An nameless reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: On Friday, in a weblog submit not even promoted by the corporate’s Twitter account or a information launch, Blue Origin quietly stated its “Blue Alchemist” program has been engaged on [using the dusty lunar surface to manufacture solar panels] for the final two years. The corporate, based by Jeff Bezos, has made each photo voltaic cells and electrical energy transmission wires from simulated lunar soil — a fabric that’s chemically and mineralogically equal to lunar regolith. The engineering work relies on a course of generally known as “molten regolith electrolysis,” and Blue Origin has superior the state-of-the-art for photo voltaic cell manufacturing. On this course of, a direct electrical present is utilized to the simulated regolith at a excessive temperature, above 1,600-degrees Celsius. By this electrolysis course of, iron, silicon, and aluminum may be extracted from the lunar regolith. Blue Origin says it has produced silicon to greater than 99.999 % purity by means of molten regolith electrolysis.
The important thing advance made by Blue Alchemist is that its engineers and scientists have taken the byproducts of this response — and these supplies alone — to manufacture photo voltaic cells in addition to the protecting glass cowl that may permit them to outlive a decade or longer on the lunar floor. Blue Origin will try and market the expertise to NASA to be used by its Artemis program to return people to the Moon in a “sustainable” method. NASA and its worldwide companions search to distinguish Artemis from the Apollo program by extra prolonged stays on the Moon and constructing infrastructure corresponding to energy methods.
“Though our imaginative and prescient is technically formidable, our expertise is actual now,” the corporate stated in its weblog submit. “Blue Origin’s purpose of manufacturing solar energy utilizing solely lunar assets is aligned with NASA’s highest precedence Moon-to-Mars infrastructure improvement goal.” It is a notable analysis breakthrough, as the identical electrolysis course of is also used to provide metals for constructing habitats and different buildings, in addition to oxygen. These are all necessary for “residing off the land” if people are to keep away from the expense of needing to deliver all the pieces from Earth to stay and work in area. Whereas it’s a good distance from lab experiments to manufacturing on the Moon, these experiments are a important first step.
