Chemicals centre on Mars

louis · 2012-01-18 13:44:58

Discussion of the scope for polymer production, leads me to try and conceptualise how we would organise chemicals production as part of scaled down industrial infrastructure.

Of course we may have a major rocket fuel production operation going from early on, maybe Mission One, but what about the wide range of chemicals we need to produce to facilitate industrial production, make fertiliser and maybe maintain life support? Does anyone have any views on the following:

(a) Is it best to concentrate chemicals production in one centre - or better to create as many centres as possible? Which carries more risk?

(b) What should be the main chemicals we aim to produce after the more obvious oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, methane, silicon...?

(c) Is there a way you can group production of chemicals from a safety or utility angle?

(d) How do we do store the chemicals? Will glass containers be could for many of them? Should they be stored away from the chemicals centre post-production?

(e) Do you agree we should keep to an absolute minimum storage of chemicals in the habitat?

(f) How far away from the habitat should be the chemicals centre?

(g) Should there be special safety procedures on Mars for chemicals production? I am thinking of perhaps (i) wearing of space suits and (ii) having someone actually ready with a fire extinguisher at all times during chemicals handling.

(h) Any other thoughts?

Last edited by louis (2012-01-18 13:45:23)

JoshNH4H · 2012-01-18 23:24:23

One highly, highly important point on this topic and then two offshoots: The topic of the production of "chemicals" is so broad and so important to the survival of the colony, involving so many different products, starting materials, procedures, reactions, as well as having such fuzzy boundaries, that it is extremely difficult to talk about it in a coherent manner; Chemical Engineering will be one of the most important occupations in any Mars colony.

Two offshoots of this: Firstly, you seem to have a general dislike or aversion to "chemicals" as evidenced by points a,e,f,g, and part of c talking about supposed dangers of "chemicals." Secondly, just about everything is a chemical; Essentially, if it's electrically neutral and made of atoms, it's a chemical. Pure, filtered water is a chemical. Air is a mixture of chemicals. Talking about chemicals as a whole like they're uniformly dangerous badly obscures the realities of the situation. When I put my retainer in water and then drop in one of the cleaning tablets, that's a chemical reaction, but it's an entirely safe one. Baking Soda and Vinegar is a chemical reaction, but you can literally do it inside your mouth without the slightest bit of danger.

For all the difficulty in addressing it, the production of chemicals is extremely important. Quickly listing off all of the chemicals which the compound could conceivably need to produce through chemical means:

Water, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Carbon Monoxide, Carbon, Hydrogen, Chlorine, Hydrochloric Acid, Sulfuric Acid, Sodium Hydroxide (or equivalent base), Silicone polymer, Silicone oil, heavier hydrocarbons, Formaldehyde, Methanol, Ammonia, Nitrogen dioxide, Methane, Iron, Aluminium, Silicon (though not for PV panels), Magnetite (Fe3O4; Or similar magnetic material), Argon, Probably Organic Solvents, including but not limited to dimethyl Ether, Ethanol, benzene and others, Melamine Resin, made from formaldehyde and melamine (itself made from Urea, which can be synthesized by mixing Ammonia and CO2 under the correct conditions), Alloys which may or may not be considered to be chemical mixtures in nature, Iron pentacarbonyl to be used in the production, forming, and purification of Iron, likely unsaturated hydrocarbons such as ethene (ethylene) and ethyne (acetylene) and equivalents for molecules with more carbons, probably nitric acid, nitrate salts for use in blasting, as well as a wide variety of intermediate chemicals which will probably be found to be produced in the synthesis of these others. Catalysts will also be absolutely vital, but many of these will probably be imported from Earth either due to tremendous complexity at the molecular level or rarity (Ex., platinum). Due to the low mass required for catalysts relative to output this is not a significant expense.

This list is by no means exhaustive.

If you're interested in talking about safety, most of these reactions will of necessity be going on in closed vessels. In many cases, this will be all the safety that will be needed. In other cases, it might be expedient to have an airtight door between the production building and the rest of the hab, depending how toxic or volatile the chemical being produced is. Another option is to make the reaction proceed in reaction vessels which are outside any hab. This is a case where even a millimeter of Martian near-vacuum is enough to protect one from any kind of chemical release.

In terms of physical location, chemical synthesis will be far too important and too large to put in any one structure, but it makes the most sense to put related procedures as close to each other as possible. Something else to keep in mind is that by tying endothermic reactions to exothermic ones in terms of heat transport, it should be possible to create significant energy savings of a magnitude which I cannot try to estimate here.

Glandu · 2012-01-20 04:04:48

globally OK with Josh.

Industrially speaking, it's always more efficient to put everything together. As long as there is enough distance to avoid a chain reaction. We should avoid catastrophes like this destroying the whole settlement. But more distance would be a waste.

JoshNH4H · 2012-01-20 15:09:27

Glandu- Fortunately, we will not be producing significant amounts of chemicals which are actually explosive. Point taken, though, incompatible chemicals should be kept away from each other.

As I said before, the near vacuum of the surface of the planet is a huge benefit when it comes to isolating chemicals. I would imagine that any gas or liquid of which a significant quantity will be produced will be stored in a separate pressure vessel outside of the hab, and pumped in through pipes where necessary. Solids are a bit more tricky and will probably have dedicated storehouses. Fortunately, most of the solids produced will be pretty nonreactive, seeing as metals will probable constitute the bulk of the solids produced by chemical means will probably be metals, which are not reactive.

The question of storage is an interesting one, though. In part, I suppose it can be solved by careful analysis of how much of each product will be needed, and production to suit that need. However, when you come to things like oxygen or methane, how would one store those? Refrigeration down to liquid temperatures, while not impossible, is energetically expensive and not desirable. Storage as a compressed gas requires a heavy container and results in a low density. Any thoughts on the storage of the more volatile substances produced?

louis · 2012-01-20 22:21:06

JoshNH4H wrote:

One highly, highly important point on this topic and then two offshoots: The topic of the production of "chemicals" is so broad and so important to the survival of the colony, involving so many different products, starting materials, procedures, reactions, as well as having such fuzzy boundaries, that it is extremely difficult to talk about it in a coherent manner; Chemical Engineering will be one of the most important occupations in any Mars colony.
Two offshoots of this: Firstly, you seem to have a general dislike or aversion to "chemicals" as evidenced by points a,e,f,g, and part of c talking about supposed dangers of "chemicals." Secondly, just about everything is a chemical; Essentially, if it's electrically neutral and made of atoms, it's a chemical. Pure, filtered water is a chemical. Air is a mixture of chemicals. Talking about chemicals as a whole like they're uniformly dangerous badly obscures the realities of the situation. When I put my retainer in water and then drop in one of the cleaning tablets, that's a chemical reaction, but it's an entirely safe one. Baking Soda and Vinegar is a chemical reaction, but you can literally do it inside your mouth without the slightest bit of danger.

Save the lecture Josh, I am fully aware that air and water and me are made of chemicals.

However we do refer to the chemicals industry on Earth and by that we usually mean the chemicals necessary to agriculture and industry. They require a lot of processing, special handling - and they are dangerous which is why explosions and fires at chemical plants have been among the worst seen on the planet. We can afford to lose a few people out of 6 billion on Earth, but we can't afford to lose a single settler on Mars. So this is an important question - or rather series of questions.

From the answers so far I'd say I think we need to have as our motto "keep it simple" to begin with...we shouldn't try anything too complex with chemicals to begin with. Perhaps we should focus on rocket fuel. It may safer and more productive to focus on metals, glass and glass fibre as involving fairly simple processes.

JoshNH4H · 2012-01-20 23:48:33

Save the lecture Josh, I am fully aware that air and water and me are made of chemicals.

Though obvious, the point I was making there is IMO extremely important to our understanding of the production of chemicals on the Red Planet. It's very difficult to talk about process or economics without knowing the specific reaction that you want to do, or at least the final product which you want to create. The basic point here is that different chemicals are so different that speaking about them generally will not yield productive results.

On Earth, the chemicals industry might be a limited thing. This is not true on Mars. Everything on Mars is directly dependent on the chemicals industry. Every plant, every machine, every structure, every joule of energy will be no more than two stages removed from the chemicals industry. If I appear to be lecturing it's only because you missed what is in my opinion a very important aspect of this issue.

Further, not all of the compounds produced by the chemicals industry on Earth are toxic or explosive. Some are simply complex or not found in nature. Some are desired for their abrasive properties (For example, Silicon Carbide and Diamond). Probably the most significant product of the chemical industry on Earth is gasoline and related petroleum derivatives.

Firstly, with regard to the chemicals which you generally talk about synthesizing:

Rocket Fuel: Why? If we're talking about our prototype mostly self-sufficient colony then we're not going to be launching much into LMO at all. Given the complexity of rockets these are most certainly not a product we will be looking at making until several years have passed. Methane and oxygen are obviously going to be necessary for a goodly proportion of reactions, but focusing on producing rocket fuel for a very limited number of rocket launches doesn't make any sense to me.

Otherwise, metals (particularly Iron and its derivative, Steel) will be huge. I don't know why you chose glass fiber as being particularly special, especially since Basalt Fiber will probably be the material of choice if you're looking for something with tensile strength or something to composite with.

More generally, chemical production techniques will be required to produce a lot of different things. As I said before, they're going to be vital to the survival of the colony. Rather than arbitrarily choosing a few different products to "focus on," it will be necessary to provide this industry with sufficient capacity and variety to produce a very wide variety of products, hopefully with relatively standard components.

Terraformer · 2012-01-21 06:07:36

I think we need to have a part of the colony devoted to Pharmaceuticals - though they could be imported from Terra, they may have to wait 2 years to get them, and the demand is unpredictable. I'd prefer to keep them separate from the rest of the chemical processing, since these are intended to actually ingest. We're not talking about massive amounts, so we'll need to have a very versatile production ability. Fortunately, I think a lot of the processes are the same in a lot of what we'd want to produce.

louis · 2012-01-21 10:17:29

JoshNH4H wrote:

Save the lecture Josh, I am fully aware that air and water and me are made of chemicals.
Though obvious, the point I was making there is IMO extremely important to our understanding of the production of chemicals on the Red Planet. It's very difficult to talk about process or economics without knowing the specific reaction that you want to do, or at least the final product which you want to create. The basic point here is that different chemicals are so different that speaking about them generally will not yield productive results.
On Earth, the chemicals industry might be a limited thing. This is not true on Mars. Everything on Mars is directly dependent on the chemicals industry. Every plant, every machine, every structure, every joule of energy will be no more than two stages removed from the chemicals industry. If I appear to be lecturing it's only because you missed what is in my opinion a very important aspect of this issue.
Further, not all of the compounds produced by the chemicals industry on Earth are toxic or explosive. Some are simply complex or not found in nature. Some are desired for their abrasive properties (For example, Silicon Carbide and Diamond). Probably the most significant product of the chemical industry on Earth is gasoline and related petroleum derivatives.
Firstly, with regard to the chemicals which you generally talk about synthesizing:
Rocket Fuel: Why? If we're talking about our prototype mostly self-sufficient colony then we're not going to be launching much into LMO at all. Given the complexity of rockets these are most certainly not a product we will be looking at making until several years have passed. Methane and oxygen are obviously going to be necessary for a goodly proportion of reactions, but focusing on producing rocket fuel for a very limited number of rocket launches doesn't make any sense to me.
Otherwise, metals (particularly Iron and its derivative, Steel) will be huge. I don't know why you chose glass fiber as being particularly special, especially since Basalt Fiber will probably be the material of choice if you're looking for something with tensile strength or something to composite with.
More generally, chemical production techniques will be required to produce a lot of different things. As I said before, they're going to be vital to the survival of the colony. Rather than arbitrarily choosing a few different products to "focus on," it will be necessary to provide this industry with sufficient capacity and variety to produce a very wide variety of products, hopefully with relatively standard components.

I accept that life on Mars is crucially dependent on the chemicals industry in a way it is not on Earth.

Methane could double up as rocket fuel:

http://www.space.com/3774-methane-rocke … ested.html

You can have fuel self-sufficiency before you have rocket self-sufficiency.

Here are some principles I would suggest we need to keep in mind:

1. SIMPLICITY. The methane example is a good one. If we can double up methane as a rocket fuel that may be a better way to go than trying to deal with the difficulties of managing other rocket fuels on the surface. If we "triple" it up and use it as energy storage as well, to avoid the need to import or make heavy batteries then all the better.

2. SUBSTITUTION. Where possible we should substitute the easy to make materials for those that are difficult to manufacture. On that basis, although we need to investigate the potential for polymer production, it will probably be best to make most implements, containers and so on out of wood (bamboo, specifically), metal, ceramics (formed basalt) and glass.

3. SAFETY, We should have safety at the forefront of our minds and procedures at all times. There must strict zoning of chemicals usage and we should avoid as far as possible the use of chemicals that required elaborate safety management.

There you go, the three Ss.

As for pharmaceuticals, these are mostly lightweight and not a huge demand on the colony's capabilities. However I think we should develop plant based pharmaceuticals as we go along.

JoshNH4H · 2012-01-21 15:37:24

With regards to your "Three Ss"

I would say that these are excellent design philosophies to keep in mind not just for the production of chemicals, but for the colony as a whole. In order to create a close approximation of self-sufficiency as we seek to do, both the first and second points are vital. The third point is of course important for any endeavor. Something perhaps to keep in mind, though: Despite its highly technological nature, Mars in the early stages will nevertheless be a frontier. I would suggest that one cannot expect, on the frontier, the same level of safety which in general can be established for populated first world countries. I'm not saying that less attention should be paid to safety, by any means, but rather that accidents simply are going to happen on occasion and this is something that people are going to have to accept.

On pharmaceuticals: I would bet that it would be very possible to predict the usage of a goodly proportion of them: Painkillers and antibiotics and antivirals will I imagine be used at a fairly regular rate. I wouldn't imagine that the first few years would see too much in the way of odd illnesses. I would imagine that the capacity to make pharamceuticals will exist in the form of the colony's chemical industry, plus some trained individuals at a lab bench.

SpaceNut · 2012-01-21 22:53:00

JoshNH4H wrote:

Quickly listing off all of the chemicals which the compound could conceivably need to produce through chemical means:
Water, Oxygen, Nitrogen, Carbon Monoxide, Carbon, Hydrogen, Chlorine, Hydrochloric Acid, Sulfuric Acid, Sodium Hydroxide (or equivalent base), Silicone polymer, Silicone oil, heavier hydrocarbons, Formaldehyde, Methanol, Ammonia, Nitrogen dioxide, Methane, Iron, Aluminium, Silicon (though not for PV panels), Magnetite (Fe3O4; Or similar magnetic material), Argon, Probably Organic Solvents, including but not limited to dimethyl Ether, Ethanol, benzene and others, Melamine Resin, made from formaldehyde and melamine (itself made from Urea, which can be synthesized by mixing Ammonia and CO2 under the correct conditions), Alloys which may or may not be considered to be chemical mixtures in nature, Iron pentacarbonyl to be used in the production, forming, and purification of Iron, likely unsaturated hydrocarbons such as ethene (ethylene) and ethyne (acetylene) and equivalents for molecules with more carbons, probably nitric acid, nitrate salts for use in blasting, as well as a wide variety of intermediate chemicals which will probably be found to be produced in the synthesis of these others. Catalysts will also be absolutely vital, but many of these will probably be imported from Earth either due to tremendous complexity at the molecular level or rarity (Ex., platinum). Due to the low mass required for catalysts relative to output this is not a significant expense.
This list is by no means exhaustive.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Mars

atmosphere on Mars
95% carbon dioxide,
3% nitrogen,
1.6% argon,
Oxygen 0.13%
Carbon monoxide 0.07%
Water vapor 0.03%
Nitric oxide 0.013%
Neon 2.5 μmol/mol
Krypton 300 nmol/mol
Formaldehyde 130 nmol/mol
Xenon 80 nmol/mol
Ozone 30 nmol/mol
Methane 10.5 nmol/mol

In-situ resource utilization will and can provide materials for life support, propellants, construction materials, and energy to a science payload.

File:In-Situ_Resource_Utilization_Testbed.gif

Sabatier reaction, CO2 + 4H2 → CH4 + 2H2O, in order to produce methane on the Martian surface, to be used as a propellant.

Reverse water gas shift reaction, CO2 + H2 → CO + H2O. This reaction takes place rapidly in the presence of an iron-chrome catalyst at 400 Celsius

electrolysis of Mars atmosphere 2CO2 (+ energy) → 2CO + O2 proposed for production of oxygen

Oxygen is often found in iron rich lunar minerals and glasses as iron oxide. The oxygen can be extracted by heating the material to temperatures above 900 °C and exposing it to hydrogen gas. The basic equation is: FeO + H2 → Fe + H2O.

Lets not forget that we have the soil as well to get resources from such as silicon, aluminum, calcium, iron and oxygen and with the dust storms the air may contain magnesium, sodium, potassium and chloride just to meantion a few. The elements titanium, chromium, manganese, Sulphur, phosphorus, sodium, and chlorine are less abundant. Secondary minerals requiring liquid water include hematite, phyllosilicates (clay minerals), goethite, jarosite, iron sulfate minerals, opaline silica, and gypsum. Basalt contain the minerals olivine, pyroxene, plagioclase, and magnetite.

There are at least seven ISRU capabilities to refine regardless of where we go:
(i) resource extraction,
(ii) material handling and transport,
(iii) resource processing,
(iv) surface manufacturing with in-situ resources,
(v) surface construction,
(vi) surface ISRU product and consumable storage and distribution, and
(vii) ISRU unique development and certification capabilities.

Last edited by SpaceNut (2012-01-21 22:55:26)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-03-21 09:47:10

Moon and Mars superoxides for oxygen farming
https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Sp … en_farming

Mining in Space Is Coming
https://www.milkenreview.org/articles/m … -is-coming

Asteroid Mining?
https://thenewmars.wordpress.com/2021/0 … id-mining/

Deep Space Industries (DSI) is gone, it was a company that was to pursue space mining it was acquired by another space technology company called Bradford Space

Asteroids are always an option if near by Mars for example an Aseroid like Anteros could be worth value and have Magnesium silicates, Platinum, hydrogen molecules, oxygen, nitrogen, aluminum, gold, ammonia, iron silicate etc

louis wrote:

What should be the main chemicals we aim to produce after the more obvious oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, methane, silicon...?

Fuel, Materials for 3-D Printer use, some Fertilizers, chemistry for medical supplies for both human and animal on Mars.

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2022-03-21 10:04:07)

Oldfart1939 · 2022-04-06 15:51:54

I just noticed this thread after having been a forum member for about 6 years.

To answer one of the original questions posed by the originator of this topic as to whether or not to concentrate the different product lines in one place or not, is pretty simple for a chemist to address.

I am by profession, a retired chemist with a wide range of experience in the industry. Concentration of the efforts is almost mandatory , due to the need for specialized infrastructure and process equipment. Some segregation is needed between manufacture of foodstuff and pharmaceuticals from polymers and mining related products, simply for ensuring the health of the colonists from contamination and poisoning accidents.

Chemical process equipment tends to be (1) very pricey, and (2) heavy. So having equipment in the plant serve multiple product lines will be mandatory, as it will need to be imported from Mother Earth. Building steel jacketed, glass lined reactors is a highly specialized industry here at home, and will be out of the question to manufacture in a growing early colony.

Calliban · 2022-04-06 16:18:00

Nitric and sulphuric acid are two chemicals that we will need in abundance. Nitric acid will be needed to produce ammonium nitrate fertiliser by reaction with ammonia. Both acids will be needed in large quantities for acid leaching of ores. Low concentration ores can often only be processed in this way. On Mars, we could mine low grade Uranium ores by drilling bore holes into the ground and filling them with hot water from an AHR and nitric acid. After a soak time, the bore holes are drained and the retrieved water will contain dissolved Uranium nitrate salts.

Last edited by Calliban (2022-04-06 16:22:50)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-08-15 05:29:52

Inside life in Elon Musk’s Mars colony – with vegan diets and ‘terraforming’ red planet into second Earth

https://www.the-sun.com/tech/4746577/li … rs-colony/

So what does this human base look like, and how do we build it?
It starts with building a large fleet of SpaceX Starships that could carry the required amount of equipment and supplies required to get a settlement going, per The Space Review.
Theoretically, if one Starship stage can carry 200 tons of cargo to the surface of Mars, then 5,000 trips would be able to carry one million tons.
Once the equipment has successfully been transported to Mars, the next concern is food production.
According to The Space Review, around 200 square meters of growing area with 100 kilowatts of power would be needed per person, which equates to a construction crew of 100 people with 10 megawatts of power and 20,000 square meters of growing area for food production.
In theory, a one-square-kilometer farm transferred to Mars (250 by 250 meters with four growing levels), could potentially feed 5,000 vegetarians.
Geologists could also potentially discover mineral site deposits, which would greatly serve the settlement.

Building Musk’s path to Mars
https://thespacereview.com/article/4333/1
What have Elon and his team built and what will they be able to do with it?

3D Printing on Mars: Creating Habitats with Realistic Materials
https://3dprint.com/254037/3d-printing- … materials/

In the recently published ‘Martian Material Sourcing Challenges Propel Earth Construction Opportunities,’ authors Matthew Troemner and Gianluca Cusatis tackle the ongoing and fascinating subject of colonizing Mars. Painting a very realistic picture of what it would be like to arrive there, Troemner and Cusatis explain that in virtual desolation, astronauts would need to take nearly all necessities with them. And while regolith would be available as a construction material, obviously there is not much else; in fact, it is promising that regolith in itself is available as it could prove to be extremely valuable. There are also plentiful supplies of sulfur compounds.

Mars Water-Based ISRU Architecture
https://rascal.nianet.org/rascal-archives/2022-teams/

Apod pic
The ice pocket may be as deep as 200 meters thick. Frost can be seen around the inner edge on the upper right part of the crater, while part of the lower left crater wall is bathed in sunlight. The existence of water-ice pockets inside craters near the Martian North Pole, like that pictured above and others noted previously, give clues not only about surface conditions in the Martian past but also possible places where future water-based astronauts might do well to land.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap050720.html
Ice-filled Mars Express pic of korolev-crater
https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 … lev-crater
Article pay publication - We Can Send Humans to Mars Safely and Affordably
https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1 … .28999.gsh
Humans to Mars: New Affordable Strategy Promoted
https://www.leonarddavid.com/humans-to- … -promoted/

NASA Additively Manufactured Rocket Engine Hardware Passes Cold Spray, Hot Fire Tests
3D-printed bimetallic lightweight thrust chamber assembly before hot fire testing at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Robotic Deposition Technology team completed the first phase of testing a 3D-printed metal thrust chamber assembly at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
https://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/n … tests.html
NASA is partnering with Aerojet Rocketdyne to advance 3D printing technologies, known as metal additive manufacturing, and its capabilities for liquid rocket engines in landers and on-orbit stages/spacecraft.

old discussion
Iron and Steel on Mars
https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=6133

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2022-08-15 05:44:14)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2022-09-12 08:39:53

New process for captured carbon to ethylene conversion
https://phys.org/news/2022-09-breakthro … rsion.html

Greenhouses gases might be useful for Mars seeing as man people want a warmer offworld

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-03-15 11:48:06

NASA wants nuclear reactor on the Moon by 2030
https://www.theregister.com/2022/06/24/ … ower_moon/
Space boffins task engineers with creating 40kW lunar fission plant that can operate for ten years

Tianwen

Pyroxene, Allophane, Opal, Gypsum and Montmorillonite minerals?

For the absorption band at ~2.224 μm, the features match better with allophane.

The absorption depth of the SWIR spectrum is positively correlated with the composition content, so we choose the absorption features of ~0.935 μm and ~2.224 μm as a characterization of the presence of pyroxene and allophane or hydrated minerals

https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2023/pdf/1819.pdf

Zhurong rover carried a payload named Mars Surface Composition Detector (MarSCoDe), which can obtain chemical compositions, mineralogy information, and micro-morphology of Martian soils and rocks using Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectrometer (LIBS), Short- Wave Infrared Spectrometer, and Micro-Imaging Camera

https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2023/pdf/1952.pdf

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2023-03-15 11:49:42)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-12-01 11:19:41

CO2 sourcing for Power to X
https://www.envirotech-online.com/news/ … to-x/61663

because Mars is so cold pollutants will be helpful to warm the planet

Why steel is our most important (and dirtiest) metal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5kN3GcG8Ec

Nippon Steel to hunt for more coking coal, iron ore assets
https://www.mining.com/web/nippon-steel … re-assets/

We also have lots of topics on plant growth, important for Food and Biofuel products, even without resources Farming Plant and Animals you can source fuels and Future of gas and oil industry. Fire is crucial not to civilizations, it is possible focused lenses can be aimed at a specially designed heat container but everywhere comes the problem of 'Dust' which ruin Solar power panels and dirty lenses. There could be a lot of plastic products, wood grass moss paper timber product, metallurgy production. There will probably be Nuclear Reactors for reliable power, people will also need to build magnets, vertical farms, electronic parts resistors, diodes, capacitors, vehicle engines, biological and chemical product as medicine for the human and animals. Mars will need to have furnaces and with humans comes a lot of fire safety the Robotics and AI might help with the chemical production process with Self-Driving wheelbarrows, production might be very basic to begin a type of charcoal to make steels, some mix of clay for 3-d printed objects, structures might be grown fortified by fungi product or bamboo or wood hull, maybe Mars would be expected to make its own Digging Excavator Equipment and Cars built locally on Mars without Earth help?

Some might insist on other options like Solar or Geothermal or Battery Storage so it is possible Mars will have people skilled in materials manufacturing for 'renewable energies' not just the Nuclear Power Station, also a specialty for other chemicals for energy storage. Living inside Tunnels, Caves, Lava-Tubes some kind of Underground Subway system with transport and industry you will need fire safety response and also enough vents and trains and fans and cars keep moving to ventilate the air, a big issue will be health and quality of air, mold, air too dry or too damp or moisture, spores and Humidity could be a problem and machines to monitor toxins in the air as they do in submarines, heat major problem in many underground train stations. Cleaning and Health product manufacturing would become its own local based Mars industry. There would need to be production of lights, some type of cooking heating devices, perhaps a radio or phone and maybe even making 'computers' on Mars instead of having them shipped all the way from Earth. Machines and Manufacturing will need to produce feed for the farm mammals or fish and feed for insect or lizard or whatever animal you decide to have inside your Biodomes or Artificial Biosphere, also producing parts filters and recycle systems for water, you might have schools to pass on the Chemical production knowledge and Mechanical and Technical skills will be important for the people of the colonies. The people on Mars might become more creative than Earth coming up with their own unique engineer ideas, R&D and local fixes for problems Earth had not foreseen.

Mars having a small number of Nuclear Reactors might then be expected to become self sufficient and build its own products and diggers and machines that will build more power stations without help from Earth.

Australia

Carba Dry Ice truck transporting bulk liquid carbon dioxide
https://nla.gov.au/nla.pic-vn3999629

a vid from a company promoting itself, 'Chemical Manufacturing'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZPlRgMjQCU

Germany news - Rhineland chemicals industries
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQIi_9jJN_A

Chemical Manufacturing 101 - Texas
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIGFxIATxE8

'Large Ship Chemical Propulsion'
https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=10171

Last edited by Mars_B4_Moon (2023-12-01 11:23:13)

Mars_B4_Moon · 2023-12-05 13:47:15

I was thinking in Industry water is wasted on Earth, there is huge use of H2O a lot of water in manufacturing process, water in cleaning, cutting with water, transfer of energy using water. what other chemicals would be used if 'Water' is so rare on Mars? Brine the high-concentration solution of salt in water, there might be use of Alcohol use of organic chemistry like Ethers, Toluene would be used as thinners finished shine lacquers, Sulfuric acid or Sulfur dioxide as an anti-microbial, Chlorine for sanitation or manufacture of inorganic chlorine compounds, Benzene would be used as an elastic polymer or in rubber cements, and you have CO2 engine ideas. Perhaps the use of chemicals might be done with Robots, certain chemicals near humans would increase risk of poisoning, some of these liquids or gas are toxic. Huge amounts of fresh water on Earth are used to make a computer or a car, or used in the concrete industry every day or to clean, there might be a possibility process sewage waste and remove chemicals for industry use on Mars. Depletion of water resources is talked about in places like California but on Mars would be an even more increasing concern.

Calliban · 2023-12-05 16:10:52

Water is likely to be more difficult to source on Mars. But all of its potential alternatives are even more difficult to source. The most commonly discussed alternative is LCO2. But its applications are limited. It woukd be of limited use for dry cleaning, because its liquid temperature range is beneath the melting point of many fats.

I think most likely, industries on Mars will pay closer attention to water recycling. Unlike on Earth, it won't simply be dumped into the environment. It will be cleaned up and reused. More attention will be given to tying processes together, such that waste from one process will be input to another. This also reduces energy use, given that waste water often contains thermal energy.

Mars_B4_Moon · 2024-06-04 03:38:33

Moon-mapping could level up for NASA's upcoming Artemis missions. Here's how
https://www.space.com/moon-mapping-nasa … algorithms

China spacecraft Chang'e-6 first to collect samples from far side of the moon
https://news.sky.com/story/china-spacec … n-13147627

The Chinese have robots on the Moon but what if they don't want to colonize it, what if their true goal is Mars?

How will supply, communications, manufacturing and scouting only the Moon apply to Mars. The Lunar challenge seems totally different, no way to slow down with low circular orbit, the change delta-V to capture a satellite and drop payloads, no time near a 24 hour day night cycle that helps crop cycles, no atmosphere to protect against micro-meteorites. We are not fully sure what Mars is made of but from Lunar samples from a number of different nations we know the Moon has huge lack of Carbon, Hydrogen, chemical compounds like Methane, Water, Nitrogen, Potassium, Iron, Chromium, Phosphorus, Sulphur, Chlorine and other chemicals important to sustain a base or life or any kind of village or civilization.

completely different worlds

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#1 2012-01-18 13:44:58

Chemicals centre on Mars

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