Speaker
Description
The homogeneity of the chemical and isotopic compositions of the Earth and the Moon facilitates the identification of potential mineral resources present and exploitable on the Moon. The current knowledge on the geological structure of the Earth's natural satellite also allows us to state that due to the greatest geochemical and geophysical activity of the surface layer of the Moon's crust - regolith, it is the regolith that is the most promising the Moon's raw material sphere (lunar resource sphere). The regolith contains increased concentrations of life-supporting raw materials (H$_2$O and O$_2$), fuels and energy raw materials ($^3$He, U, Th, H$_2$, and O$_2$), metallic raw materials (Fe, Ti, Zr, Hf, Eu, other REE, Cr, Ni, Co, Al, and Si), rock raw materials (regolith, breccias, basalts, anorthosites, and others) and chemicals raw materials (K, P, Cl, and S). Lunar regolith should be treated as a multi-component, pre-crushed ore, in which there are local enrichments of selected raw materials. Therefore, initially, the subject of exploitation and processing on the Moon will be regolith. The next deposit potential zones are areas where there are outcrops of basic and ultrabasic igneous rocks, which may be enriched in metals such as Cr, Ti, REE, and PGM, or places, where these rocks are covered by only thin layer of regolith. Such zones also include areas of occurrence of acidic igneous rocks, enriched in quartz, and perhaps also in many other valuable metals and chemical raw materials. The most important prospective areas in terms of the occurrence of raw materials in the regolith are the lunar maria, primarily the Procellarum KREEP Terrane, circumpolar areas, as well as areas on the far side of the Moon characterized by a regolith thickness exceeding 10 m.
