UK Space Agency Launches Challenge to Purify Lunar Water angielski

The UK Space Agency, in partnership with its Canadian counterpart, has launched the £1.2-million Aqualunar Challenge, which aims to support the development of technology that would enable the extraction of purified water from ice buried beneath the lunar surface.

In addition to providing astronauts with drinking water, the purified water could also be used to grow food, and component elements of water could be extracted to produce oxygen to breathe and hydrogen to refuel vehicles visiting the lunar surface to deliver cargo and crew.

Advanced water purification also has a number of applications here on Earth, from removing microplastics to providing safe drinking water in drought-prone areas.