Seek for Moon-Targeted Sustainability Options

NASA is accepting U.S. submissions for the second part of the company’s LunaRecycle Challenge, a Moon-focused recycling competitors. The problem goals to develop options for recycling widespread trash supplies – like materials, plastics, foam, and metals – that would accumulate from actions corresponding to system operations, industrial actions, and constructing habitats in deep house.

Phase 2 of the LunaRecycle Challenge is split into two ranges: a milestone spherical and the ultimate spherical. Submissions for the milestone spherical are open till January 2026, with finalists from that spherical introduced in February. Up to twenty finalists from the milestone spherical will compete within the problem’s in-person prototype demonstrations and ultimate judging, slated for the next August. Cash prizes totaling $2 million can be found for profitable options in each rounds.

“NASA is eager to see how reimagining these materials can be helpful to potential future planetary surface missions,” mentioned Jennifer Edmunson, performing program supervisor for Centennial Challenges at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. “I’m confident focusing on the most critical trash items – and integration of the prototype and digital twin competition tracks – will yield remarkable solutions that could enable a sustainable human presence off-Earth and transform the future of space exploration.”

Estimates point out a crew of 4 astronauts may generate greater than 2,100 kilograms (4,600 kilos) of single-use waste – together with meals packaging, plastic movies, foam packaging, clothes, and extra – inside one year. Successful options in LunaRecycle’s Phase 2 ought to handle life like trash volumes whereas minimizing useful resource inputs and crew time and working safely with minimal hazards.

Phase 2 is barely open to U.S. people and groups. Participants can submit options no matter whether or not they competed within the earlier Phase 1 competitors.

All Phase 2 individuals are anticipated to construct a bodily prototype. In addition, individuals can submit a digital twin of their prototype for extra awards within the milestone and ultimate rounds.

The LunaRecycle Challenge is a NASA Centennial Challenge, a part of the Prizes, Challenges and Crowdsourcing Program inside NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate. LunaRecycle Phase 1 acquired record-breaking curiosity from the worldwide innovator neighborhood. The problem acquired greater than 1,200 registrations – greater than any competitors within the 20-year historical past of Centennial Challenges – and a panel of fifty judges evaluated almost 200 submissions. Seventeen groups had been chosen as Phase 1 winners, representing 5 international locations and 9 U.S. states. Winners had been introduced by way of livestream on NASA Marshall’s YouTube channel.

LunaRecycle is managed at NASA Marshall with material consultants primarily on the heart, in addition to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida and NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. NASA, in partnership with The University of Alabama College of Engineering, manages the problem with coordination from former Centennial Challenge winner AI SpaceManufacturing facility and environmental sustainability trade member Veolia.

To be taught extra about LunaRecycle’s second part, together with registration for upcoming webinars, go to: