In an attempt to join the big league of world powers in the space race, Australia is now apparently planning to launch a lunar mission that will primarily conduct mining on the moon. This mining mission is aimed at extracting water from the moon, a move that could revolutionize future space missions.
It should be noted that the country has founded the space agency on July 01, 2018, and within nine months, the ASA is planning to some a mission which many countries have executed after long years of homework.
"We're witnessing a massive transformation of the sector, due to things like the miniaturization of technology, the lowering cost of launch and faster innovation cycles," said Anthony Murfett, Deputy Head of the ASA in a recent interview, Bloomberg reports.
Murfett also added that the Australian Space Agency is planning to emerge as the most industry-focussed space agencies in the world.
Andrew Dempster, Director of the Australian Centre for Space Engineering Research at the University of New South Wales revealed that the ultimate aim of the space agency is to reduce the investment risk of private companies that may also contribute in this upcoming lunar mission.
In last January, Rio Tinto Group, a private company who may be involved in Australia's lunar mission had revealed that their autonomous drilling technology could help the mining mission to discover water on the moon.
It should be noted that successful extraction of water from the moon could help space agencies to run upcoming space missions in a profitable manner. As Mars colonization is the next step in planetary inhabitation, many experts believe that setting up a permanent base on the moon could help to carry out these missions with ease.
Moon water could turn out to be a potential source for rocket fuel, and thus deep space missions can be carried out in a very profitable manner.
"Getting things from the surface of the Earth into orbit or into deep space costs a lot of money. If you can produce water in space for less than it costs to get there, then you're ahead," said Dempster.
A few days back, it has been revealed that the United States is planning to take humans to the moon by 2024. The proposed program was revealed by Vice President Mike Pence at a meeting of the National Space Council. Before that, Jim Bridenstine, NASA's administrator had made it clear that the purpose of this lunar mission is to make humans stay on earth's one and only natural satellite.
