Assessment of Testing Needs and Test Facilities for the Lunar Dust Management Project

The NASA Dust Management Project has been established to address relevant high priority needs for lunar dust mitigation technologies to be used during lunar surface operations. (1) (2) A key task of the project is to support the assessment of test planning and test facility requirements for dust mitigation technology evaluation and demonstration. The overall objectives of the assessment include a) delineation of testing philosophy and needs and b) the identification and evaluation of the capabilities of available and suitable NASA and non-NASA test facilities to identify potential gaps between testing needs and current operational testing capabilities. The approach, methodology and initial results of this ongoing assessment are described in this paper.