Overview
- The peer‑reviewed paper by Martin Elvis and Jonathan McDowell, published Monday, Sept. 14, 2026, models how long different settlement sizes could live off known polar ice.
- Using a generous one billion tonne baseline and ISS‑level 98% water recycling, the team finds a 1,000,000‑person city would exhaust that supply in roughly 100 years.
- Current best estimates are about 20–30 times lower than that generous baseline, which would shorten lifetimes by the same factor and make large cities unsustainable on current data.
- Power is unlikely to be the constraint: the authors show roughly 3 gigawatts could be produced with kilometer‑tall solar towers on well‑lit crater rims and lunar silicon could supply panels.
- The researchers urge deeper subsurface surveys, major advances in recycling and low‑water farming, possible water import plans, and international rules to manage scarce polar ice.