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Nice subject topic.
While others are working on parallel projects, I want to explore the glory of Burning Buffalo Chips.
Well, that is possibly part of it.
I may alter the title later. I would like to be allowed to sort of set the guard rails for this in the first few posts.
For Earth, I want to develop a type of farming on marginal land, that involves machines and livestock. I want to have the machines groom the land for plants and to pick up poop and collect it to processing centers.
Processing may involve bioreactors to produce Methane and Fertilizers, Pyrolysis, and Steam Reforming of organic matter into fuels.
A possible instance could be represented as vertical solar panel rows, and some type of groomed vegetation growing between them.
Since the solar panel rows will generate electricity, I want the robots to have relatively small batteries, and to be able to recharge from the panels as would be efficient. So, probably no internal combustion engines, as a general practice.
The solar panels are to help the soil to conserve moisture for the rooted plants.
I do not specify plant types, but I suppose legumes might be desired. Perhaps some sort of groomed grassland scheme.
That's a start.
Last edited by Void (2023-01-01 11:25:36)
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The history of burning Buffalo Chips: https://www.buffalotalesandtrails.com/2 … 20a%20meal. Quote:
Native Americans had always burned buffalo chips where trees were scarce. These large, chips or “buffalo pies,” when dried burned quickly to start a fire. They produced hot fires to warm the tepee or to roast a meal.
One of my Grandmothers who for a time lived in the Dakota's for a time mentioned that it did stink.
But, it was a fuel.
If we can minimize the stink, and keep the fuels, then:
So, this probably is no till farming, and would likely build the soils up, not deplete them.
The animals, if you want to consider it, are weed choppers. Otherwise, the plants would have to be harvested and chopped up.
Marginal lands might include semiarid and northern evergreens. While many feel that the North is not a good place for solar, if that solar creates fuels, then it does not so much matter if the solar comes in a summer lump and is not particularly available in the winter. For this, I am more thinking that patches of evergreens would be replaced to create an artificial savannah type vegetation scheme. I you could somehow actually use Wood Bison; they could take shelter from winter winds in the forest clumps. The people who used to live here in the past regularly burned forests to promote better food resources. We don't do that now. This could replace it. Although the solar panels would collect heat and electricity, the snow on the ground or the dry grass would tend to reflect it. Hard to say what the balance is. But the panels might expand the growing season in the locations where they were as they would retain heat from the day. Or if they radiate at night in wavelengths that can penetrate the atmosphere, they might cool things. Don't know if that can be done.
But I anticipate trouble between Bison and solar panels. I guess an experiment might indicate what might be true. Other animals might be more suitable. In fact, perhaps even some animals whose numbers might benefit from expansion.
Bioreactors are an obvious method to process the poo into Methane and fertilizer, I presume.
To get other fuels heat might be useful.
While the solar panels might send power to a grid, they also may make hot steam which could be used in steam reformation of organic materials into fuels, even liquid fuels, I hope.
To be continued:
Last edited by Void (2023-01-01 11:23:43)
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So, then you have all this poo and can reform it in some ways.
Bioreactors is a method that has some history: https://www.bing.com/search?q=bioreacto … 3670c0e162
Pyrolysis to make Oils: https://www.bing.com/search?q=Pyrolysis … 54235b664d
Quote Title:
Pyrolysis to produce gasoline and biodiesel
Dennis Pennington, Michigan State University Extension - October 31, 2012
https://www.canr.msu.edu/news/pyrolysis … rocracking.
Quote:
Pyrolysis is a thermochemical process that heats (400 to 500 degrees Celsius) biomass in the absence of oxygen to create bio-oil that resembles crude oil. To convert bio-oil to usable transportation fuels, the bio-oil is upgraded through hydrotreating and hydrocracking.
Quote Title:
Pyrolysis-catalytic steam reforming of agricultural biomass wastes and biomass components for production of hydrogen/syngas
Author links open overlay panelKaltumeAkuboMohamad AnasNahilPaul T.Williams
Steam Reforming of biomass: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/a … %20reactor.
Pyrolysis-catalytic
The two-stage pyrolysis-catalytic steam reforming process for biomass, involves the evolution of hydrocarbons from the biomass during the pyrolysis process which then become subsequently reformed in the catalytic steam reactor.
To continue:
Last edited by Void (2023-01-01 11:34:32)
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Here may exist the method towards a store of high temperature steam: http://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.php … 92#p203592 It is in: "Index» Science, Technology, and Astronomy» Geothermal and Geostored Energy"
Good chances you can't get high enough temperatures near site from geothermal. But Geostored might work. If you drilled Eavor type tubes, and filled them with water, you might conduct excess electricity though that water to store very high temperature heat, and so then steam.
This technology may well be available for the purpose: https://www.eavor.com/
Quote:
The First Truly Scalable Form
Of Clean Baseload Power
Done
Last edited by Void (2023-01-01 11:40:41)
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The key is a waste recovery system that makes use of the energy that is still contained within it. Lots of the poor nations do this with a variety of animal wastes and as you noted you do not need the fumes to get to the outside of the burn or pyrolysis chamber to capture and make use of that. It does need an oxygen source but that's easy here on earth where it is abundant for use. Even the exhaust can be reuse for the carbon elements and more if you take the time in the design layout to do so. Then there is the exhaust heat to capture as well from the processing of the stuff within the chamber.
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Yes, the Oxygen is then needed for the subsequent oxidation process to release the energy to a purpose.
But for Mars can Perchlorate be a substitute that is storable? It might be collected from the environment or created.
As for the vegetation, it would produce an Oxygen stream for use, which except for dust storms will be predictable as so could be bonded to industrial and residential needs.
For Mars, I am thinking vertical solar panels with a transparency over them. A very cold-water pool under them. Antarctic cold. The "Tent might have slight pressurization. Probably only microbial crops could be grown.
As for evaporation, simply compress the moist air inside the "Tent" to get fresh water. The dump your non poo waste into the pool.
Antarctic water is typically at near or below freezing with salts in it. The pond could have transparent "Sea" ice over it most of the time. The salt allows brine channels which microbes can grow in. To harvest, melt the ice temporarily and somehow collect the organic matter.
https://www.nwf.org/Home/Magazines/Nati … -Ice-Algae
They mention a Fat in the algae. That might be convenient, so that it might be rendered out of the algae at a lower temperature or by another process perhaps. Quote:
Unlike most plants, algae do not have flowers, stems, roots, leaves or vascular tissue— but they do have chlorophyll, which allows them to absorb light for photosynthesis. In polar seas, algae can be pelagic (blooming in open waters), benthic (living on the sea floor) or sympagic (blooming in or on ice). Sympagic sea-ice algae pack more fats and bloom several weeks earlier than their cousins, but their relative importance to the food web has been a mystery until recently.
A fat called IP25, produced only by sympagic ice algae, is yielding important clues. Scientists have long studied IP25 to detect ancient algal blooms in ocean sediment cores. But a few years ago, scientists began studying its presence in animals. In 2016, biochemist Thomas Brown of the Scottish Association for Marine Science became the first to spot IP25 at the top of the food chain. After analyzing the tissues of 55 polar bears, he showed that an average of 86 percent of the bears’ nutrition came from a food chain that originated with ice algae—a breakthrough for polar ecologists.
A question does exist, as to how much dissolved gasses the algae need. If you have a fairly thick but rather transparent ice, this may allow the inclusion of more dissolved gasses. I think we discovered in the past that to some degree the ice gives U.V. protection.
As for the transparent tent, it is good to not collect too much Oxygen in it, as under U.V. it may react with the film to cloud and damage it.
SeaDragon gave us that.
So, we could do some of this on Mars as well, I think. We do need more discovery about that though.
Done.
Last edited by Void (2023-01-01 15:17:11)
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Continuing from the just previous post:
So, for Mars "sympagic ice algae" might become very important.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sympagic_ecology
Quote:
Sympagic ecology
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to navigationJump to searchROV image of krill grazing under the ice. In this image most krill swim in an upside down position directly under the ice. Only one animal (in the middle) is hovering in the open water.
A sympagic environment is one where water exists mostly as a solid, ice, such as a polar ice cap or glacier. Solid sea ice is permeated with channels filled with salty brine. These briny channels and the sea ice itself have its ecology, referred to as "sympagic ecology".Residents of temperate or tropical climates often assume, mistakenly, that ice and snow are devoid of life. In fact, a number of varieties of algae such as diatoms engage in photosynthesis in arctic and alpine regions of Earth. Other energy sources include Aeolian dust and pollen swept in from other regions. These ecosystems also include bacteria and fungi, as well as animals like flatworms and crustaceans. A number of sympagic worm species are commonly called ice worms.
Additionally, the ocean has abundant plankton, and prolific algal blooms occur in the polar regions each summer as well as in high mountain lakes, bringing nutrients to those parts of the ice in contact with the water. In the Arctic Ocean, ice algae accounts for close to half of the primary production during the summer months.[1]
In the spring, krill can scrape off the green lawn of ice algae from the underside of the pack ice.
So, if we are going to manufacture "Ice Windows" on Mars: Query: "Transparences of ice and dissolved gasses"
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/26309797/
This may do: https://www.quora.com/Why-is-ice-not-transparent
Quote:
Profile photo for Ian MacLaren
Ian MacLaren
Mad ScientistAuthor has 133 answers and 241.3K answer views5y
Pure ice is transparent.Some refraction occurs as light passes through it, and red wavelengths are absorbed after a fair distance, so thick ice looks blue. But for the more part, thin sections are very transparent.
Are you thinking of ice with air bubbles in it? These cause scattering, which can make ice look white.
So, one method to harvest the Algae would be to see of the enclosure will sustain an elevated air pressure. If so, then melt the ice, and then harvest the Algae. Then degas some brine with a slightly lower salinity and place it on top of the water to freeze.
https://www.veoliawatertech.com/en/solu … %20boiling.
Quote:
Degassed water or water degasification is the removal or reduction of dissolved oxygen, carbon dioxide, and other gasses from water. Thermal degasification applies steam heat to remove gasses from a water stream via boiling.
Quote:
Vacuum Degassing Method
Vacuum deaerators, also known as vacuum degasifiers, is a water degassing system that uses a vertical pressure vessel, multiple vacuum stages and vacuum pumps to continuously remove objectionable gases from liquids. Packed towers, supported by powerful vacuum pumps, reduce the surrounding vapor partial pressure which promotes the mass transfer from the liquid to the gas phase. Veolia’s proprietary system design provides the best value in the market by optimizing the tower diameter, number of stages, packed bed geometry and vacuum capacity on the basis of the salinity, temperature, and other conditions of the influent water.
I would say that for a Mars method related to the farming of Ice Algae, probably needs its own recipe.
But the atmosphere of Mars is already low, so the amount of degassing is a lesser problem.
But the point is that if you can manufacture a rather transparent ice window, then the ice thickness can be greater, and still allow most of the light to get to the Algae. Thicker ice allows more dissolved gasses to stay in the water.
In this situation, if you pumped Martian Atmosphere into the water on a continuing basis while the sun shined, the Algae would consume the CO2. Oxygen released would saturate, and also Nitrogen and Argon would saturate. So, then bubbles would collect under the ice which should contain the saturated gasses. The thicker the ice is the less the bubbles would have to be compressed to become breathing air.
Done.
Last edited by Void (2023-01-01 12:45:03)
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