Could the first lunar habitat be printed in 3D with moon dust?

Written by By Rebecca Cairns

The last time a person stepped on the moon was in 1972. Now, the moon is back on NASA’s space agenda. This time the agency not only visits, but plans to stay there.

With its Artemis missions starting next year, NASA aims to have astronauts on the moon by 2024 and plans a permanent lunar base by the end of the decade. This would be the first habitat ever built on an extraterrestrial surface and the challenges are unprecedented.

Sending a lot of building materials to the Moon would be costly and time consuming. But Texas-based ICON says it has a science fiction solution: 3D printing of a lunar base from moon dust.

ICON is collaborating with NASA to develop technology that can turn moon dust into a concrete-like material, according to co-founder and CEO Jason Ballard. The dust of the moon, also known as lunar regolith, is the sand-like surface earth that covers the surface of the moon, formed from minerals and tiny fragments of glass created over millions of years as they form. meteoroids hit the moon. It’s crisp, abrasive, and extremely sticky: Apollo astronauts found him hooked on everything, including his space suits. There is a lot of it, which means there is a large supply of raw materials if ICON is successful.

The BIG concept for the Olympus Project includes donut-shaped buildings that could be built entirely with the ICON 3D printer. Credit: Bjarke Ingels / ICON Group

The initiative is called Project Olympus after the largest known volcano in the solar system, which adequately conveys the challenge of the mountain facing the team. But Ballard doesn’t just shoot at the moon. By designing a lunar habitat, he expects the construction of the Earth to be cleaner, faster, and more economical.

Olympus Project

ICON has been using 3D printing technology to build social housing in Mexico and Texas since 2018. Using a concrete mix called lavacrete, its Vulcan printer can print about 500 square feet in 24 hours.

But the moon is a “radically different world,” Ballard says. From Earth, it looks like a serene, soft plateau orb, but it is subject to high levels of radiation, violent lunar earthquakes, extreme temperature fluctuations, and frequent micrometeorite shocks that collide through its fine atmosphere, he says.

And turning moon dust into building material is another huge challenge. The team is experimenting with small samples of moon dust in a lab, working on how to change its state with microwaves, lasers and infrared light, while using “little or no additives,” Ballard says.

The research area of the lunar structure proposed by ICON is illuminated with intelligent lights that simulate day and night on Earth, to help astronauts maintain a normal sleep-wake cycle. Credit: Bjarke Ingels / ICON Group

ICON worked with two architecture firms, Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) and Space Exploration Architecture (SEArch +), to explore the possibilities of 3D printing technology.

The team studied habitats in extreme environments, including McMurdo Station in Antarctica and the International Space Station, and used their discoveries to create a number of lunar design concepts, Ballard says.

Architects had to consider how to create a safe and comfortable environment to live in, says BIG founder Bjarke Ingels.

The SEArch + proposal includes a tall, multi-storey structure with 3D-printed protective petals that protect a core to be built on Earth, while BIG designed a circular structure that could be printed entirely on the moon.

BIG’s design includes a visible membrane of water that cushions the bedroom walls – “a good insulator against radiation,” says Ingels, which will provide astronauts with extra protection while they sleep.

Radiation means that windows must be kept to a minimum, so Ingels carefully chose the location of the only one in the building, which always faces Earth.

SEArch + envisioned a base “that would allow astronauts to enter and exit the surface frequently,” with clocks, roads, cutlery, and habitats, according to co-founder Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman. Credit: SEArch + / ICON

A “double-carcass” structure and outer latticework, which can contain loose lunar dust, provide additional protection against radiation and meteorites, Ingels says.

In addition to astronauts ’living and working spaces, the lunar base should incorporate landing pads, roads, and storage sheds. Until now, the human presence in space has been “dominated by engineering,” says Ingels. With several industries working together, he hopes the Moon’s first permanent structure can be “aspirational” in design, as well as an engineering marvel.

A gateway to the galaxy

NASA began exploring 3D printing as a possible space construction technology with the launch of the 3D Printed Habitats Contest in 2015. Both SEArch + and ICON participated in the initiative, with SEArch + primarily for his Mars X house design.

With the launch of the Artemis missions next year, NASA’s first step toward a lunar habitat is the “Gateway,” a space station in orbit around the Moon, says spokeswoman Clare Skelly. The astronauts will live and work at the front door and launch into the moon, staying in their landers for up to a week.

ICON’s 3D printer, Vulcan, draws the outline of the building one layer at a time. It can print up to 500 square feet in 24 hours. Credit: ICON

Its goal, however, is a permanent base, from which to explore the moon in more depth and test the technology of human survival in space. NASA wants to build facilities to house four astronauts for up to a month, Skelly says. It is an essential first step towards Mars, and beyond.

Skelly says it has not yet been decided whether the lunar habitat will be built using 3D printing, but “NASA could provide additional funding to ICON” and could give the company a chance to test its technology on the lunar surface.

Using lunar technology on Earth

Ballard is also optimistic about the terrestrial potential of technology. He believes the findings of the Olympus Project could help resolve the global housing crisis.

As a relatively new technology, there is little definitive data on the advantages of 3D printing in construction. However, a 2020 review notes that it could reduce construction waste by between 30% and 60%, labor costs by between 50% and 80% and construction time by between 50% and 70%. , which would make construction cheaper, faster and more sustainable.

ICON’s first 3D construction project was a collaboration with New Story nonprofit in Mexico, to build a social housing community for people who had lost their homes to natural disasters. Credit: Joshua Perez / ICON

Although the technology is widely used in bespoke projects, Ballard hopes the possibility of using “more raw and direct local materials” could open up more opportunities for 3D construction, which could be transformed by to some of the 1.6 billion people who are still there need adequate housing on Earth.

“It’s kind of fun thinking,” he says, “but it may turn out that the answers to our problems on Earth are on the moon or Mars.”

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