To a large extent, the Post-War global economic expansion in the past 60 years is powered by the availability of cheap fossil fuels. Today, we are not only facing with the problem of questionable future supply of fossil fuels but also its implication to global warming and other environmental issues. By mid-21st Century, human society definitely needs to find a replacement for fossil fuels. Alternative energy sources, such as solar, geothermal or bio-fuels, can just reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. The only alternative energy source that holds the promise of replacing fossil fuels is nuclear energy. However, with high-profile accidents such as Chernobyl and Fukushima, public resistance to nuclear fission power is widespread due to possible release of radioactive nuclear fuel or waste.
Nuclear fusion is a more powerful form of nuclear energy that powers the Sun. Scientists worldwide have been working on to tame it for peaceful use since 1950s. Scientific demonstration of fusion power in laboratory has been achieved in the 1990s. The next step is to prove economic feasibility, which is the goal of a large international cooperative project "ITER" (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor).
Fusion is an ideal energy source because its fuel is easily available. First generation fusion reactors burn heavy hydrogen (deuterium, available in natural water) as fuels and have much benign radioactive problems compare with fission reactors. Scientists estimate that the energy content of deuterium in a bathtub of water can supply power for a country like England for a year.
More advanced fusion reactors can burn helium-3 as fuels and free from any radioactive problem. The only problem with helium-3 is there is very limited amount of helium-3 on Earth. However, helium-3 is an important component of solar wind, the energetic particle streams originated from our Sun. Since the Apollo project, scientists have found abundance of helium-3 on the lunar surface.
In this talk, I will tell you the amazing story how the Moon is linked to the solution of our energy problem on Earth. Scientific research on two fronts: fusion and lunar sciences, eventually points to a brighter future for human beings. No wonder some advocates for helium-3 fusion predicted the Moon could become the Persian Gulf of the 21st century.