| Title: | Journey to the Moon : technological and legal perspectives for sustainable human presence |
| Material Type: | ISU Team Project report |
| Publisher: | Illkirch-Graffenstaden (France) : International Space University, 2023 |
| Format: | 1 electronic resource (viii, 58 p.) / col. ill. |
| Bibliography note: | Includes bibliographical references |
| Languages: | English |
| Subjects: | In-situ resources utilization ; Lunar bases ; Lunar mining ; Moon--Exploration ; Space law ; Sustainability |
| Description: |
During the Southern Hemisphere Space Studies Program (SHSSP23), this team has identified the most pressing of these challenges, looking for practical solutions that would ensure a sustainable presence of the human species on the Moon.
The concept of sustainability, defined as the ability to maintain a continuous long-term human program on the Moon, and how to ensure it, is the central focus around which this work is developed. Among all the factors required to achieve sustainability, we focus on the requirements which relate most strongly to the physical sustainability of a lunar settlement: power, in-situ resource utilization (ISRU), and human habitation. Since the achievability of a sustainable human presence is directly correlated with the technology and research available, this team project addresses the challenge of sustainability by considering the following roadmap: near-term (until 2030), mid-term (until 2040) and long-term (until 2050). Thus, for each of these three requirements, a detailed presentation on the current status of the technologies developed is provided, presenting the challenges in sustained human settlement on the Moon, and giving recommendations for their future use in all the various phases, for a beneficial human presence on the lunar surface. A roadmap and a series of tables summarizing the contents and the information defined are also present in the report. The constructive discussions conducted by the team have highlighted the gaps in the current international legal framework of proper means to tackle the most pressing contemporary issues surrounding expected activity in cislunar space and on the Moon. The international legal instruments that regulate outer space have been revised proposing a new version of the international treaties, based on the Artemis Accords and the Antarctic Treaty, and picturing a two-tiered system with which to handle the international interaction among different parties, both governments and private entities, in lunar activities. At the end of this report, a series of comprehensive and conclusive recommendations, both from a technological and legal point of view, have been addressed. We hope that the same doubts and questions we have been asking ourselves will arise in the future in some other institution, and they may find in this work a solid base for their considerations for peaceful and sustainable lunar exploration. |
| Contents note: | 1.General introduction 2. Scope of the project 3. Evolution of lunar exploration 4. Resource utilization 5. Legal framework 6. General conclusions |
| ISU program : | Southern Hemisphere SSP |
| Format : | Open Access |
| Permalink: | https://isulibrary.isunet.edu/index.php?lvl=notice_display&id=11718 |
Read online (2)
 Journey to the Moon_Executive summary (21.9MB) Adobe Acrobat PDF | Journey to the Moon_Full report (2.77MB) Adobe Acrobat PDF |
