Elon Musk just announced a new and major focus on building a 'self-growing' city on the Moon within ten years.
Not just a small research base with a dozen crew members. Not just a small tourist hotel. Not just small robotic mining operations. But a city. Where all the above happens in grand scale. Yes, this would include vacations to the Moon for perhaps the price of a luxury cruise. Retirees with weakening bodies may find living on the Moon beneficial and therapeutic to regain youthful mobility.
The Moon is where we will learn how to live on Mars and other worlds. This is where Musk will perfect the technologies to sustain permanent human presence on Mars. The Moon is three days to home in the event of an emergency. The supply chain is incredibly short.
Mars alone would have been incredibly difficult and may have failed, costing lives. Incremental gains and iterative gains are necessary.
The Moon is the only testbed for developing and perfecting the necessary technologies. These include habitats, life support, protection from radiation, extremes of temperature, micro-meteorites, communications, vehicles, low-gravity physiology (could humans born on Mars ever come to Earth?) fuel production, energy (nuclear and solar), and of great importance, preventing harm from toxic regolith.
On the Moon, the 'soil' particles are incredibly sharp, and would have effects much worse than asbestos. On Mars, the dust is clingy and contains toxic levels of perchlorates. Preventing infiltration of those particles from getting in habitats, vehicles and space suits will require using existing and new technologies. Learn on the Moon, then take the technologies to Mars.
Journeys to Mars with conventional propulsion takes many months--and are captive to the 26-month launch and return windows. You can't just order supplies for rapid delivery. You can't bail out if everything goes wrong. Those unable to adjust to the initially rough life on Mars and so far from family will also have to wait many months for the window and months more for the transit.
Nuclear-electric propulsion will allow for faster transits and shorter launch windows, but there will always be a long journey to and from Earth.
The Moon will be the site of great manufacturing and tourism in coming years and decades, with easy access to Earth for supplies, personnel and vibrant commerce. Indeed, visits to the Moon will be affordable to millions within a decade, perhaps for the price of a luxury cruise today.
There will eventually be many jobs on the Moon. And you can look forward to new and modified sports that exploit the advantages of the low gravity.
This concept is a reversal from Elon Musk's previous goal to give the Moon brief attention while he focuses on his goal to create a civilization on Mars. He will get there, but slower and with a great many essential lessons learned on the close-by Moon.
Blue Origin and many others will join in on making the dream come true. At present, there's a race between SpaceX and Blue Origin to provide the crew lander for Artemis III.
A city on the Moon has vital strategic benefits as well. China has declared the Moon and Mars to be the same as the South China Sea islands they have illegally seized. The resolve to build an initial base within this decade and a true city in the next will deter China's worst instincts. It will forever secure access for the U.S., commercial space and the entire free world.
What does a 'self-growing' city mean? Most likely using an army of Tesla Optimus and many other types of robots to rapidly build the infrastructure, supplied by an automatic fleet of Starships. As elements of the initial base and the city evolve, the human population will grow.
Because freedom and tyranny cannot peacefully coexist, partnering with China would be off the table. Indeed, China may be afraid to have more than small Lunar and Martian military-led bases. Why? What if they shake off the tyranny and learn to love liberty? One day, perhaps within a decade, children will point to the lights on the Moon and exclaim, "look mommy, there's people on the Moon!"
And humanity will be forever transformed into a spacefaring society.
Read Elon Musk's announcement for yourself:
@elonmusk - For those unaware, SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years.
The mission of SpaceX remains the same: extend consciousness and life as we know it to the stars. It is only possible to travel to Mars when the planets align every 26 months (six month trip time), whereas we can launch to the Moon every 10 days (2 day trip time). This means we can iterate much faster to complete a Moon city than a Mars city.
That said, SpaceX will also strive to build a Mars city and begin doing so in about 5 to 7 years, but the overriding priority is securing the future of civilization and the Moon is faster.
Ad Astra.
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