New Mars Forums

Thermal Super Critical CO2 engine as an alternative to solar panels.  Sure, whatever works best.

Potato Patato.

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So, while Deimos/Phobos/Mars may be early sources of hydrocarbon materials to supply to the Earth/Moon hill sphere, I think the big players will eventually be Ceres and the other not quite as large Asteroids.

The list of exceptional asteroids comes to mind again: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_e … _asteroids
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Many of these including Ceres have what is needed.

Energy will be no problem as mirrors can pump the energy concentrations up to what is suitable.

So, if you can make many solar sails out of Hydrocarbons with a thin Aluminum coating, you can then sail them to the Earth/Moon hill sphere on photons, I expect.  But they will start with slow acceleration without a boost.

I guess you could do a boost or a tow.

Depending on method the sails will be either deployed or bundled on launch.  High sudden acceleration such as a mass driver would require bundling and then unfurling.

A slower method could be to push it with a laser or particle beam.

A somewhat more traditional method would be to tow it with a big tank of water, and a power source, perhaps cracking the water into Hydrogen and Oxygen in small quantities along the way.  Perhaps the solar sail with an Aluminum coating could serve as a concentrating mirror at this stage and give solar concentration to solar panels so that the water could be cracked and burned.

Once the assembly got deeper into the sunlight and all the water was consumed, it might change over to sailing on Photons.

So, this might work well from Ceres as we expect that Ceres has massive amounts of water available.

So, you need to construct transformable solar sails in mass at Ceres, and also water tanks, solar panels and what else is needed.

And by this means then to move these materials into the Earth/Moon hill sphere.

The sails themselves would be rendered into Hydrocarbons and Aluminum.  I presume that the tank and solar panels would be also rendered as useful.  It would be very likely to pick up valuable metals along the way and incorporate them into the trip to be distributed to the Earth/Moon hill sphere.

Eventually similar for other inner planets as well.

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So, the whole Asteroid Belt is usable for this, and after that the moons of the outer planets.

So, I guess I will chase this around some more.

https://exclav.es/2023/08/24/sunshine-maps-revisited/
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The three ways that power could be sent to the Earth's surface that I am aware of are:
-Orbital Mirrors.
-Microwaves.
-Lasers.

Typically, the idea is to beam power to where it is needed.  This would often be to cloudy areas though, which in some cases would be counterproductive.

But places like the Great Basin in North America, might be thought of as a sort of window in the sky.

And of course if you have looked into this topic, you know that I am interested in Cisterns and Carbon Capture (At a profit), for places like the Great Basin.

Carbon Capture at best has been to do power to Gas or other fuels.  At worst it is a hairshirt intended to make the population of western nations poorer.

If you have a cistern in the desert that is associated with productive Carbon Capture, then it may be sensible also to beam space power to it, as there is less in the nature of cloudy skies.  It is more like a window with shades open.

This is the type of behaviors I would like to see more of: https://globalenergyprize.org/en/2025/0 … di-arabia/
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They should be proud!

Now, what if you had these solar panels on top of a floating island, and pulled the evaporating moisture into a cold condenser?

I have made this variation on the covered pond:

Instead of holding heat on the bottom hold cold.

So, perhaps not relying entirely on rainwater, but absorbing moisture into the gel at night.  Then the gel cools the solar panels during the day, and if you capture the moisture coming off you can perhaps condense it into cold salt water.

In reality if you wanted to go extreme, the water at the bottom of the pond might be as cold as Don Juan Pond in Antarctica.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Juan_Pond
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Such very cold very salty water would suck almost all water from the air.  But it would take a lot of energy to pull the temperatures down that far.

Water as salty as the Arctic Ocean and nearly as cold would be more sensible.  With a layer of less salty warmer water on top, it would be well insulated.

And you could glow Algae or perhaps even Macroalgae in it.

I am thinking heat pumps of course.  Presuming that batteries can store energy efficiently then you could run a heat pump at night and dump heat into the night sky, cooling the bottom water.  In the drawing I have distinguished between solar panels and radiators.

The gel in the solar panels might absorb moisture from the night air and also be cooled at night, and then during the day could cool the solar panels, and release the moisture.  The moisture might be collected then and condensed into the cold salty water, which might be presented to it in a condensing device.

I did say batteries for night power, but it might be that power might be beamed down at night.  This might contradict the moisture gathering function, but maybe it could be on and off to cycle many times during a night.

Of the power might be beamed down nearby to the covered cistern.

The water is salty of course, but could be distilled to provide fresh water.  But in that case the grey water would need to go back into the cistern.

So, the objective of capturing Carbon to build cistern structure might make sense, where substances like plastic and Carbon parts might be created from Carbon pulled from the atmosphere.  During the process of condensing moisture into the cold salt water that cold salt water may absorb CO2 from the air.

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I have been focusing on the new SpaceX direction to the Moon first and as its own purpose as well.

Elon Musk seems to be of the opinion that the Moon will be found to have sufficient Hydrogen and Carbon for a civilization.
I think it is more likely than not.

But I have also been thinking about photon sailing.  I wondered if it would be possible to make a fabric out of Carbon that could sail on the suns photons.  It probably is possible, but I don't know about performance.  Things already contemplated might be a better option.

It turns out that out Moon and many of the inner asteroids may lack some of the materials needed to create solar sails, but every other world in reach seems to have them.

Mercury, Venus, Deimos/Phobos/Mars, and about 40% of the inner asteroid belt objects may have what is needed.

The point is if solar sails sail in order to bring their substances to be used in the Earth/Moon, orbits, and on the Moon, they may compliment what can be found on the Moon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_sail
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My understanding is that a plastic film such as mylar is given a think coating of Aluminum to make it reflective.

The chemical formula for Mylar?
https://www.xometry.com/resources/sheet/what-is-mylar/
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polyimide
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I think that Kapton may have the usual suspects but may also have a small amount of Nitrogen in it's chemical structure.

The point is if a factory could be established that could make solar sails at a non-Earth/Moon location these might be able to fly to the Earth/Moon orbits and be rendered into what the Moon somewhat at least lacks.

If coming from Mercury, then a mass driver from Mercury would have to supply a factory in orbit.  The sunlight would really push the sails.

IF coming from Deimos/Phobos/Mars, or the Asteroid Belt, then some sort of boost method might be used to start the flight and then the sails would use photon propulsion to finish the flight.

So that would be a way to mix the Organics of other worlds with the materials of our Moon.

I think that could work out, particularly if the process was mostly robotic.

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This is something that I have pondered for some time:

Can you land a cylinder like a Starship?

So, you might have to use some active cooling for this but I would like to see a version where the "Locomotive" only lands back on Earth.

That would be the propulsion systems including the propellant tanks and engines.

The "3rd" stage could also be equipped to land on Earth or Mars but more likely would not be.

So, this version would not be expected to land any cargo on Earth or Mars, using the "Locomotive".

An enlarged version of the Stoke Space 2nd stage might be hosted though.

Or you could make a Stainless-Steel Moon ship with it's own engines.

Or you could make something out of Carbon for the "3rd" stage, perhaps getting assistance from Rocket Lab Neutron Rocket build methods.

I see it as being a plus as you need to retain less propellants to land, and the tower does not need to catch as much mass.  Or if you land on a barge at sea the "Stack" is not as tall or heavy.

But can you enter the atmosphere with a Cylinder shape?

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So, the idea of Methane as a transferred commodity on Mars.

Cast Basalt Pipes?

https://www.miningequipmentsupplies.com … ast-basalt
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If you had a tar-like substance as a joint compound, then you could establish a methane pipe network all over Mars.

There appear to be consumable ice deposits on Mars and perennial ice deposits.

The Polar Ice Caps are Perennial, possibly Korolev Crater is Perennial.

The others are fossil and therefor consumable, not naturally renewable.

On Mars, rather than irrigating with water which can freeze, I suggest pipelines for Methane.

More difficult would be parallel pipelines for Oxygen or Synthetic Earth-Like Air.

Power beamed from orbit to the ice deposits could make it possible to synthesize the Methane and Oxygen/Synthetic Air.

Methane piped to a location can allow the creation of water, and so then what is needed for a particular resource access.  You can always get Oxygen from the CO2 of the atmosphere of Mars.  But for a greater cost you might pipe in Oxygen or Synthetic Air.

So, for the situation of Methane leaks, this would be supportive of the terraforming of Mars.

Beamed power might also contain signal, so it might be involved in AI about Mars.

Orbital AI may need some extra radiation shielding.  Hydrogen from Mars and Oxygen from Deimos or Phobos could provide water for that, or regolith from the two moons.  But some AI might be embedded into the Mars regolith, I suppose.

It may be posible to access deep burried ice on Mars: https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration … _s_equator
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Could power beamed down from orbit power electrical current flow into the ice mass to melt it?

So, you can make electric conductors from Carbon from the atmospheric CO2.  So, maybe space two electrodes on the surface by a number of km, then impose electric power between them.  At first, perhaps not too conductive in the ground, but salty brine may develop along the lines of conduction.

So, then to generate an Artesian Flow of water.  So, then an argument on the surface between artesian water flow up into a body of water and evaporation from the ice on top of that water.

Putting poly vapor barrier on top of the ice and regolith on top of that.  Not too much regolith.  It has to not weight the ice down too much.

But then as a lake grows you could throttle the amount of electric flow, to control the amount of artesian water flow.

So then to build a Methane and O2/Air production facility.  The water supply should last for quite a while.

The water extracted, the "Lake" will descend into a pit that gradually forms.

Water at Candor Chaos might be done this way first.  It is much closer to the surface.  But we do not know how deep it is.

Sun-Synchronous power platforms in orbit will be able to deliver power to various ice bodies on Mars including near the equator and at the poles.

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Suppose a sea in a dry land with it mostly covered.  I have previously suggested rotating solar floating islands.

But for Mars and let's speculate 100% cover, maybe for the Salton Sea, a 98% covering.  Perhaps just some beaches on the shoreline.

Evaporation 98% inhibited???  Not known.  You could have rotators or not.

On Mars rotating floating islands would leave water open to boil or evaporate into the thin atmosphere.  Even if the Atmosphere becomes 2.5 times as thick as it is it would be so.  You could live with that if you had enough makeup water.  But Mars would be more suitable to fixed robotic solar arrays.  That is the gravity is .38 that of Earth, we don't expect hail, and the winds are not much of a threat.  Dust is a problem in both worlds but much worse on Mars.  We would expect to have cleaning robots to groom the solar arrays all the time, I expect.

On Mars we might have something like floating islands, only as spinning hovercraft.  A hover platform could be sun following by periodic jets of air under its skirt and an actuation to spin to follow the sun.  Simply compressing Mars atmosphere and a lift and spin event every so many minutes during the day.  Such hover platforms would not have to be over water reservoirs but could be.

OK, then I think means to have a little sea will exist on both Mars and as similar we might look at the Salton Sea.

I have speculated before that if you covered 98% of the Salton Sea with floating platforms that inhibit evaporation, the Salton Sea would swell up and deepen until the salinity was compatible with some forms of salt tolerant creatures.

It always amused me that people may talk about putting artificial lights into a presumed sea on Europa, but will not think it wise for Mars or indeed for the Salton Sea.

But let's imagine 5% light.  Then add Oxygen and Acetate.  Now can you grow Macroalgae???  That is a maybe.  But you could grow microalgae it seems.

Your 5% light could come though fiber optics or windows or artificial lights.

In post #18 I have a drawing: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 07#p237907
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You don't have to do all of it but you might.

The solar panels and the floating cover will reject some of the heat of the day.

But you could use heat pumps during the sunshine to maintain salt gradients and temperatures.  You might cool the solar panels during the day with a cool fluid flow and push heat into the bottom pink layer.

During the night you might pull heat from the pink layer and flow it though the panels to reject heat and to generate electricity.

All the time you could grow Algae of some kind in the blue layer.

Or if you prefer, forget the heated bottom layer and just have temperate temperatures at the bottom of the Salton Sea, and grow Macroalgae, (If it is possible) as vegetables.

Salt is always accumulating in the Salton Sea, but if you allow the sea to keep expanding you can keep the level habitable.

But at some point perhaps you flow it to another basin in the Great Basin and keep expanding.  Rather than irrigating crops with the Colorado River perhaps you just keep building more covered seas.

And of course, I consider this how we may first get productive farmland on Mars.

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In this drawing from the previous post, there is a possibility that ice tunnels in ice masses may be able to store air.

I am presuming that lasers starting at the base of an ice mass could melt sideways with a bit of up-angle.  On Mars, the gravity is .38 that of Earth and the ice is likely colder than that of Earth's poles.  The tendency to sag for such ice tunnels may be lower.

It may also be possible to make braces from Carbon or some other materials to help keep them from sagging.  And you may pressurize the tunnels as well, perhaps that would reduce sag.

So, during a global dust storm, presuming orbital power is cut off you would have a major air supply.

You may also be living in rock tunnels that are containing residual heat.  They may be down in the rock below either ice or water.

So, then you have heat and Air, and presumably you have stored food, either frozen or dried.

You may have nuclear reactors as well, of course.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

I have suggested wind fences made of solar panels in the past.  But I also suggest ice pits.  That is if you have a body of ice that you can pull water from then you can leave pits that dust might become trapped in.

There are many high latitude ice slabs and some in the mid-latitudes.

https://www.astronomy.com/science/massi … d-on-mars/
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Lets imagine a trenching machine that would eat into the ice slab, leaving a trench.  Perhaps it would receive power form orbit.  It would take the water vapor from the ice and make Oxygen and Hydrogen.  Then from the Atmosphere, Oxygen and Carbon.  Then Methane.  Then if you had pipelines you could transport the methane across planet.  Pipes might be of Cast Basalt???

There would be Methane Leakage, but who cares, it is a greenhouse gas.

The trenches could be across the wind patterns or might be serpentine in nature so as to catch dust, and to store it where dust devils cannot suck it up.

So, perhaps this method could over time reduce the dust load available to Global Dust Storms and so altering the climate to be more favorable to human use.

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Here is a cross section drawing of a "Dust Capture Trench".:

The ice that would be exposed by trenching would need to be covered by some type of suitable materials after the trenching.  Perhaps just regolith may do, or maybe a vapor barrier under the soil is desired.

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More of this stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXhi0dOfz6c
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I am not able to swim in their ocean.  I do not know how real it is.

But it is interesting.  They link Frances attacks of "X" to very important matters.

It is surprising when Poland and Italy look like American's friends, and the UK and France act like enemies to our interests.

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Referring to the electrolysis methods mentioned in the previous post, I presume simulated decay products like Acetate can be produced, along with Oxygen.

It seems likely to me that some organisms' east products of decay.  Obviously, Fungi and Yeast.  But some Algae and maybe some plants also do so.  This could explain in part how some organisms would survive an extinction disaster.  Lots of dead materials decaying, and residual Oxygen in the air and water.  I saw in one search that the decay of Macroalgae not only produces Acetate but also some other products.  Perhaps those also might be used to grow other organisms.

So, as fuels to grow things we have Hydrogen, Methane, Acetate, and perhaps some other things.

As a segway, I have an idea for utilizing Hydrogen, underwater.  Since it is in my mind I will make a drawing.

Hydrogen has multiple problems with handling.  In this case I imagine a flexible Hydrogen bag inside of a flexible agriculture bag.

The Hydrogen is expected to leak out of the Hydrogen over time and feed organisms as a food/fuel.  The Host bag that it is inside of will have water suitable to some type of living organisms, and the needed nutrients provided and either Oxygen dissolved in the water or CO2 dissolved in the water.

If the case is CO2, then the microbes might likely product Methane, and also might do some tasks, like:
-Precision Fermentation
-Cellular Farming
-Mineral processing related to mining.

I imagine we might expect free floating organisms and organisms making a biofilm.  A robot to "Weed" this situation might be desired.

In the case of the Salton Sea, then the lake may provide shelter.  The assembly may be in relatively shallow water.

This could be done on the bottom of lakes or on the continental shelf.  In shallow areas some light would get though, perhaps helpful to signal organisms what to do.

The growing of Macroalgae in such bags might be useful.  I don't know if they would be able to utilize dissolved Hydrogen or not.  Of course they would need Oxygen and not CO2.  They might be provided both Hydrogen and Acetate and perhaps some other decay product simulation.

And we do not know if some organisms can consume Methane under water.  It seems reasonable that they might because Methane Seeps and so on.

Macroalgae consuming dissolved Methane?  Well, it might be possible.  Don't know.

While open water might blead a little light into relatively shallow bottoms, it might also be possible to pipe light down with fiber optics or alternately produce a little light with LET's.  These might be useful on Mars.

Anyway even if you have toxic water like the Dead Sea, you might put these things into it and grow crops.  You may have problems anchoring them down in such buoyant water though.

Can we do a "Wetter" Nemo's garden?  https://www.nemosgarden.com/
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These underwater domes are filled with air, and are hard to anchor down, and will have significant differential air pressure to hold against.

But a mostly water filled situation may be easier.  Macroalgae might be an option.

A Wet Version:

So, this could utilize both photosynthesis and chemosynthesis with Acetate, Methane?, Hydrogen?

To some extent Macroalgae being domesticated could be a sort of Vegetables in the diet of people.

The risk of Hydrogen explosions may be low, as the air pocket on top is small, and we hope that the organisms within will consume the Hydrogen that leaks though the Hydrogen bag.  But there could be some risk.  But the volume of the explosion may be low.

The air pocket might also allow humans to work inside of the structure, but the gasses would need monitoring and perhaps robots would do as well.

This would be frost free agriculture, and with unusual circumstances so that normal pest species for the crop would be inhibited from damaging it.

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So, for instance you might switch to this kind of agriculture and allow the Aral Sea to fill back up with water.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aral_Sea

You could put floating solar over the deeper parts and this agriculture in the shallower parts.  Floating Solar may reduce evaporation, perhaps allowing the sea to expand even more.

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Data Centers in space will be important for robots, including cars and humanoids: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N68li3iPx54
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I am not sure how much of this I am in agreement with but it is interesting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk-GQGFMuXQ
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I am not sure they can do this without the approval of some spooky forces, but it is interesting.

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