came up during the second annual Lunar Development Conference, held here July 20-21.Building necessary Earth-to-moon transportation that is affordable, reliable and safe will take big bucks. Billions of dollars of research and development will surely be needed.
"It's going to take a huge investment. I'm convinced that the taxpayers will not do it," said Alan Wasser, member of the board of the National Space Society, living in New York City.
"If NASA footed the bill, Congress would stop them. And if Congress did, the taxpayers would throw out the lawmakers that voted for it," Wasser told SPACE.com.
. And that is the ability to claim land," Wasser said.Land rush
In terms of putting humanity on the moon, owning "a piece of the rock" takes on new meaning.
The Wasser plan calls for recognition that "what no one owns, no one cares for or develops," he said. Although nations cannot claim land on the moon, private entities can.
Lunar land grants are just the ticket for jump-starting the settlement of the moon, Wasser said. While the United States cannot grant land ownership in space, it could grant recognition to a claim made by a privately funded settlement, he said.
Remember that "worthless land" just outside Orlando, Florida a few years back? Thanks to Walt Disney, that same property now sits under a giant theme park raking in major dollars each year, Wasser said.
"Worthless land on the moon will some day be valuable," Wasser said. "Use that incentive to get the money to develop Earth-to-moon transportation. People would be given the right to claim land on the moon. It can be sold piece by piece to speculators, to people who want to build the hotels, factories, and open mines to produce products for lunar settlers," he said.
Catalyzing a return
Land claims on the moon are sure to ignite international argument, said Steve Durst, head of the Lunar Enterprise Corporation in Palo Alto, California.
How best to catalyze a return to the moon, be it nationally, internationally or privately, is most assuredly subject to controversy, Durst said.
"Possession is nine-tenths the law. American privateers might bring up the question sooner than later. There's no doubt that the return to the moon is stronger than it has been over the past years," Durst said.
Some sort of lunar ownership is likely needed to stimulate a permanent human presence there, said Haym Benaroya, professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Rutgers, the state university of New Jersey in Piscataway.
"The subject of ownership is now an academic question. I think the laws will evolve as the needs arise," Benaroya said. "It will be like the internet. We have a lot of confusion now as people try to catch up with the technology. I think it will be the same for the moon," he said.
Meanwhile, on this day, it had been 10,083 days since humans last trod across lunar territory.
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