The Moon's polar regions have abundant water ice resources. The mining and utilization of lunar polar water ice could serve as a propellant and survival resource for human exploration of deep space. The concept of thermal mining has been proposed to extract water ice resources. There are advantages and disadvantages to different mining methods. The energy problems faced by in situ resource utilization on the Moon are of great concern. The electrolysis of water and the heating of weathered layers require a continuous supply of energy. Wired energy transfer at the lunar poles would be very costly for launching conductors from Earth to the Moon. Wireless energy transfer technology is also well-developed today and has promising applications in the energy supply of lunar thermal mining. This paper describes the different methods of thermal mining and the various ways of supplying energy using solar energy for thermal mining. (c) 2024 COSPAR. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
