Hunter Williams
Long-term human habitation and robotic science on the Lunar surface will require infrastructure. The need for power provision in the tens to hundreds of kilowatt hours over multiple lunar night cycles serving multiple customers at varying distances from each other will make a microgrid one of the earliest Lunar infrastructure elements. The low risk tolerance of human spaceflight, the high importance of continuously functioning electrical systems for survival on the Lunar surface, and the difficulty of repair operations will necessitate a Lunar electrical grid with robustness, redundancy, and autonomy. This review includes a high-level overview of grid elements including generation, transmission, distribution, and end user electronics and a mapping of terrestrial grid elements to potential Lunar grid architectures. It includes original architecture level designs for grid architectures built around direct current, alternating current, and wireless options. It also includes an investigation of electrical failure modes and their likely equivalents in a Lunar environment. Finally, it includes a concept of an autonomous agent software layer and control hierarchy using discrete power elements.