Italian Space Agency Selects OHB Italia Consortium to Implement Lunar Oxygen Extraction Technology

The Italian Space Agency (ASI) has taken another step toward lunar resource extraction by awarding OHB Italia S.p.A. a contract to develop ORACLE (Oxygen Retrieval Asset by Carbothermal-reduction in Lunar Environment), a compact system designed to extract breathable oxygen directly from lunar regolith. This contract represents Italy’s strategic commitment to mastering in-situ resource utilization—a capability that will prove essential for sustainable human presence beyond Earth

The ORACLE mission builds upon foundational work that began in July 2023, when ASI partnered with Politecnico di Milano to develop the core carbothermic reduction technology. The process itself involves heating lunar regolith with carbon at high temperatures, triggering chemical reactions that release oxygen bound within metal oxides naturally present in the regolith. This extracted oxygen can then be collected and stored for multiple critical applications: sustaining astronaut life support systems, fuelling rockets for Earth return missions, or enabling further exploration toward Mars.

On the 23rd June this year, ASI signed a contract with an OHB Italia-led consortium to advance ORACLE through its complete development cycle to flight readiness. The collaboration brings together specialized Italian expertise: ENEA will engineer the chemical processing systems, while Kayser Italia Srl provides the mission’s control electronics. Over the next 40 months, this team will design, construct, and test a laboratory-scale system contained within a compact 50 × 50 × 50 cm payload.

While ASI advances ORACLE’s development, the mission awaits selection for a “future lunar mission currently being chosen” to carry the payload to the Moon’s surface.

Given the substantial costs of landing payloads on the moon, ORACLE’s compact footprint represents a strategic advantage in mission economics. This relatively small payload opens practical pathways for lunar oxygen production. While surface operations will still need logistics support to deliver regolith to the processing unit, specialized companies like Polimak Space and Komatsu are developing the lunar mobility and excavation solutions necessary to make such compact resource extraction systems operationally viable.

Missions like ORACLE transform abstract concepts of space resource utilization into tangible engineering solutions, bringing us closer to a future where the Moon serves as both destination and stepping stone for human expansion beyond Earth.