Jan 21, 2020
ESA opens oxygen plant, making air out of moondust
Posted by Quinn Sena in categories: materials, space
ESA’s technical heart has begun to produce oxygen out of simulated moondust.
A prototype oxygen plant has been set up in the Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory of the European Space Research and Technology Centre, ESTEC, based in Noordwijk in the Netherlands.
“Having our own facility allows us to focus on oxygen production, measuring it with a mass spectrometer as it is extracted from the regolith simulant,” comments Beth Lomax of the University of Glasgow, whose Ph.D. work is being supported through ESA’s Networking and Partnering Initiative, harnessing advanced academic research for space applications.