Our Moon Camp is an expandable base, designed to be enlarged as the crew increases or ecosystems in greenhouse grow up. 

Water is the critical resource for our human habitat, so the camp is settled next to a small crater where water ice exists because of permanent shadowed areas inside. Water ice will be extracted and transformed into liquid from these dark zones by a controlled sublimation process.

The settlement is divided into different modules, each one with its own purpose, design and materials, these designs are based in three different structures:

First, a folding structure for the greenhouse, making it possible to change its dimensions mechanically to host different size ecosystems.

Second, inflatable habitats for the living quarters, warehouse, dining room or gym that can be inflated in situ in order to adequate its volume to the crew.

Third, rigid structures for the power module, shuttle platform or oxygen tanks.

We consider the greenhouse as the core unit, a folding three domes structure placed in the center, with three different environments supplying oxygen and carbon dioxide through plants photosynthesis, food via aquaponics and global temperature regulation. This core unit connects the other modules through folding passages.

Energy is obtained through solar panels distributed all along a big area on the camp surface, the space reserved to this objective is quite big because of the wide angle of incidence of sun rays with the surface, so that sun rays are little energetic and a lot of panels are necessary to produce a reasonable amount of energy.

A recycling module helps astronauts to obtain water and nitrogen from their urine and feces.

Our Moon Camp is settled at the north of Ibn Bajja crater, about 200 km from the south pole where temperatures are not so extreme because of the higher angle of incidence of sun rays.

The ridge of Ibn Bajja is near-constantly illuminated, an advantage to light up the base and to place solar panels to power the equipment. In the same way, water ice concentrates at permanently shadowed areas at the bottoms  inside the crater.

The crater size, about 2000 m depth, is adequate to extract water ice from shadowed areas inside, transforming it into liquid water by controlated sublimation using pipelines. After the extraction, an electrolysis process is carried out in order to obtain oxygen for breathing and hydrogen as fuel for the shuttle.

On the crater ridge, 450 m high, communications with Earth are adequate, no additional satellite is needed as on the dark side of the Moon.

To build up the camp, we send modular parts to be assembled and inflated in situ, building up the different structures.

We have to use as little space as possible, in order to save energy to refrigerate spaces and to perform efficient pressurising .

Attached to the core unit through flexible passages, there are rigid structures such as the warhouse module, the shuttle launcher or the energy power plant. All other modules as living quarters, gym and communications room are inflatable habitats

These habitats are expanded outward generating just the necessary space for the crew, accommodating the astronauts and instruments inside. The shape of these modules, once expanded, is cylindrical as a result of the different pressure between vacuum outside and the pressure inside.

The material for these inflatable structures are interwoven layers of kevlar and mylar.

The greenhouse is built with the Hoberman´s expanding geodesic dome system, so that the structure will expand as ecosystems inside grow up. This core unit is designed as a triple dome module applying the Double Bubble Theorem in order to cover the maximum space with the least material.

To cover the outside of the core unit  we use pneumatic panels made of ETFE (Ethylene tetrafluoroethylene) transparent and filled with water. Gravity on the Moon is one sixth gravity on Earth, so weight is not a critical problem for the structure stability.  

This core unit is protected by a double graphene layer, giving resistance to the structure. 

The main threats would be the extreme temperatures, radiation coming from space and the possibility of being hit by a micrometeorite.

The area where the camp will be located does not have drastic temperature changes, but just in case, we can modify the temperature inside the folding habitats changing their volumen as the pressure inside is constant and distributing thermal energy all throughout the camp.

To cover the outside of the core unit  we use a double thin graphene layer to protect from impacts the covering pneumatic panels made of ETFE (Ethylene tetrafluoroethylene) filled with water. This water acts absorbing cosmic radiation and the double graphene layer protects the structure from impacts. The materials used for the inflatable modules, kevlar and mylar avoid radiation from affecting the crew.

The layers of the inflatable habitats are made of resistant materials like kevlar and mylar so that the different inflatable modules of the camp are protected from radiation and micrometeorites.

As already mentioned, we have decided to get the water ice from the bottoms inside the crater using a pipeline performing a controlled sublimation process.
As a consequence of null pressure, water only exists in ice or vapour form. Water ice inside the crater is about -240 ºC but when its temperature rises to -70 ºC water sublimates in vapour form.
We will launch a little pipeline to the bottom of the crater, heating the extreme in contact with the ice with a little heater inside the pipeline increasing the local temperature of the ice up to -70 ºC performing the sublimation and collecting the vapour up the crater.
Once up, the water will be distributed according to its use, depending on whether it goes to the greenhouse, to the houses or to another module of the camp.
In the Moon Camp water can be obtained, as well, from the recycling module where urine and feces from the crew are recycled.

As aforementioned, a greenhouse module will be built, in order to cultivate food for the habitants of the base. The idea is to divide the crops into the different sections inside the greenhouse, according to the water they require for their growth.
We will use an aquaponics uniti to cultivate herbs and vegetables and growing fish using, as well, hydroponic horticulture.

As a renewable energy source we will have the sunlight, which we will obtain thanks to the solar panels that we will place near the camp, to provide it with energy.
We have electricity generators using the water sublimation to rotate a turbine for generating electricity, this energy is used and stored in batteries.
For those periods of time when sun rays don’t reach the Moon surface, for example in a solar eclipse on the Moon, we use energy accumulated in batteries.

A certain percentage of the camp’s water will be destined to the energy power plant, where it will be treated and through an electrolysis process it will be transformed to supply the camp with oxygen.
The air in Earth’s atmosphere is made up of about 75 percent nitrogen and 20 percent oxygen.
Ecosystems in the greenhouse will produce oxygen and carbon dioxide, the nitrogen will be obtained from recycling the urine and feces in the recycling module.

The main purpose of our project is to build a lunar camp designed to be a scientific development and exploration outpost, where the crew can explore and investigate from a safe place that will provide them with everything they need.

Organization is fundamental to keep the crew alive, so diary tasks related to control have to be organized to keep safe. 

First, it is necessary to control the pressure inside the habitats, if there is a loss of pressure because air comes out the habitats, people can die in minutes.

Another important process to care for is electrolysis because this process generates oxygen complementing that coming from the plants in the greenhouse.

About energy, although we can use batteries during a short period of time, solar panels are important to generate energy to power equipment and keep the pressure pumps running.

The crew will be divided into shifts to control all the previous aspects, there will have to be a night shift so that someone is awake in case there is a failure or a problem in the system and it has to be repaired.

Then, there will be the day shift in which each person will have a different job in different sections of the camp.

Each shift will have breaks to eat and interact with other camp habitants in the common rooms, to relax or use the gym for example, without forgetting their sleep hours.