Water Ice: Evidence versus Hype
How much water is on the Moon, where is it, and how sure are we?
Chapter summary
There is water ice in permanently shadowed craters near both poles, where temperatures stay below about −160 °C.
Key takeaways
- 1
NASA's LCROSS impact in 2009 measured about 5.6% water by mass (± 2.9%) in the plume from Cabeus crater, and orbital neutron and radar data point to more.
- 2
Published totals range from about 100 million to 1 billion tonnes per pole, and 600 million to 2 billion tonnes for both, but local concentrations are patchy: 0.5–4% by mass is more common than 5%, and the data mostly describe the top metre.
- 3
No mission has yet drilled into ice-rich ground and measured it directly.
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