This Marvelous Machine Splits Moon Dust Into Oxygen and Metal – Singularity Hub

Like the settlers of old, space explorers will live off the land. But if self-sufficiency on Earth is difficult, its orders of magnitude more challenging in space, where there are no trees to build shelter, no plants and animals to eat, no water to drink, and no breathable air.

Like The Martians Mark Watney, future space explorers will have to use a heavy dose of science-y resourcefulness to survive hostile environments on the moon and Mars. Luckily, also like Mark Watney, theyll have access to some of the brightest brains on the planet.

Some of those brains, currently working at the European Space Agency, are making a machine that transmutes moon dust into oxygento breathe and make rocket fuel withand metal for building.

Truly, the surface of the moon is a barren wasteland. Its like being exposed to the vacuum of deep space with the modest benefit of a little ground under your feet and dust on your boots.

Its this dust, fine, grey, and bone dry, that may prove to be an invaluable resource for lunar homesteaders. Known as lunar regolith, moon dust is 40-45 percent oxygen by weight. Bound up in mineral and glass oxides, oxygen is the most abundant element on the moons surface.

Oxygen is also, obviously, necessary for breathable air, and its a key ingredient in rocket fuelbut you cant breathe or fuel ships with moon dust. Which is where ESA comes in.

The ESA team, led by University of Glasgow PhD candidate and ESA researcher Beth Lomax and ESA research fellow Alexandre Meurisse, is adapting an industrial method developed by UK company, Metalysis.

Called molten salt heat electrolysis, the process involves heating up a basket of simulated moon dustwhich is a close approximation to the real thingand calcium chloride salt to 950 degrees Celsius. The researchers then split off the oxygen with an electric current, leaving behind a pile of metal alloys.

The process can separate 95 percent of the oxygen in 50 hours, but in a pinch, 75 percent can be extracted in just the first 15 hours.

The team unveiled a proof-of-concept last October, which they said was a significant improvement on other similar processes that produce less oxygen or require far higher temperatures. And theres room for improvement. To that end, the team announced last week theyre setting up a new oxygen plant in the Netherlands to further refine things.

A key goal is to reduce the temperature. The higher the temperature, the more energy you need. And energy will be in finite supply on the moon. The team doesnt have a target temperature in mind, Meurisse told Singularity Hub in an email, but they believe they can do better. How much better depends on how lower temperatures affect other aspects of the process (like efficiency).

In addition to oxygen bound up in lunar dust, we know the moon has water. Though the details are still somewhat shrouded in mystery, scientists believe the moons water takes the form of ice in permanently shadowed areas at the poles.

Well need water to drink, of course, but we can also separate it into its elemental components, hydrogen and oxygen, by electrolysis. Provided we can get to the moons ice, how does the ESA processs energy requirements stack up to the electrolysis of water?

Meurisse said the two resources will likely have different trade-offs to consider (though we may well need need both to support a sustainable presence on the moon).

Because ESAs process involves high temperatures, its very energy intensive compared to water electrolysis which can be done at room temperature. But moon dust covers the entire surface as far as the eye can see. Grab a shovel and bag some up. The moons ice, on the other hand, will be rarer and much more difficult to mine, and we arent sure of its composition or what kind of processing itll require to make it usable.

Theres also something else to considerthat pile of metal left over once the oxygen has been pulled off and siphoned away. This metal may prove to be a reliable building material, something the ESA team will also look into exploiting in the coming years.

Could [the metals] be 3D printed directly, for example, or would they require refining? Meurisse asked. The precise combination of metals will depend on where on the Moon the regolith is acquired fromthere would be significant regional differences.

Next, the team will build a pilot plant that could operate on the moon (but wont be sent there yet) by the mid-2020s.

In the longer term, if the technology proves scalable and space-worthy, it could help make the moon into a gas station for spacecraft in Earth orbit and beyond. Manufacturing fuel on the lunar surface may prove more cost-efficient than dragging it up from Earth. Ultimately, explorers may use moon dust to breathe, build, and fuel missions across the solar system.

Image Credit: NASA

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This Marvelous Machine Splits Moon Dust Into Oxygen and Metal - Singularity Hub