Researchers Extract Lunar Water With Sunlight, Producing Oxygen and Fuel Gases as Launching 1 Gallon Costs $83,000
Updated
Updated · spacedaily.com · Jul 18
Researchers Extract Lunar Water With Sunlight, Producing Oxygen and Fuel Gases as Launching 1 Gallon Costs $83,000
1 articles · Updated · spacedaily.com · Jul 18
Summary
A July 2025 Joule study used concentrated light on Chang’e-5 lunar soil to release water and convert it in one photothermal process into oxygen, hydrogen and carbon monoxide.
The setup uses regolith twice: heating frees hydrogen-bearing water, and minerals including ilmenite help catalyze reactions with carbon dioxide—envisioned as recycled astronaut exhalation.
The result is a lab chemistry demonstration, not a working Moon plant; the authors say current catalytic performance is insufficient for human life support and still requires purification, storage and robust excavation systems.
Chang’e-5 returned 1.731 kilograms of soil from Oceanus Procellarum, where earlier studies found about 28.5 to 120 parts per million hydroxyl in very dry mid-latitude regolith.
The appeal is mass savings: the paper cites about $83,000 to launch 1 gallon of water, but NASA says lunar volatile location and accessibility remain too uncertain to design extraction systems confidently.