Blue Origin awarded NASA partnership for lunar dust-based solar cells

KENT, Wash. — NASA awarded Blue Origin a $35 million Tipping Point partnership today to continue advancing its Blue Alchemist breakthrough revealed this year.

Blue Origin, which has a facility in Huntsville, received the award for the project which would produce solar cells from lunar regolith, which is the dust and crushed rock on the surface of the moon.

This year, Blue Origin used lunar simulant material to produce solar cells in a terrestrial lab.

Based on a process called molten regolith electrolysis, the breakthrough would manufacture unlimited electricity and power transmission cables anywhere on the lunar surface. This process also produces oxygen as a useful byproduct for propulsion and life support.

According to NASA, a technology like Blue Alchemist is considered at a Tipping Point if the agency’s investment can help grow the innovation into a viable commercial solution. Today’s investment will result in a demonstration of autonomous operation in a simulated lunar environment by 2026.

“Harnessing the vast resources in space to benefit Earth is part of our mission, and we’re inspired and humbled to receive this investment from NASA to advance our innovation,” said Pat Remias, vice president, Capabilities Directorate of Space Systems Development. “First we return humans to the Moon, then we start to ‘live off the land.’”