ESTEE is currently taking part in the first interuniversity demonstrator project initiated by the European Space Agency: the ESA_Lab IGLUNA project, a Habitat in Ice.
Powered by the Swiss Confederation (SERI) and supported by the Swiss Space Center, this project brings together several student teams from across Europe. A series of modular demonstrators will be combined together, set in a glacier, that will begin to simulate some conditions for living in a lunar habitat.
In close collaboration with UNIL-EPFL’s association Légumes Perchés and ZHAW (School of Life Sciences and Facility Management), ESTEE’s team is leading the development of an automatic greenhouse module. This module will facilitate the production of food from human metabolic waste – both urine and faecal biochar – using hydroponic systems and lunar soil.
The demonstrator will be in operation during the month of June 2019 in Zermatt’s Glacier Paradise.