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There is one point that has to be mentioned is that for robots radiation is nothing like as severe a problem as it is for Humans. Whoever builds the bases we need on the Moon and Mars will be exposed to a degree of radiation that inhibits a long term approach to anything. This is not a problem for robots and it is that advantage that we should utilise. What we learn from the Moon we should bring to Mars. Why should our astronauts when they get to Mars be subject to that much background radiation and industrial hazard to build a base. Not when we have so much more important things for our astronauts to do on Mars.
Robots can and will be our backup and helpers they will make what we need(even when quided from Earth) and will allow us to really plan for a long term stay wherever we so want to.
It has been found that plants will grow much better in a CO2 enriched enviroment to the point that what is best for plant growth is not breathable for humans. So why risk people in breathing gear to just pick the crops get a robot to do it. This sort of technology is essential for manned settlement of space and is rather potentially useful down here on Earth too.
There was also the proposal that small pellets of Antimatter and uranium are collided and the incredible heat created is used to heat water to its plasma stage and this is used as propellant. This was supposed to give a propellant fraction in the 17000s, not bad at all.
During Apollo, the motivation was von Braunian. Since then, the motivation has been mostly Saganaut. I think that the primary motivation of most space enthusiasts is O'Neillian, but this motivation is not acknowledged by NASA and there is a large "giggle factor" involved.
Without official acceptance of the O'Neillian ideas, proponents of human space exploration must phrase all of their arguments in Saganaut terms. This makes it more difficult for space activists to convince the government to fund many important human spaceflight projects and that is one of the reasons why NASA's fraction of the federal budget keeps shrinking. Getting NASA to accept O'Neillian philosophy is probably the most important thing that space activists can achieve right now.
Well said. Anyway I believe in an evolving strategy. Start out with many saganaut goals with foresight and planning to try and achieve some O'Neillian goals in the long run. It is about balancing priorities and working within the available budget.
And the people who can give us the chance to advance space Flat-Earthian?
Look, as far as I'm concerned, a 10% chance of astronaut death during the mission and a 20% chance of mission failure (ie, they fail to land on Mars or are force to abandon most of their samples and data) are ACCEPTABLE risks.
And I would wager that you would still get HUNDREDS of very qualified astronauts volunteering.
Also, I'll submit that reducing the danger of space missions has also had the effect of reducing public support as well.
And I can quarantee that the politicians and the powers that be do not think so and as they control the money they control the mission. And you may get your volunteers but the public would be horrified if that amount of risk is put to them.
It really is as close to this that should another disaster resulting in the loss of an American crew happens then it is likely that the US will withdraw from manned spaceflight. For there is enough pressure on the manned flights to be cancelled by the likes of Dr Bell and the ilk that any accident could result in enough media pressure etc being put to bare that it does happen. And any mission to Mars have such a catastrophe then you can forget any further missions, This is the world we live in now. The apollo spirit is gone people really do prefer boring space flight. If something happens that makes it look dangerous then it will likely be so tied up in safety committees that it will be more or less cancelled
As an aside the economic growth of the US will be about 3.3% and the United Kingdom about 3.7%. This is compared to the growth of the China at a minimum of 12%.
At this rate of increase the Chinese will leap from the 6th economy in the world to 4th next year(bipassing Britain). and at this increase it will bypass the US in 10 years.
So from a space perspective it will look very much that the Chinese goverment will be needing resources soon and that its spare cash will allow it be able to promote its space program.
"They can also be faster and more precise than people."
The reason that the Mars rovers are so slow is that the distance that these Teleprescence rovers have such a communication delay that it would easily miss important details. It could result in the rovers being damaged.
The USSR also placed two rovers on an extraterrestial body. These two the Lunkohods where able to travel a lot faster as the distance between the Moon and Earth allowed quicker coomunication and greater distances where accomplished.
Now it has never been claimed on this forum or most reasonable ones that Telerobotic Robots would be a hundred percent better than people. Only in certain points will they prove to be more effective. But it is with our current technical and financial constraints it would prove that the robots are the answer to pioneer the way for Man. I personally would prefer people to be able to be there to do the jobs, but this is not going to happen and realism states we get something to do it and Telerobotics will do it. And they will do it at a lot more reduced cost and reduced constraints.
The study recommends reviving Energia, but doesn't necessarily commit ESA to doing so. It would probbly be the cheapest option for ESA, though.
My problem with the study is that it rules out technologies that would dramatically improve our odds for successfully making it to Mars and back. Nuclear power, NTRs, ion engines, and in-situ propellant production are all off the table. Aurora is quickly becoming a re-hash of Battlestar Galactica.
ESA and europe as far as I know any intention to use NTRs the individual member states would surely block any such research. Of course in the future this may change but its not likely.
Ion engines are the most efficient space engine we have, just they are not man rateable there thrust is too low for it to be the main engine on any manned flights. Look how long it took Smart1 to get to the Moon.
There was nothing too intristically wrong with a battlestar Galactica design other than NASA intended its construction to be the pinacle of its plan, not landing on Mars. If Esa using Energia creates a plan that creates such a sizable space vessel in 5 or 6 launches and makes it reasonably reusable, but keeps the long periods of Astronauts actually working on the surface of Mars, then what is the problem. It looked to me that what ESA wanted to do in this one study was to create a cycler so allowing for increased numbers of crews being sent to Mars. And I have already seen in another docuement that ESA allways plans to use a Hab style approach on Mars.
The biggest cap is our launch costs from Earth upwards. I am a proponent of Insitu material using but it only reduces Long term costs but most plans we are currently doing are short term.
So unless we can reduce the costs of travel TOO space we will be reasonably stuck with a scenario where the economy is simply a drain and the benefits are not too tenable ie science and people factors.
And Diamonds will soon be worth a lot less than they are now, this is if the russian process for making them comes to fruitition and they turn out clear.
John and BWhite,
I am not talking about a large scale mobilization, but an integrated strategy that over a period of years and into decades the expansion of mars and the raw material exploration of mars will be conducted and then accessed to bring from small outpost - larger outpost - small permanent base - large permanent base to full colonization settlement of Mars.
But , knowing the way governments work on this planet they don't stay the course when coming to space exploration. Using the " Apollo Style programs " give the governments an out clause, It would be harder if the outpost has permanent crew and only through crew rotation would the crew expansion happen and also new supplies and more automated vehicles, development droids and probes for planetary exploring and development.
also will lock the government to fund the outpost like the ISS agreements are signed for the funding of the ISS life. We need to create the same environment for the funding process for the Mars Mission or it will fail to deliver overall objectives.
Bwhite regarding the frogmen approach, in many landing by allied forces then sent in destroyers and exploded a path to te beach and didn't send frogmen for intelligence gathering or disarming explosives. If we want to move and hold a budgetary funding in any government for space exploration of mars we need to design the program around those issues and expand the ground survillenance over several missions and expansion flights with automated cargo transports from earth and crewed missions to the planet. \
We will start small we cannot afford or do anything else. But as each further advancement is done our capacity and capability in space should increase. We need a plan to do this not rely on little Ad-hoc arrangements and fudges that seem to have resulted in things like the way we have the ISS now.
And as a history aside when it was decided that the freeing of europe from the dominance of the Nazis it cam down to two men as to how it would be done. These men swam unto each beach in turn and took samples and found how the beaches makeup was made. It was these two men who found out how much structural strength each beach had and this determined how we invaded and which beach we used. This was done for every Beach landing that ever happened. So you could say a small frogmen approach did lead to D day.
How about the pressurised rovers having the pressurised section inflatable. That should solve that issue.
Good dolphins. Natural instinct or not it kind of shows what species is mans best friend in the water. I happen to live on the coast near a dolphin pod and they show extreme intelligence to the point my goverment have announced their protected status.
But like all animals with high intelligence we find uses for them even if it as suicidal mine delivery systems.
It depends at the moment most oil prices are classed as how much a barrel of oil costs in dollars. This is superpower status what happens when it becomes how many euros to a barrel etc. what political power is lost in that equation.
You must remember that that many countries are about to impose political and economic sanctions on the US as a result of its protectionism of the steel industry. These will increase the costs of american goods abroad.
So United States exports are due to fall rather than rise so exponentially increasing the dollars fall.
The one question that I have always thought is the deathknell of the mars direct program is.
5) Is mars direct just not an expanded Apollo program and that after a few missions and with public interest becoming less it will be cancelled just as fast as the apollo missions where.
You can easily make a gravity of equivalent of 0.5g compared to 0.38 just by lengthining the connection that binds the two parts. I have always admired the creation that is two equal space masses that spin.
The reason each launch costs so much is simple economics
We will only launch a certain amount of the same vehicle each year probably maxing out at about 6. The cargo is worth extremely more than the launch vehicle. Economics state that maxing production with reusability is the way to reduce costs.
BUT, at the moment with the lack of launches by the same system and zero reusability means that each launch is by a system that is for all intents and purposes hand made. Why risk a launch on a mass produced item when a hand made is available. Only increasing the launch rate will reduce costs.
There was a plan to use long draglines in space to propel packages just by swinging them. What if we use a line through an atmosphere would it work and could it simply syphon through the line. Or would it be dragged down.
Interesting idea this.
With the Dollar constantly becoming weaker and weaker to the rest of the world economies and with the possibility of China stopping purchasing the dollar. Could it cause the Dollar to freefall and require it to be devalued.
What effects will this have apart from the obvious major job losses and the world economy taking a real strong hit. Will it destroy any financial plans that the USofA has.
And what can be done to stop it and should it actually be tried. Why has it happened and is it the result of Americas massive deficit.
Deutrium-Helium3 requires a lot more heat and magnetic containment than the fusion Deutrium-Tritium reaction.
We will develop a helium3 fusion reactor though for some real concrete reasons even with the main fuel source being of extra terrestrial origin. Helium-Tritium reactions are the easiest fusion reaction we can create, but to generate power we must use its neutrons to heat up water and so generate steam which goes through turbines so generating power. But the Deutrium-Tritium reaction and those neutrons result in the shielding and water to become radioactive and this is extremely difficult to deal with. One advantage and disadvantage is that the reaction will cause the water to become tritium which can be used later in the reaction. But Tritium is a major component in the creation of Hydrogen bombs so any fusion user can get a real leg up in the creation of such weapons.
Deutrium-Helium3 reactors though still midly reactive from stry D-D reactions will generate power by the amount of charged particles they make. This can be drawn of directly so providing power and the D-He3 reactors will benefit from reasonable low maintenance costs. The Moon is not the only source of He3 the gas giants hold enough to run our civilisation for Millenia.
We will start using Deutrium and Tritium reactors but for fusion to be universally used by the world and to reduce the radioactive waste and to put real security in place. We will swap to Deutrium-Helium3 as soon as is practicle. And these will provide power to the general world, not just the developed world.
We can get helium3 in usable quantities from the Moon it will be enough to develop and get the technology working. After that we need the Gas giants to provide the resources to completely replace Nuclear and severely dent fossil fuel power generation across the world.
If we really do go further than our solar system we will eventually have to do this. Why I honestly, do not believe we are alone and that all species will make it. This means some will have fallen to the Galactic lottery and the only way we will learn what this race was or could have been will be to do archaeology.
We may well learn just how close we can go before we too could become extinct and why some did not make it. Scary aint it.
Smart-1 is a great probe and technology demonstrator but it will struggle if it tries to look in those permanently dark areas that could hold hydrogen bonded in some form. Smart-1 will though do a decent survey of the physical makeup of the moon though stopping short of an actual mineral survey.
It will though tell us for sure as long as it remains operational just which areas recieve sunlight and tell us for sure for how long. A real benefit to further missions to remain permanently on the moon.
Of course I had hoped for a mission that would tell us for sure what minerals are where and what is in those dark areas. But im sure the Chinese or Indians will do it, all I hope is that they share.
Im sorry GCNRevenger I cannot agree with you stating that there are enough resources to provide a comfortable living for a population of 9 Billion humans. We are struggling to provide water and food for 6 billion never mind clothing and medical help.
Our demands for materials and energy in the western world is increasing and increasing. Do you believe honestly that the western world would accept limits on what we could use and of its energy expenditure. Would you want to be the president that imposes a fuel limit on the American dream of driving anywhere. It takes about two ounces of platinum at the moment to provide a fuel cell that would power an ordinary small family car. The south africans which are the leading producer and have the most reserves have 1523 million ounces left in the world. This is all that is commercially possible to get with todays or reasonable development in technology.
With the development of commercial fusion we will provide more power but it really will only replace the greenhouse producer of Coal power stations. Deutrium or D/T fusion will like all power sources find itself competing against the fusion power stations provided by Helium 3. But Helium 3 will be able to draw power straight from the fusion reaction.
But we will find that our power demands will increase and increase. But not to power air conditioners / TVs but to provide the one resource we are running short off. This is drinkable water. Most water on our planet is undrinkable or polluted, to provide drinkable water to everyone will require considerable development. Especially with the changes our enviroment is showing.
So why go to the Moon, well if we want to provide the platinum we need then we should go to the same place the South Africans got theres, Space. It was an asteroid strike that provided the Platinum and Gold that the South Africans mine. We can get that minerals from the Moon and further out and when we need Helium 3 we can find it where it came from space.
And who says that you will ever be allowed to use Nanotechnology on Earth. The potential for the misuse of this technology is horrendous. We struggle to allow basic research into our makeup and limited cloning. We are truly terrified of so called frankenstein food going wrong so what makes the much potentially worse Nanotechnology going to fair any better.
We will have to rely on Goverment sources for a long time. It will be unlikely that any private corporation would see enough of a profit to envisage the incredible development and maintenance costs. As an example. The Fultron company did a survey on the potential of space tourism and discovered that it could be worth about 1Billion$ in total by 2021. This is not enough to allow that as a source of funds to propel space future.
Goverment will look to recoup some costs and it will be this that starts the returns of mined materials to the Earth. But no way will we expect to make profits in the short term from returning to the Moon etc. But in the long term this equation changes as more and more operations start in space then it will reverse and our having set up infrastructure on the Moon will pay for itself. Going to space is an investment and I doubt any company will go for it. Only Goverments have the possible chance to do this.
When president Kennedy decided the goal would be the Moon, Nasa did respond, it threw money at the problems and it could do it, It had a blank cheque.
We do not have a blank cheque. But we still want to go the Moon and actually we want to do one better then Kennedys space dream we want to stay. So what do we do. Well we have to think clever. Zubrin showed that using Insitu resources reduces the cost of any operation. And that means we also use technologies invented after the Moon rush for other purposes as well.
When we do go to the Moon we will start small but we should go with the definite idea and backing to expand. We should design each mission to increase capacity so that the next mission and the next will find our base bigger and better. Why will we start small well we do not have the launchers or financial backing to do anything else. Only if we are willing to bring in extra complexity and assemble in orbit will this change. But even then there are limits to size with our current or planned launchers.
I have never said that the plan was to create a Moonbase that was completely self sustaining immediatly. But the more resources we can get from the lunar surface to suppliment and to increase capacity the better. It will reduce costs.
There are materials that we can garner from the Moon that are rare and desperatly needed for use on the Earth. GCNRevenger is right the population of the Earth will tend to tail of increasing at about 9 Billion people. But what he declined to mention is that the majority of those people will have to remain in a state of abject poverty. The Earth cannot sustain that amount of people in a lifestyle like we in the western world take for granted now. In fact we cannot do it now so what is the answer. We are using our main fuel source Oil faster and faster each year and supplies will run out sooner. The fuel is dirty and does severe damage to our enviroment and us. We now have alternatives but these require specific materials which due to there origin are hard to get on Earth.
The best way to develop the Moon is to start small and use telerobotics. In this GCNRevenger is wrong they are no longer in the labs youll find them working in the Mines of Australia and South Africa. Keep increasing your industrial capacity on the Moon and then use Human personel to do what they are best at real science.