Metalysis, a Rotherham-based company specialised in extracting metals from the metal oxides trapped in minerals, has won a contract from the European Space Agency (ESA) to adapt its technology to extracting oxygen from moon rock. The company, that usually works with the electronics, aviation and automotive industries, will be paid £250,000 by ESA.
A typical kilogram of moon rock contains up to 500 grams of oxygen, locked within its minerals. Finding a way to extract the gas could provide an almost unlimited supply of oxygen on the moon itself and pave the way for longer term manned missions in future.
Humans are expected to return to the Moon from 2024, when the first manned mission since 1972 are scheduled for. Nasa hopes to establish a Moon base that will be used as base camp for missions to explore the Moon’s surface in greater detail. Eventually, the hope is that the Moon will serve as a launch base for missions into the further reaches of our solar system, starting with Mars.
Nasa, and ESA, are hopeful that many of the key resources needed for further exploration of the solar system, particularly oxygen and water, can be extracted from the lunar surface and used for drinking water, breathable oxygen and even rocket fuel.
The awarding of the contract to Metalysis was announced by the UK Space Agency. Metalysis extracts metals including titanium and tantalum from mined rock. The metals are then used in the aerospace and automotive industries as well as being used in numerous electronic devices, including smartphones.
First the minerals ilmenite and columbite are extracted and purified, they produce the metal oxides titanium dioxide and tantalum pentoxide. Metalysis then uses a process called electro-deoxidation to strip out the oxygen atoms, leaving the pure metals.
The process involves using the metal oxide as one electrode, with the second formed from an inert element. Both are then placed in calcium chloride and an electric wave is passed through it. That shakes free the oxygen atoms from the oxide, which then pass to the other electrode. Normally, the oxygen is considered a by-product and left to escape. But on the Moon, it would be captured and used as breathable air.
Metalysis is adapting its process by working with simulated moon rock, which is especially rich in oxides like silicon dioxide. The company believes that moon rock will offer up oxygen in usable quantities, while also extracting valuable metals. Moon mining is considered to have the potential to be a huge future industry, possibly allowing for the ‘outsourcing’ of Earth-based mining, which is often environmentally harmful.
The International Space Station needs 2.5kg of oxygen a day for the astronauts in residence to breath for 24 hours. Which would mean, if Metalysis’s approach is successful and 500 grams of oxygen can be extracted from just one kilogram of moon rock, 5 kilograms of rock per day would provide enough oxygen for the crew.
Metalysis will work with space scientists to help adapt its processes to the low temperatures, low gravity and dusty conditions on the lunar surface.