| THE DAMASCUS PROJECT: LUNAR STEEL MAKING |
| Steel is the most versatile of all metals. About 95% of the metal produced on Earth is steel. On the Moon, Mars and other worlds steel will be necessary for heavy machinery, vehicles, construction of buidlings and many other things. Steel is made from abundant iron and a little bit of carbon as well as some other elements for alloying special steels. |
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| Simple Language Version of the Damascus Project Lunar iron ores are made of iron combined with silicon and oxygen. To separate the iron from the silicon and oxygen we use hot carbon monoxide gas. Iron forms and trickles down to the bottom of the furnace. Silicon and oxygen form silicon dioxide (SiO2, molten sand or glass) and this reacts with flux, calcium oxide (lime), to form molten slag that floats on the molten iron. In a blast furnace on Earth heat comes from burning coke (roasted coal, fairly pure carbon) and carbon monoxide comes from the burning coke too. It is the carbon monoxide that actually reduces (smelts, separates the iron from oxygen and silicon) the ores. When the CO reacts with ores it forms CO2. On the Moon we have very little carbon so we must recycle the carbon by converting the CO2 to carbon monoxide and oxygen so that we can reuse the CO and oxygen in the blast furnaces. It takes energy to convert the CO2 to CO and oxygen but we have far more energy on the Moon than carbon and it would cost too much to import the carbon we need to make lots of iron and steel. There is plenty of solar energy on the Moon and we can use nuclear power there too. Heat for the blast furnace can come from electricity or direct application of solar energy. Heat and pressure are needed for the reaction of the ores with CO. The ferrocious temperatures and pressures of a blast furnace are needed to make these reactions happen. Besides, they put the yang into the iron. Some of the CO reacts with CO to form CO2 and carbon. The carbon dissolves into the iron and makes it strong; stronger than pure iron that is soft as far as metals go. Cast iron comes out of the blast furnace and it contains 2% to 4% carbon. Cast iron is strong but steel is even stronger. Converting cast iron to steel is another matter. In the lunar blast furnace most of the carbon in the form of CO will become CO2, but a little will dissolve into the iron. Some CO will react CO+CO = CO2 + C We must mine the Moon's soil for traces of carbon to maintain CO supplies. There might also be carbon in lunar polar ice and in chambers of volcanic gas in the form of CO, CO2 and CH4. Someday we will mine carbonaceous chondrite asteroids to supply the Moon with all the carbon it will ever need for making cast iron, steel and many other things like lubricating oil, plastics and CO2 for plants. We might even import carbon from Mars. Mars has a CO2 atmosphere and carbon could be extracted from it. There might have been life once on Mars and coal, oil and gas might have formed there. The moonlets of Mars, Deimos and Phobos, might contain carbon and water. They seem to be carbonaceous asteroids captured by Mars' gravity. |
| DRI SYSTEMS |
| CRUCIBLE SYSTEMS |
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