Space/Science — HabitableZone

Space/Science » in reply to We don't disagree much on this.

re: We don't disagree much on this.
gbaikie — (archived)

Water can form into very transparent material. Ice which slowly formed in the artic ocean is an example. On the Moon you shouldn't much problem making water ice that has no impurities in it.
And because of the Moon low gravity water ice can function as material that doesn't require structural material for support- a sheet of ice could function similarly as a sheet of glass does on Earth. Or if glass is used it's weight is a 1/6 on the moon, so a flat pane can span a greater distance without bending due to it's weight. In addition, some support can be gotten from the air pressure.

Note that on earth even from high mountains there will be a certain amount dust in the atmosphere that a telescope will look through [mother nature will determine how much at any given time]. You are also looking through water vapor. I don't know exact number but somewhere a couple mms of dust, about an inch of water and if gases of atmosphere were liquid about 20' of Liquid nitrogen and LOX [from a high mountain].

On earth you can get lucky and have optimal conditions for viewing [low dust, constant air temperatures and whatever]. On the Moon you could control your "luck"- you could design a system that can be virtually dust free.

Now, before thinking too much about the dust on the Moon and solving this problem; first how much dust in there on the Moon? For instance clear a hundred diameter meter area, wait a hundred years and how much dust is going get on area in the center. There is no way that you are going to get as much dust as you would on Earth. If you had 1 mm of dust collect in hundred years, then in a million years on the Moon you would have 10 meters of dust.

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