This is an interesting concept. Makes me wonder what kind of industrial/mining capacity the Moon may have by 2100. A possible idea for Envision 2100 ( https://www.lianeon.org/p/envision-2100 ) ?
How much material would we have to remove from the Moon before its orbital path would be affected? (Of course, we are also adding material in the form of personnel, equipment, living quarters, and physical waste material).
Good question! I think as you remove mass (while keeping velocity constant) the Moon's orbit will get wider by a proportional amount. This has been happening for millions of years, but lunar industry would probably accelerate it.
I don't think we would have to worry about its orbit becoming unstable until we used over a millionth of its mass, but I'm not sure. I wonder what the "ideal" Earth-Moon orbit would be from the perspective of space travel?
This is an interesting concept. Makes me wonder what kind of industrial/mining capacity the Moon may have by 2100. A possible idea for Envision 2100 ( https://www.lianeon.org/p/envision-2100 ) ?
How much material would we have to remove from the Moon before its orbital path would be affected? (Of course, we are also adding material in the form of personnel, equipment, living quarters, and physical waste material).
Good question! I think as you remove mass (while keeping velocity constant) the Moon's orbit will get wider by a proportional amount. This has been happening for millions of years, but lunar industry would probably accelerate it.
I don't think we would have to worry about its orbit becoming unstable until we used over a millionth of its mass, but I'm not sure. I wonder what the "ideal" Earth-Moon orbit would be from the perspective of space travel?