I assume that non polar sites will be focused on the extraction of oxygen from lunar regolith using both solar and nuclear power.

The electric power used for the plasma arc pyrolysis of biowaste produces more than six times as much electric power in the form of syngas (hydrogen and carbon monoxide) as is put into it.

The combustion of syngas with oxygen to produce electric power during the lunar night would, of course, produce water and carbon dioxide as a byproduct.

Marcel

The components for such a reactor design might very well be transportable with a lander like the Blue Moon in several loads. Landed in the crater and then moved with a bobcat and stacked together.

If I might suggest, the immediate goal should be utilization of the water at the lunar poles and beginning to utilize other lunar resources for structures (etc.).

There will be plenty of time later to decide the proper course of expansion to other lunar regions (with more data upon which to make informed decisions) at that point.

However, needing megawatts of power to do resources extraction like this, in my opinion, cannot possibly have a viable cost/benefits ratio.

I didn’t say that and don’t believe it. You simply require much more power to do it.

But doesn’t that only pertain to a solar based power system? The day/night cycle only affects the reactor radiator sink temperature (thus power production) slightly and in the opposite direction anyway.

In any event, as you imply, it makes no sense to extract hydrogen from dry regolith. Yet, outposts at non-polar sites might still have valid uses for other resource extraction/science.

No. I assumed that we would continue to expand power generation as the outpost grows. There’s no significant qualitative difference between 125 and 200 kW — you can still do it all with steerable solar arrays.

I don’t understand why you need a 1-10 megawatt reactor.

Because 1) you have to survive the 14-days of continuous lunar nighttime; and 2) it requires at least 1-2 orders of magnitude more power to extract implanted solar wind hydrogen from “dry” regolith than it does to melt and collect the water in ice-laden polar regolith.

I don’t understand why you need a 1-10 megawatt reactor. If your outpost can operate with 200 kW solar power (near continuous during the polar day time), then assuming a nuclear system providing 10 kW each, you need 20. Developers/funders do not want to build giant nuclear reactors due to high costs, so, while the smaller reactors may not be mass optimized, they meet other programmatic needs. The reactor based power level/outpost is then site independent. Does it take a lot more power to acquire water/ice elsewhere on the Moon? Do you have a paper documenting this analysis?

Our lunar resources outpost architecture deploys 200 kW of solar electrical power. To survive at mid-latitudes, the need is for a 1-10 megaWatt-class reactor. This reactor is too small by 3 orders of magnitude.

http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/ON-NASA-to-test-prototype-Kilopower-reactor-1711174.html

“The Kilopower reactor could produce 1-10 kilowatts of electrical power, continuously for ten years or more.”