The construction technology company ICON has been chosen by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) among 14 partners to build a framework for lunar architecture. The LunA-10 Lunar Architecture Study will run for seven months with the aim to “create a framework for interoperable commercial lunar architecture that will help to guide lunar research and investment over the next ten years.”
The 14 companies have been chosen for their prior engagement with the space industry, whose products and services may form the foundational elements for a future lunar economy. Aside from ICON’s focus on construction, the group also contains specialists across power, communications, and mobility.
“By participating in LunA-10, we can understand what inputs are going to be available, when, at what cost, and in what quantities,” said Evan Jensen, ICON’s Vice President of Strategic R&D, in a statement. “Similarly, those same providers will now understand what ICON capabilities they can rely on to enable their capabilities and services in the lunar economy.”
In 2022, ICON was similarly awarded a $57.2 million contract under NASA’s Small Business Innovation Research program to develop space-based construction technology. Named Project Olympus, ICON’s system is intended to primarily use lunar and Martian resources as building materials “to establish a sustained lunar presence.”
The company has also previously collaborated with BIG on a 3D printed structure intended to help simulate life on Mars. Named Mars Dune Alpha, the habitat was designed in collaboration with NASA and is intended to form part of future long-duration, explorative science missions.
Back on Earth, ICON recently unveiled the first completed model home at their Wolf Ranch development in Texas, also in collaboration with BIG alongside Lennar. Other high-profile residential projects by ICON include a three-structure military barracks outside of El Paso designed by Logan Architecture and another 2,000-square-foot Lavacrete residential design in Austin from Lake|Flato.
6 Comments
Not satisfied with pioneering new ways to use very high carbon materials on earth, ICON now sets its sights on the rest of the solar system
I'm not sure global moon warming is a significant problem just yet... I think we'd need to create an atmosphere first before we screw it up.
ICON's printed structures are concrete. Until they start doing portland cement production and find sedimentary rocks on the moon the carbon emmissions will be in our atmosphere.
Fair enough but as far as I was aware launching cement into outer space was not an economically viable construction option either
I'm sure it will be preposterously expensive, but NASA has done several studies on cement in space and this appears to be related to that work.
Sure, we could try and figure something so hard as solving homelessness in our country, but working with the imperialist war machine is so much cooler. Plus it's off Terra.
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