Lunar In-Situ Thermal Wadis

Lunar Thermal Wadis are structures that store thermal energy in a large thermal mass, and either release it slowly to allow assets like rovers to survive the lunar night, or use it to generate power. No credible hardware architectures have been proposed to quickly create a large enough thermal mass to use in a Wadi. Ethos Space intends to mature an innovation for an implement which is a modular and detachable piece of equipment to directly melt the lunar regolith in-situ and at depth to rapidly produce a large thermal mass that is extremely hot at the beginning, and can also be recharged after it cools. The proposed effort will create computer simulations of the Wadi, design an implement that uses the Ethos Durandal heaters to create a thermal mass, and carry out a small demonstration of creating a thermal mass with lunar regolith simulant in a vacuum chamber. The intended use of funding includes salary, and equipment for the small demonstration. The target markets are governments and private companies who are sending expensive hardware to the Moon, such as the Lunar Terrain Vehicle, the Pressurized Rover, and other mobility systems and equipment. Ethos intends to offer survive-the-night as a service by building and/or leasing use of Thermal Wadis to diverse customers who will use them to greatly increase the longevity of their missions, getting closer to the goal of sustained lunar exploration.

Our technology directly supports NASA mission directives surrounding the Artemis program. The STMD shortfalls assessment ranked Shortfall ID 1618 "Survive and operate through the lunar night" as the #1 overall priority weighted across all mission directorates. The NASA Moon to Mars recurring tenet RT-5 is "Maintainability and Reuse: When practical, design systems for maintainability, reuse, and/or recycling to support the long-term sustainability of operations and increase Earth independence. The ability to recharge a Thermal Wadi to perpetually survive the lunar night is in direct support of this tenet. Our same technology for creating Thermal Wadis is also broadly applicable for creating landing/launch pads, roads, foundations, and dust-free operating surfaces on both the Moon and Mars. A host of private companies are currently working on developing, launching, and operating assets on the lunar surface with a mixture of government and commercial funding. These assets (landers, rovers, etc.) mostly have mission lifetimes that are directly tied to the lunar day-night cycle; either 14 Earth days at equatorial latitudes and potentially longer at polar sites. There is a commercialization opportunity to build and operate Thermal Wadis to and sell the use of them so that expensive assets can survive the lunar night and greatly extend their lifetimes, increasing the return on investment for industry-built assets. This added value creates a commercialization opportunity, where a company like Ethos can demonstrate the Wadi technology at scale on the Moon before offering it as a paid service.

This is a mature technology (TRL 7+) — the realistic path in is usually NASA's Technology Transfer Program: licensing an existing NASA patent, or a Space Act Agreement to use NASA facilities/expertise directly. NASA also runs a startup licensing program with no upfront fee for companies formed to commercialize a specific NASA technology.

None of these are guaranteed paths for this specific project — TechPort itself doesn't have an "apply" button. Reaching out to the contact(s) above with a specific question is usually the fastest way to find out what's actually open.