A Summary of Technical Requirements, Environmental Factors, and Loading for Lunar Infrastructure
Publication: Earth and Space 2022
ABSTRACT
Humankind has not set foot on the Moon in more than half a century. Since then, our best chance to get back to the Moon and stay, is now, with the Artemis program, led by National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). To achieve a lunar presence for longer than 3 days, the astronauts will need a safe lunar habitat that will protect them from the harsh environment on the lunar surface. When designing for a structure that is quite literally out of this world, there are many different factors to be considered, which are not present on Earth. Humanity went through thousands of years of construction to develop their understanding of structural shape effectiveness, construction material, understanding of the stresses and forces that are present in the Earth environment, and summarized them into various building codes. However, most of that knowledge is not applicable for the lunar environment due to different factors and lack of atmosphere. Various conceptual designs were presented and published around the world, but a more comprehensive study needs to be conducted to account for all the technical requirements and extreme factors affecting the decision of the lunar habitat. This paper briefly summarizes the most important data on the technical requirements and environmental factors to be considered for a successful design and continues with development of a preliminary in-depth and systematic framework, through the Pugh Matrix, to determine an optimal design for a lunar structure. 23 different evaluation criteria were used. Even though numerous different lunar habitat concepts were published throughout last 50 years, they were summarized in eight different concepts. The full decision matrix is presented, with the 3D printed structures as baseline concepts, and Modular Block Structures as the most viable option.
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Published online: Jan 5, 2023
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