Titan vs Mars

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-11-19 16:07:25

9780804197977
http://www.signature-reads.com/2016/11/ … oon-titan/

MS: You chose Titan as a better bet for colonization than Mars. I was surprised by that. Why?
ARH: It’s an awesome place. One of the big issues with space colonization is keeping your colonists alive and safe. We’re taking about a long term colony. People are going to live together: They’re not just going to visit and come back home. We need our colonists to be protected, and the best way to do that is not to live underground on the Moon or Mars, but to live as much like we do here on Earth as possible.
Titan is a really good place to do that because it has a thick atmosphere: it is about 1.5 times the surface pressure of Earth, and it provides some protection. In addition, Titan is in Saturn’s magnetosphere, its protective magnetic bubble. That means the surface is largely shielded from these very damaging and dangerous energetic particles that come from the sun and galactic cosmic rays. That, I think, is the number one reason why Titan is a better option than Mars for a future space colony.
In addition to that, Titan’s landscape gives it Earth-like qualities in that it has lakes, some mountains, and dunes. It is probably the most Earth-like place in the solar system despite being so far from the sun and different in other ways. Another advantageous quality is the energy situation: Titan is loaded with hydrocarbons, so in terms of production energy, there are a lot of options there.

This raises an interesting question, the main thing Titan lacks is heat, light, and gaseous oxygen. Titan has plenty of oxygen in the form of water ice and perhaps ammonia water slush under the surface. Suppose we warmed a spot on Titan's surface, we could use water electrolysis to liberate oxygen, and use a nuclear reactor to generate heat at the same time, using a heating element in the shape of a ring, if you generate oxygen in the same spot while at the same time heating the air, you can create a spot on Titan in which you can stand and breath outdoors. You' have to create oxygen at a rate to keep up with its diffusion in the atmosphere, and if you stand in the center of a ring of heat radiators, cold gases can't come in to take the place of the rising hot air. This would be the Titan equivalent to standing next to an open air furnace. You can't do this on the Moon or Mars. This all presupposes cheap energy. I thought the book was highly alarmist about Global warming. I think it is easier to make a case for Titan, when one is not playing "Chicken Little!"

RobS · 2016-11-19 18:14:31

Of course, Titan's atmosphere has a certain amount of methane in it, which is explosive with oxygen. This might be especially interesting if Titan has methane rainstorms (very likely) with lightning (quite possible).

Living on the surface of Titan would be like living inside a liquid methane tank. We're talking about cryogenic conditions. In contrast, Antarctica is tropical. If you take a piece of Titan "crust" and bring it inside earth-like conditions, liquid hydrocarbons inside the ice would vaporize and explode the ice, sending shards everywhere. Just heating up regular water ice--hard as concrete in Titan conditions--to terrestrial temperatures could cause cracking and spalling. It'd be like putting a rock in a camp fire. Sometime they pop.

If people ever settle on Titan, they will live inside well insulated structures, probably insulated caves or large structures covered with water-ice concrete. If they go outside, they will be well insulated against winds and will avoid methane rainstorms. I suspect they will use virtual reality to control robot bodies; much less danger of frostbite.

louis · 2016-11-19 19:08:39

Titan is a fascinating world and one we will eventually investigate but Mars is clearly by a long mile the frontrunner for human colonisation.

The only thing against Mars in relation to Titan is the issue of protection from cosmic radiation - but we can protect against that effectively in the short term and, with terrformation, we can make the planet entirely suitable for human habitation.

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-11-19 21:34:56

louis wrote:

Titan is a fascinating world and one we will eventually investigate but Mars is clearly by a long mile the frontrunner for human colonisation.
The only thing against Mars in relation to Titan is the issue of protection from cosmic radiation - but we can protect against that effectively in the short term and, with terrformation, we can make the planet entirely suitable for human habitation.

Titan has something Mars needs, water nitrogen. Titan has something Venus needs, hydrogen. If we are to extract oxygen from Titan water, we have a surplus of hydrogen, send the hydrogen to Venus to make an ocean while producing enough oxygen to make Titan's atmosphere breathable. Boiling point of oxygen is 90.19 K, Boiling point of Nitrogen is 77.34 K. The surface temperature of Titan is 93.7 K. So apparently oxygen can exist as a gas in Titan's atmosphere, it would probably form clouds at higher altitudes. I thought the author of the book made a big deal about having to live underground to protect from radiation. I say, so what's wrong with living under ground? On Titan, you would have to live under something, you would have to wear some sort of heated environmental suit if you went outside, even if it wasn't a pressure suit. I believe we can duplicate the conditions of Titan's atmosphere here on Earth and can test out various suits to see how well they protect against that kind of cold. I don't know if NASA ever built a Titan Suit, it probably doesn't have much reason to. I believe every square inch on one's body would have to be covered up and heated. If one exhaled into Titan's atmosphere, the carbon dioxide would precipitate out an fall the ground as dry ice. One can inflate a dome on Titan, it need not hold in that much greater pressure than the outside atmosphere, just enough to hold its shape. The dome need not be transparent either. I'm not sure if residents would want to look a Titan's orange sky, the light of the distant sun would produce as much light as twilight on Earth. You would probably see a glow in the sky from reflected light from Saturn. I think a dome might as well be opaque, it would have to be well insulated anyway. Some form or artificial illumination would be provided, if done cleverly, this could look like natural sunshine, I think lasers would be a good way to get natural sunlight intensity, and they produce a lot of waste heat, but that's okay, on Titan you need waste heat. I think probably we'll have fusion reactors by the time we're ready to settle Titan, they can supply electricity for light and heat, and can also crack water to make oxygen, which can be carried around in tanks for more portable energy sources. I think fusion reactors will probably come from spaceship engines. We can duplicate all the conditions on Earth inside an enclosure except gravity, which is at 14% that of Earth. Air travel would probably be the best way to travel on Titan. Helicopters, balloons, airplanes of one sort or another would all work on Titan. Also getting into orbit from Titan would be easy.

Quaoar · 2016-11-21 09:39:05

At the moment, a human mission on Titan is far beyond our technology. We have no artifact or device able to work at the low temperature of Titan atmosphere. We cannot build an habitat where the astronauts can stay for one of two days without freezing. We cannot built spacesuits able to insulate their bodies from the cryogenic atmosphere, we cannot built boots able to walk on cryogenic water rocks. To not mention the space voyage: we surely cannot send humans on Saturn system with chemical rockets: we need something else we still don't have, like gas-core NTR or Orion NPP.
Vive versa, on Mars equator the climate is quite fair and we might be able to send human there at 2030 if we start now investing money for projecting and building space vehicles, landers and habitats.

Last edited by Quaoar (2016-11-21 09:40:08)

Antius · 2016-11-21 12:06:40

I would agree with Quaoar. Titan is a far more difficult colonisation target from where we are now. Much further away, much colder, far less sunlight, virtually no silicates. The 1 bar atmosphere is useful, but heat losses into air that cold would be too much for even the warmest Earth clothing to protect against. Extremities would need to be heated to prevent them from freezing off.

In the long run, Titan's atmosphere and abundant surface liquids provide an excellent heat sink. But in the short term, it would be much harder to survive there than it would on Mars.

Tom Kalbfus · 2016-11-21 13:29:32

I kind of agree with you there. I was just finishing the book, and the argument for Titan would seem to be cosmic rays, the protection our atmosphere gives from them is equivalent to 10 meters of water above you head. Though I think 10 meters of Martian water can be found on Mars if we look hard enough, and if not that rock and dirt can also block cosmic rays if not as well. A big thing was made of having to live underground. The Moon could give the best protection of all, with only three days of travel to get there, and if astronauts upon arrival go immediately underground they will be the best protected against cosmic rays, and you can build the base before colonists arrive On the Moon, you can replicate everything the Earth has to offer except a full Earth gravity.

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-10-11 13:02:52

NASA's Titan Dragonfly will touch down on a field of dunes and shattered ice

https://www.space.com/dragonfly-titan-s … nding-site

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-03-10 05:36:30

A Helicopter is Going to Titan. Could an Airplane be Next?
https://www.universetoday.com/160433/a- … e-be-next/
What are the hydrocarbon seas on Titan really like? While the upcoming Dragonfly helicopter mission to Saturn’s hazy and frigid moon should arrive by 2034 to explore Titan’s atmosphere, the need remains for a mission that could study the moon’s mysterious seas and lakes, filled with liquid hydrocarbons.
But, how about an aircraft that could study both the seas and skies of Titan?

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#1 2016-11-19 16:07:25

Titan vs Mars

#2 2016-11-19 18:14:31

Re: Titan vs Mars

#3 2016-11-19 19:08:39

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#4 2016-11-19 21:34:56

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#5 2016-11-21 09:39:05

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#6 2016-11-21 12:06:40

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#7 2016-11-21 13:29:32

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#8 2022-10-11 13:02:52

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#9 2023-03-10 05:36:30

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