Lunar Bases: Past & Future

Presented by Rutgers University’s Haym Benaroya

What might a habitat on the Moon look like? Even though we are a couple of decades from a permanent settlement on the Moon, we have been considering and studying what the habitats might look like since before the Apollo era. Initially, they will be pressurized cylinders, like the modules of the International Space Station. Later, they will be inflatable structures with larger volumes, making living inside more Earthlike and pleasant psychologically. If they are on the surface, we will need to cover them with regolith in order to shield against radiation and temperature extremes, along with the periodic micrometeoroid. Eventually, habitats and lunar cities will be underground, perhaps within the newly discovered lava tubes. But these will be so large, well lit, and Earthlike that we will hardly know we are under the lunar surface. This presentation provides an overview of the engineering, physiological and psychological issues and how we may address these.