Welcome to our house on the Moon! This space camp was designed by Elsa and Emily. Let us show you around! In our design, half is underground and half is on the surface. The upper floor is based on craters, this is to save material and space. The underground part is where astronauts have their bedroom, kitchen, and bathroom. Because when they’re on the surface, there are more dangers like UV rays and radiation. The upper floor has a greenhouse, library, gym, and main door. The greenhouse is for growing crops and the gym is for astronauts to exercise and stay healthy. We also have a library for entertainment and research. We have solar panels to provide power for the moon camp and three satellites to contact Earth. There is a rocket landing pad for you to park your rocket when you visit the astronauts. We have a machine that can dig for soil, heat it up, and capture the water and oxygen.

In the Tinkercad, we have a transparent block that represents the surface. On the surface, our rooms are in crater shapes because it stabilizes the moon camp and provides support. Our design is made for astronauts that need to stay in space for long terms of time. The moon camp has a simple and efficient design. Satellites, solar panels, library, gym, bedrooms, kitchen, bathroom, greenhouse, and rocket landing pad. We were able to fit into this camp. The maximum is two astronauts can live in this space. We were also able to put a working computer to transport information back to earth. You can live here with everything you need on earth. Greenhouse to grow plants and crops with soil from decomposed leftovers, that is watered with water astronauts
have used already. And since our location is close to the lunar poles, we have plenty of sunlight that can be stored into the battery bank in the solar panels. The astronauts get their water from a complex machine that mine for regolith and heats it up to steam and is stored. They have oxygen from the same machine as the water, but as it’s heating up, oxygen also comes from the soil and is stored into oxygen tanks.

The moon camp can keep itself running without anything from earth being launched into space. It works almost as well as a house on earth but looks entirely different. We designed our camp
with craters because that way it’s safer and is protected. If we build our moon camp away from the solar poles they would have two weeks of sunlight, then two weeks of complete darkness and that doesn’t help the plants in the greenhouse.

Close to the Lunar Poles

We chose this location because the lunar poles have sunlight all the time. If we built our moon camp somewhere else they would have two weeks of sunlight, then two weeks of complete darkness and that would not be good for the plants in the greenhouse. We can build solar panels there that connect to the moon camp which is somewhere not as close, so the heat doesn’t affect the camp. The sunlight can also help us grow some crops in the greenhouse, but the greenhouse will have to be not as close, so it doesn’t get too much sunlight.

The process of getting water is similar to making oxygen on the moon. We also have to use the regolith (lunar soil) and the same machine. But after it mines up the soil, when it’s getting heated up, there’s steam that comes out of the soil and we’re able collect that, then filter and refine it, to make clean drinkable water. Scientists have detected a few water molecules and moisture in lunar soil which proves to everyone that it’s possible to mine water on the moon. Nearly the entire lunar surface is covered with regolith so we have almost an unlimited supply.

Our moon camp has a source of food from the greenhouse on the surface of the camp. The greenhouse has thick glass covering it for protection. It gets sunlight from being close to the lunar poles and water from a tube that is connected to where the wastewater collects. The astronauts main food source is from the crops they grow in the greenhouse. The first batch of soil is from earth, but as they keep on growing, leftover food is decomposed into soil, water from wastewater used by the astronauts, and sunlight from being close to solar poles.

The moon camp gets power and electricity for lights, machines, heat, their bathroom, the kitchen, and from the solar panels. The solar panel collects solar energy which is sunlight. It’s wireless to transport the power to the camp. Even at times when there’s no sunlight, it has a battery bank to save up energy to use for later. The satellites help them return research and information back to earth. Some of them are beside the camp and others are on top of it. The ones on top of it can provide shade. The satellites are on the side but still work very efficiently.

For oxygen we’re going to use regolith, which is also lunar soil. Regolith is a type of soil that is deep under the surface of the moon. Regolith is a layer of loose dirt covering solid rock. It has soil, broken rock, dust, and other materials that are also on earth and other planets. We have a machine that is underground and mines up the lunar soil.Then it heats the soil up so the oxygen that comes out is captured into a tank or put intothe moon camp. They can also store the tanks of oxygen for future use.

The main part is craters. We designed our camp with craters because that way it’s safer and is protected. We also would build it with highly efficient fireproof material and a material called polymer which is a thin layer of metal-covered plastic foil that can be applied to any part of the space camp. Polymer protects it from lightning and other things like that. There will be a strong outer shell of extremely lightweight carbon fiber reinforced plastic, used in spacecraft solar arrays and antennas. That can be put into the solar panels and satellites.

Our moon camp’s design is that when the astronauts are sleeping, their bedrooms are underground. At night on the moon it gets colder, so the deeper you are the warmer. The moon works a lot like the earth and also has a core. Astronauts will need to wear specific clothing on the moon. There will be clothing made with a special fabric used into making sleepwear, sports wear, and casual. That can bring comfort to astronauts and protect them. The fabric is actually really thick from all the other layers that are put into it. This fabric can be synthetic which protects them from space radiation, cold temperature from wind or daytime, and UV rays.

“Beep, beep beep” What’s that noise? The solar powered alarm clock shows 7:00. Out from the sheets reaches a tired hand, then “slap!” it stops the alarm clock. Dan wakes up, he’s the first one up! He puts on his gravity boots and wakes up his peers. Dan leads them down and they eat breakfast at the dining table. After they’re done, their leftovers can be made into soil. They go take a shower using water refined last night and get ready for work. The water that they use will become wastewater and go to the greenhouse to help the plants. They have a job as research photographers and they are working on close-up crater pictures for The Lunar Times , a newspaper on the moon. They split up at work, two taking pictures, two writing the report and two editing- the whole team’s working! They take a peep at their solar powered watches.

“12:10” Lunchtime already?! I guess time flies when you’re having fun! They return to the house and have lunch. Soon, lunch came to an end. “Guys, it’s quarter to one, I think we should get going.” Max, assistant editor pointed out. “Oh, right”, the others agreed. They all got to work immediately.
A few hours later…“Me and Dan finished!” said Richard, assistant writer. “That’s great news!” Said the editors, Max and Kai in unison. “That was a spectacular day!” sighed everyone and they
all looked at their solar watches.

“8:30 pm, bedtime.” Good Night!