TL;DR
Mining the Moon has always sounded like a 1950s magazine cover, but one lunar resource now has paying customers lined up. Helium-3, a rare form of helium used to cool quantum computers, sells for up to $20 million a kilogram, and the U.S. makes only about 1 kilogram a year. Interlune, a Seattle startup, says it has nearly $500 million in orders and a NASA contract to build a helium-3 extractor for the Moon, with a lunar test targeted for 2028. The twist is that its first deliveries will come from Earth, and a Minnesota gas well is being studied as another Earth source. If helium-3 can be pulled from lunar soil at scale, the Moon becomes the first off-world mine with a real market. If Earth sources come through first, the Moon may not be needed.
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