October 2018
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The colonisation of the Moon is a widely accepted mid-term goal for space exploration in the current astronautical discourse. One idea of how to realise a form of shelter for newly arrived astronauts is to use naturally occurring lava tube for protection purposes. In this paper, we add several conceptual considerations to this idea, such as a specific location for the setup of a habitat and a type of construct, fitting the needs for establishing shelter in this environment. We also provide a thermal calculation to demonstrate the energetic advantage of such a habitat. We close by suggesting to aim at this endeavour in the form of a sizable and multinational collaboration under the name "Planetary Exploration in Astronautical Cave Environments (PEACE)".