Chinese Researchers Devise New Strategy for Producing Water on the Moon

The strategy for in-situ water production on the Moon through the reaction between lunar regolith and endogenous hydrogen. Credit: NIMTE)

Posted on August 24, 2024 by Matt Williams

In the coming years, China and Roscosmos plan to create the International Lunar Research PStation (ILRSP), a permanent base in the Moon’s southern polar region. Construction of the base will begin with the delivery of the first surface elements by 2030 and is expected to last until about 2040. This base will rival NASA’s Artemis Program, which will include the creation of the Lunar Gateway in orbit around the Moon and the various surface elements that make up the Artemis Base Camp. In addition to the cost of building these facilities, there are many considerable challenges that need to be addressed first.

Crews operating on the lunar surface for extended periods will require regular shipments of supplies. Unlike the International Space Station, which can be resupplied in a matter of hours, sending resupply spacecraft to the Moon will take about three days. As a result, NASA, China, and other space agencies are developing methods to harvest resources directly from the lunar environment – a process known as In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU). In a recent paper, a research team with the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) announced a new method for producing massive amounts of water through a reaction between lunar regolith and endogenous hydrogen.

The research was conducted by Prof. Wang Junqiang and his team at the CAS Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering‘s (NIMTE) Key Laboratory of Magnetic Materials and Devices. They were joined by colleagues from the Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics Engineering at the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. The paper that describes their process, “Massive Water Production from Lunar Ilmenite through Reaction with Endogenous Hydrogen,” recently appeared in the Chinese journal The Innovation.

Ever since the Apollo missions brought samples of lunar rocks and soil back to Earth for analysis, scientists have known that there is abundant water on the Moon. These findings were confirmed by several subsequent robotic sample-return missions, including China’s Chang’e-5 mission. However, much of this water consists of hydroxyl (OH) created through the interaction of solar wind (ionized hydrogen) and elemental oxygen in the regolith. There is also plenty of water in the form of ice that can be found in permanent shadowed regions (PSRs), such as the craters that cover the South Pole-Aitken Basin.

More:
https://www.universetoday.com/168194/chinese-researchers-devise-new-strategy-for-producing-water-on-the-moon/