Researchers have conducted experiments with lunar regolith and concluded that they can extract much more water than previously thought possible — and do so simply by heating it.
How to extract water on the Moon? Source: phys.org
Water from the lunar regolith
The future colonization of the moon is closely tied to the availability of water on the lunar surface. The problem of providing astronauts with drinkable water usually comes down to polar ice reserves. However, a team of scientists from China's Ningbo Institute of Materials Science and Engineering recently proved that lunar regolith is good enough to make it happen.
The fact that the top layers of rock contain water has been known since the time of the Apollo crews, and recent studies with Chinese instruments have confirmed this, but the material most important for life is found in very small amounts in the regolith: 0.0001% to 0.02%.
But as Chinese scientists have discovered, this only counts physicochemically bound substances: when the hydrogen and oxygen in the minerals are released and combined, there is much more water.
How much water can be extracted from one tonne of regolith?
It turns out that extracting the hidden water is not that difficult: it's enough to heat the regolith to 1200°C – exactly the kind of experiment the authors of the new study were conducting. They didn't even need powerful furnaces or lasers; all they needed was a system of concave mirrors that concentrate sunlight.
It turns out that one gram of regolith can yield 51-76 mg of water, which may not seem like much, but one ton of rock can yield 50 liters, enough for several people to survive for a day or more.
Subsequent studies have shown that the rock ilmenite found in some places on the lunar surface contains even more water in its composition. In general, studies have shown that the hydrogen in lunar rocks has great potential for use: it can provide water for humans and plants, as well as be used as rocket fuel.
According to phys.org:
