[nine_k]

It may be easier to undertake a massive industrial operation on an unfamiliar celestial body when there is a human around to oversee things first-hand and troubleshoot issues when (not if) they arise.

First Lunar habitats are going to be mostly underground anyway, and nuclear-powered. Not much is needed to terraform.

[NikolaeVarius]

I'm constantly "impressed" (not in a good way) at how good some people are at saying completely unfounded statements as fact. There is literally no reason to believe either premise of most bases being underground, nor is there to believe nuclear power will be the dominant power source. We have a hard time getting RTGs inside steel boxes capable of surviving disasters into orbit.

[m4rtink]

Actually, its not hard to make RTG that survives reentry, multi RTGs did just that, one of them even being relaubchen after they recovered it.

Also since some rather missinformed protests back in IIRC cassini times I don't thin anyone really cares about modern RTGs being launched these days.

[nine_k]

You don't need the reactor working, or assembled, on the way to the destination. Consider a pebble-bed design.

Digging underground is a reasonable way to get a massive layer of radiation protection without carrying it with you. This is important when you are just starting a long-term habitat. Later designs can of course be different.

[NikolaeVarius]

1) The issue isn't limited to the existence of the reactor. It is linked to the public perception of anything nuclear being launched into the air. A commercial/proven pebble-bed reactor doesn't even exist yet, and last I heard they only started the first design in 2018.

Digging underground is reasonable if your only requirement is "block radiation". Its less reasonable when requirements also include 'get the digging machines into space', 'have it survive landing', and 'learn all the new fun techniques required to dig into lunar regolith in a low g environment with never before tested or used techniques and equipment'

[m4rtink]

There are already big suitable underground spaces in the form of lunar lava tubes. Those should help massively with bootstrapping of any undrground lunar colony.