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India wants to go to the moon, mine it for trillion-dollar energy source

India wants to go to the moon, mine it for trillion-dollar energy source

Moon

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Helium-3 waste-free nuclear energy source that could be worth trillions of dollars and could theoretically power the Earth's energy needs for 250 years

The Indian Space Research Organisation is planning to go to the moon and when it gets there, mine it for a waste-free nuclear energy source that could be worth trillions of dollars and could theoretically power the Earth's energy needs for 250 years. 

That energy source is helium-3. 

Helium-3 is rare on Earty but abundantly available on the moon. 

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Solar winds have bombarded the moon with helium-3 because it is not protected by a magnetic field. 

The presence of the isotope on the moon was confirmed by the American Apollo missions. 

The ISRO rover will take off from Earth in October. The next steps would be putting a space station in orbit and then finally a crew on the moon. 

The first step — getting the rover there — will cost about $125 million. 

This will not be India's first moon mission. 

ISRO's Chandrayaan-1 craft, launched in October 2008, completed over 3,400 orbits of the moon and landed a probe that discovered molecules of water in the moon's surface for the first time.