2010 Field Demonstration of the Solar Carbothermal Regolith Reduction Process to Produce Oxygen

Abstract

Many potential destinations of interest (including the Moon, Mars, Phobos, Deimos and many asteroids) are covered with regolith that cont ains a variety of oxygen-bearing minerals, providing a virtually unlimited quantity of raw material which can be processed to produce oxygen. One attractive method to extract oxygen from regolith is the carbothermal reduction process. The carbothermal reduction process is not sensitive to variations in the mineral composition of the regolith and it creates other valuable resources within the processed regolith, such as iron, glass and silicon . ORBITEC developed the Carbothermal Regolith Reduction Module to process regolith simulants using concentrated solar energy. The Carbothermal Regolith Reduction Module was integrated with other modules to form the Carbothermal Regolith Reduction Processing System which was demonstrated at an analog test site on Mauna Kea in Hawaii. This paper describes the analog test operations and the experimental test results, plus the results of some more recent laboratory tests at higher power levels.