge and probably not detrimental.

[M Paul Lloyd]

Doesn't ring a bell, sorry, but we do really need the Moon as for one thing it helps keep our axial tilt relativley fixed thereby helping to control our seasons.

[King Random]

well, in the program it said that the Moon was moving 3 point something cm per year further away from us. And if it kept on doing that the Earth would start to wobble chaotically and the night could get up to an incredibly long 20 hour night. Also, because the Moon's gravity lessening on Earth and causing the Earth to become differently tilted, the poles ice could melt causing the Earth to flood.....

[Shadowwolf]

Well it is going to keep on receding but if it does so slowly then Terra may acclimatise itself gradually and not get into wicked shimmies. I must say that I like this twenty hours of night, perfect place to build a fortress of doom.

Course these are problems that would not occur were there no moon ever, it would just be how it is, normal.

[M Paul Lloyd]

Anyone for some rotating sphere real estate?

[King Random]

that would be cool!

Another thing: There was this guy who wanted to put a whole ring of solar panels around the Moon to ge more energy and then transfer it through microwaves to Earth. Also, he was proposing to build a whole 'Moon Base' to launch rockets from which would be a lot more efficient because of the weaker gravity. And, unbelievably, the total cost would be LESS than that of which Oil rigs use to get oil today, so theoretically, we could start doing that right now.

I don't know if that all makes sense to you....

[M Paul Lloyd]

The idea of space-born power generators that transmit their energy via microwaves has been around for a long time, certainly since the early 1970's, and it has a lot going for it although these were almost all intended to be orbital stations rather than Lunar based.

However microwaves are not very efficient at transmitting energy over long distances and the combination of the Earths magnetic field and atmosphere would pretty much negate the overall benefits of trying to supply our power needs from the Moon.

A rocket launching Moon base is a nice idea especially as water, in the form of ice, has been discovered on the Lunar surface and it would make an excellent propellant. The only problem I can see is that you would have to get sufficient hardware from the Earth to the Moon to build your Moon-base anyway but if you put all that effort into building a spacecraft in Earth orbit you could be well on your way to Mars and back at least twice over.
However I can see a good reason for building small automated mining facilities that would project lunar soil, that contained water/ice, into Lunar orbit to be collected for use in spacecraft generally.