Understanding Helium-3 from the Moon as an Attractive Energy Source

You may have heard of Helium-3 and the promises it has as a perfect energy source. To understand, somehow, how it can help us we need to assume that fusion plants to extract its energy are safe for everyone. We also need to go back to the future and check out the tons and tons of Helium-3 being transported from the moon’s surface back to earth.

The Recipe for Nuclear Fusion

When we speak of a nuclear reaction, we are really talking about altering the arrangement of the nucleus of the atom. The nucleus of the atom has a very strong bond, moving the neutrons and protons that make up the nucleus means moving energy big time.

For our purpose, we need the isotope of helium, tritium, and deuterium.  Let us focus on the helium which we use for our balloons and colorful blimps. The regular helium is formed by 2 neutrons and 2 protons. To get helium-3, one of the neutrons must be out of the picture. The condition to kick out the neutron is not that easy to simulate—it happens in the sun.

Now we try to react helium-3 with deuterium so we can get the energy that we want.  This is what we call nuclear fusion. The reaction will give us a helium-4 and a proton. Imagine a kilo of Helium-3 doing the magic with 0.67 kg of deuterium, this will give us and energy output of 19 megawatt years.

When the nuclear reactors we design fail, it will still be safe for us. The worst picture will not lead to deaths, or skins and bones melting.

Energy and Value of Helium-3

When rocket loads of lunar rigolith are brought back to earth from the moon, the rocks and soil will be heated up to 6000 degrees Celsius to extract Helium 3.

A million tons of 3He reacted with deuterium will result to 20,000 terrawatt-years of energy. It is hard to attempt to explain how much thermal energy that is but a terawatt is equal to a trillion watt years. Removing all the commas and zeros, a 100-watt bulb will just consume 100 watt years in 12 months.

The amount of energy we are talking off is about ten times greater than what we can extract if we harvest all the fossil fuels that we have here on earth.

Here’s another good picture to imagine, a train load of Helium-3 or about 25 tons of it can power the whole of United States for 1 year. The price for this is $3 billion/ton or about $75 Billion. Doing the math, it will still be profitable in the future to use Helium 3 as our energy source. It will also take about 10,000 years before we exhaust the Helium-3 supply on the lunar surface, and by that time we might have figured out a better source for our energy needs.