our solution
In-Situ Manufacturing for Lunar Fission Reactor Infrastructure
Lunar Forge uses laser sintering of lunar regolith to manufacture the heaviest components of fission power systems directly on the Moon. Only the reactor core launches from Earth.
Lunar Infrastructure, Built from the Moon Itself
Every program heading to the lunar surface this decade - Artemis, Fission Surface Power, commercial landers, resource prospecting - shares one unsolved dependency. They all need infrastructure that does not exist yet: shielding around reactors, pads under landers, roads between sites, foundations under habitats.
That infrastructure is measured in tons. And at today's delivery costs, every ton launched from Earth to the lunar surface carries a price that breaks mission economics before the mission begins.
Lunar Forge solves this the only way it can be solved at scale: we build lunar infrastructure on the Moon, from the Moon. Our systems process raw lunar regolith - the loose rock and dust covering the entire surface - and laser-sinter it into dense, load-bearing structures. No binders. No water. No construction materials shipped from Earth. Just local material, energy, and a process engineered for the actual conditions of the lunar surface.
That infrastructure is measured in tons. And at today's delivery costs, every ton launched from Earth to the lunar surface carries a price that breaks mission economics before the mission begins.
Lunar Forge solves this the only way it can be solved at scale: we build lunar infrastructure on the Moon, from the Moon. Our systems process raw lunar regolith - the loose rock and dust covering the entire surface - and laser-sinter it into dense, load-bearing structures. No binders. No water. No construction materials shipped from Earth. Just local material, energy, and a process engineered for the actual conditions of the lunar surface.
The Solution in One Sentence
Lunar Forge converts lunar regolith into structural infrastructure through adaptive laser sintering - producing material with 200-345 MPa compressive strength, in the range of high-performance concrete, using nothing but what is already at the construction site.
Why Regolith Is the Answer
The Moon's surface is covered in regolith several meters deep - fine, abrasive, mineral-rich material available at every landing site in effectively unlimited quantity. For decades it has been treated as a problem: it degrades seals, abrades hardware, and gets thrown as high-velocity ejecta by every lander plume.
Lunar Forge treats it as the feedstock it actually is. Sintered under vacuum, lunar regolith fuses into a dense ceramic-like solid. Our vacuum-processed material testing shows compressive strengths of 200 to 345 MPa - meaning the "dust problem" is, correctly processed, a construction material stronger than most concrete poured on Earth.
Every kilogram of structure we sinter on-site is a kilogram that never rides a rocket. That single substitution is the difference between lunar infrastructure as a line item and lunar infrastructure as a dealbreaker.
Lunar Forge treats it as the feedstock it actually is. Sintered under vacuum, lunar regolith fuses into a dense ceramic-like solid. Our vacuum-processed material testing shows compressive strengths of 200 to 345 MPa - meaning the "dust problem" is, correctly processed, a construction material stronger than most concrete poured on Earth.
Every kilogram of structure we sinter on-site is a kilogram that never rides a rocket. That single substitution is the difference between lunar infrastructure as a line item and lunar infrastructure as a dealbreaker.
What We Build - and What We Build First
Our systems produce the full range of surface infrastructure: reactor shielding and housing, landing pads, roads and dust-mitigation surfaces, blast berms, and structural foundations.
But sequence is strategy. We build reactor infrastructure first.
Fission surface power is the most committed, best-funded demand signal on the Moon. NASA's Fission Surface Power program is advancing 40 kW-class reactors toward lunar deployment, and every one of those reactors needs prepared ground, structural housing, and shielding mass before it operates. That mass is the single heaviest element of reactor deployment - and it is exactly what regolith provides when sintered in place.
So the Lunar Forge build sequence is deliberate:
Each completed site becomes a power node that lowers the cost of the next build. Infrastructure compounds.
But sequence is strategy. We build reactor infrastructure first.
Fission surface power is the most committed, best-funded demand signal on the Moon. NASA's Fission Surface Power program is advancing 40 kW-class reactors toward lunar deployment, and every one of those reactors needs prepared ground, structural housing, and shielding mass before it operates. That mass is the single heaviest element of reactor deployment - and it is exactly what regolith provides when sintered in place.
So the Lunar Forge build sequence is deliberate:
- Sinter the reactor site first. Housing and shielding, built to customer specification, before the reactor arrives.
- The reactor comes online. Our customer's power system installs into prepared infrastructure.
- Power unlocks everything else. With kilowatts flowing, the same sintering systems expand the site - pads, roads, berms, foundations - faster and cheaper with every structure.
Each completed site becomes a power node that lowers the cost of the next build. Infrastructure compounds.
Energy Independence by Design
A construction system that needs reactor power cannot build the first reactor site. Our Forge systems run on solar and radioisotope power - deliberately independent of the reactors they build for. This is a foundational architecture decision: Lunar Forge operates on day one of a surface campaign, before any surface power exists, which is precisely when reactor infrastructure must be built.
Built for Real Regolith, Not Laboratory Assumptions
Regolith is not uniform. It varies by region, by depth, by scoop. A sintering system tuned to one simulant in one laboratory will meet material on the Moon that behaves differently - and open-loop systems fail when the feedstock changes.
Lunar Forge's approach is adaptive end to end:
The result is a system that sinters the regolith it has, not the regolith a model assumed. That is the difference between a laboratory demonstration and a construction capability.
Lunar Forge's approach is adaptive end to end:
- Feedstock conditioning first. Raw regolith is filtered and sieved to control particle size distribution before sintering - stabilizing melt behavior before the first watt is applied.
- Closed-loop laser control during the build. Real-time melt-pool sensing continuously adjusts laser power, speed, and pass depth to the material actually in front of the beam.
The result is a system that sinters the regolith it has, not the regolith a model assumed. That is the difference between a laboratory demonstration and a construction capability.
From Demonstration to Delivery
We are flying, not theorizing. Forge 1, our teleoperated sintering testbed, targets a commercial lunar lander flight in 2027 - proving adaptive laser sintering on native regolith, in vacuum, on the surface. Forge 2 follows in 2028 to execute the first structural builds, beginning with reactor housing. Forge 3, our first production system, puts the full capability on a rover base - a mobile construction platform that moves across a site and builds wherever the structure is needed.
For lunar programs, that timeline means infrastructure capability arriving in step with reactor deployment and sustained Artemis operations - not a decade behind them.
For lunar programs, that timeline means infrastructure capability arriving in step with reactor deployment and sustained Artemis operations - not a decade behind them.
Who We Build For
Lunar Forge delivers infrastructure-as-a-service to the organizations deploying hardware to the lunar surface:
- Reactor developers and primes - site preparation, shielding mass, structural housing
- Lander providers - sintered landing pads that eliminate plume ejecta damage
- Agencies and Artemis programs - roads, berms, and foundations for sustained presence
- Commercial surface operators - build-to-spec structures as the lunar economy scales
Talk to us about your surface infrastructure requirements
If you are working on lunar fission, surface operations, or ISRU - we should talk.
Laser sintering is a manufacturing process that uses focused laser energy to fuse loose lunar soil (regolith) into solid, load-bearing structures. By heating regolith particles past their melting point and allowing them to bond as they cool, we produce construction-grade material directly on the lunar surface without transporting building materials from Earth.
Sintered lunar regolith achieves compressive strengths exceeding 200 MPa, with tests demonstrating up to 345 MPa in vacuum conditions. For comparison, standard structural concrete on Earth typically ranges from 20-40 MPa. This makes sintered regolith more than capable of serving as reactor housing, radiation shielding, and load-bearing foundations.
Fission power is the enabling technology for sustained lunar operations - and it has the worst mass economics of any surface system. Over 80% of total reactor system mass is structural: housing, shielding, foundations, and support infrastructure. That mass costs $1M+ per kilogram to land on the Moon. By manufacturing it in situ, we eliminate the single largest cost barrier to lunar fission deployment.
The uranium fuel core, reactor control systems, power conversion units (Stirling or Brayton cycle), radiator panels, instrumentation, and cabling. These are the high-value, low-mass components that require terrestrial manufacturing precision. The entire value proposition rests on this division: fly what must be flown, build everything else on the surface.
The Forge operates on solar and radioisotope power, completely independent of the fission reactor it is building. This eliminates the chicken-and-egg dependency and allows the manufacturing system to deploy and begin construction ahead of any fission hardware arriving on the surface.
The Fission Surface Power program is a joint NASA/DOE initiative to deploy 40kW fission reactors on the lunar surface. The January 2026 NASA/DOE MOU and a White House executive order formalized the commitment to lunar fission deployment. Three prime contractor teams are now scaling toward delivery: Lockheed Martin with BWXT and Creare, Westinghouse with Aerojet Rocketdyne and L3Harris, and IX with Intuitive Machines, X-Energy, Maxar, and Boeing.
Lunar Forge is a supplier to the primes, not a competitor. The three FSP teams are building the reactors. None of them can manufacture housing, shielding, or support infrastructure on the lunar surface. Lunar Forge provides the in-situ manufactured components that complete their systems - infrastructure-as-a-service integrated into their deployment architecture.
KRUSTY (Kilopower Reactor Using Stirling Technology) was a 1kW ground demonstration that validated the core fission technology. FSP is the 40kW deployment-scale program taking that technology to the lunar surface. Lunar Forge designs its demonstration structures at KRUSTY-class scale so that the 2027 surface demo directly de-risks manufacturing at full FSP deployment scale.
Raw lunar regolith is highly heterogeneous - particle sizes, mineral compositions, and glass content vary significantly across even small areas. Filtering and sieving feedstock before sintering is what delivers consistent melt behavior and predictable structural properties. This beneficiation step is what separates reliable, repeatable manufacturing from experimental one-off sintering.
Lunar Forge is targeting a 2027 lunar surface demonstration to validate in-situ manufacturing of reactor-scale infrastructure in the actual lunar environment. This demonstration is designed to produce structures at a scale directly relevant to FSP prime contractor integration.
Launch the core.
We build the rest.
We build the rest.
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