Researchers have successfully created solar cells from simulated moon dust that could fuel power. The cells the scientists developed should convert sunlight into energy efficiently and withstand radiation damage, theyreportin the Cell Press journalDevice.
The technique kills two space logistics birds with one stone: it could create electricity without involving heavy payloads. Building a solar power electrical plant with existing technology would likely require multiple expensive trips to ferry heavy components to the satellite.
“The solar cells used in space now are amazing, reaching efficiencies of 30 percent to even 40 percent, but that efficiency comes with a price,”Felix Lang, a researcher with the University of Potsdam, Germany, and an author of the study, said in apress release. “They are very expensive and are relatively heavy because they use glass or a thick foil as cover. It’s hard to justify lifting all these cells into space.”
Turning Moon Dust into Power
Vision of future solar cell fabrication on the Moon, utilizing raw regolith. Shown are robots that source raw regolith and bring it to a production facility, which fabricates perovskite-based moon solar cells. Later automated rovers or astronauts install the produced solar cells to power future Moon-habitats or even cities. (Image Credit: Sercan Özen)
Lang’s team developed a technique to create glass for the solar cells out of the Moon’s loose surface debris, called “lunar regolith.” Since glass for solar cells represents the heaviest, bulkiest component, creating the material on the lunar surface could reduce a spacecraft’s launch mass by 99.4 percent, cut 99 percent of transport costs, and pave the way for lunar settlements.
To test the idea, the researchers melted simulated Moon dust into moonglass, then paired it with a cheap and easily made crystal called perovskite. The combo proved very efficient; thetechnique replaces every gram of material that would need to be sent via space,and the new panels produced up to 100 times more energy than traditional solar panels.
“If you cut the weight by 99 percent, you don’t need ultra-efficient 30 percent solar cells, you just make more of them on the Moon," Lang said in the press release. "Plus, our cells are more stable against radiation, while the others would degrade over time.”
Read More:Scientists Are Still Pondering These Mysteries of the Moon
Moonglass and Solar Panels
The team tested that proposition by zapping both their version and conventional solar panels with radiation. The moonglass versions outperformed the Earth-made ones — likely because standard glass slowly browns in space, losing efficiency. The moonglass, already with a brown tilt essentially built in due to chemical impurities, doesn’t degrade further.
The team wrote that making moonglass in space should be relatively easy since the ingredients don’t require purification. Concentrated sunlight alone should provide enough heat to transform lunar regolith into glass.
There are still challenges the scientists must overcome to make cells on the Moon rather than on Earth. They aren’t clear how the process will work in lower gravity. The solvents now used to process the perovskite are ineffective in a vacuum. And they are unsure how drastic swings in the Moon’s surface temperature could impact the materials’ stability.
To address these issues, the team aims to launch a small-scale experiment to the Moon to test the technique in lunar, not laboratory, conditions.
Read More:The Water on the Moon May Trace Back to Early Earth — and Comets
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Before joining Discover Magazine, Paul Smaglik spent over 20 years as a science journalist, specializing in U.S. life science policy and global scientific career issues. He began his career in newspapers, but switched to scientific magazines. His work has appeared in publications including Science News, Science, Nature, and Scientific American.