Author Topic: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars  (Read 18249 times)

Offline Nilof

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I just learned about Whittier, Alaska, which apparently is a city where the entire population (~220 people) lives in a single building with everything they need inside:



...It generally looks very similar to what a colony on Mars of a similar size may look like.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whittier,_Alaska
« Last Edit: 05/10/2016 04:31 pm by Nilof »
For a variable Isp spacecraft running at constant power and constant acceleration, the mass ratio is linear in delta-v.   Δv = ve0(MR-1). Or equivalently: Δv = vef PMF. Also, this is energy-optimal for a fixed delta-v and mass ratio.

Offline CuddlyRocket

There's the underground Australian Town of Coober Pedy (plenty of vids on YouTube).
« Last Edit: 05/10/2016 07:26 pm by CuddlyRocket »

Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #2 on: 05/11/2016 02:14 am »
McMurdo Station, Antarctica

Leif Erickson's Viking (first known European) settlement in Nova Scotia, North America 1000 A.D.

And I think a colonial settlement on Mars will have to be spread out with regolith piled on top for radiation shielding. You'd need limestone (to make Portland Cement- and limestone is a sedimentary fossil rock-meaning living organisms in an ocean) and water to mix with regolith to make a poor concrete to form buildings like that. I don't see the raw materials being available to build and rad shield that.
« Last Edit: 05/11/2016 02:20 am by TomH »

Offline Lar

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #3 on: 05/11/2016 03:00 am »
Clearly you'd need "synthetic limestone" since you don't have the ancient organisms to transform the calcium and CO2 into calcium carbonate. I expect that is possible, but like so many ISRU operations, takes power and possibly reagents. Terrestrial cement making uses water as a working fluid to slake quicklime. Doable even without the organisms.
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
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Offline dwheeler

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #4 on: 05/11/2016 03:29 am »
Good ol Camp Century in Greenland

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


Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #5 on: 05/11/2016 04:22 am »
Clearly you'd need "synthetic limestone"

I don't know how you would concentrate the calcium. I'm not sure how much calcium is in Mars regolith. On Earth, you get it from limestone, beds of shells and bones that have not yet compacted to sedimentary rock, and you can distill it from well water. Even if there is as much on Mars as on Earth, the mechanisms to concentrate it would be difficult at best. I am not sure what else could serve as a binder. This doesn't even consider the hardness and purity necessary in the sand and gravel aggregate.
« Last Edit: 05/11/2016 04:29 pm by TomH »

Offline launchwatcher

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #6 on: 05/11/2016 05:04 am »
Clearly you'd need "synthetic limestone"

I don't know how you would concentrate the calcium. I'm not sure how much calcium is in Mars regolith. On Earth, you get it from limestone, beds of shells and bones that have not yet compacted to sedimentary rock, and you can distill it from well water. Even if there is as much on Mars as on Earth, the mechanisms to concentrate it would be difficult at best. I am not sure what else could sat as a binder. This doesn't even consider the hardness and purity necessary in the sand and gravel aggregate.
Or you could use a different element.   One possibility is sulfur.

I found:

"A Novel Material for In Situ Construction on Mars:
Experiments and Numerical Simulations"
Lin Wan, Roman Wendner, Gianluca Cusatis

http://arxiv.org/abs/1512.05461

found via:

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/545216/materials-scientists-make-martian-concrete/

Offline llanitedave

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #7 on: 05/11/2016 03:32 pm »
We've seen gypsum in veins, that's calcium sulfate.  If we find enough of it, maybe we can make a plaster.
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Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #8 on: 05/11/2016 04:32 pm »
We've seen gypsum in veins, that's calcium sulfate.  If we find enough of it, maybe we can make a plaster.

Well, maybe you could remove the calcium and process to Portland Cement or perhaps some of the other binders that were made from limestone before Portland Cement was perfected. When I think of gypsum, drywall comes to mind, and that's not very strong stuff.

Offline Lar

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #9 on: 05/11/2016 04:41 pm »
I may have led this thread astray...

We've mentioned Whittier, IceWorm/Camp Century, Coober Pedy, McMurdo ...

Although not mentioned yet, Prudhoe Bay sprung to mind.. what about oil platform communities?

What other communities have interesting similarities?  What makes them similar and what can we learn about the problem studying them?
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
"We're a little bit like the dog who caught the bus" - Musk after CRS-8 S1 successfully landed on ASDS OCISLY

Offline mr_magoo

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #10 on: 05/11/2016 04:53 pm »
There is a good documentary called "Antarctica: Year on Ice." that follows everyday workers at McMurdo (iirc).   Workers not scientists.   It gets particularly interesting when the smaller winter crew starts showing some psychological effects.   Some get a little punchy and when most workers come back after the winter the winter crew is initially skittish around them and prefer to avoid the new people.

Preview:

Offline CuddlyRocket

British Antarctic Survey Halley Research Station:




Interesting for the modular, movable construction.

Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #12 on: 05/12/2016 05:44 pm »
Interesting for the modular, movable construction.

I am surprised at the elevated pods. This leaves the underside exposed, increasing the amount of surface area exposed to radiant x convective thermal loss. Putting it on the surface with closed cell foam insulation under the bottom and sides that aerodynamically deflect convective winds would be much more efficient in such a cold environment.

Offline nadreck

Interesting for the modular, movable construction.

I am surprised at the elevated pods. This leaves the underside exposed, increasing the amount of surface area exposed to radiant x convective thermal loss. Putting it on the surface with closed cell foam insulation under the bottom and sides that aerodynamically deflect convective winds would be much more efficient in such a cold environment.
However the downside is that escaping heat causes the ice below to melt which causes uneven subsiding leading to stress and damage to the buildings.  This happens even on "land" that is frozen, buildings sitting on permafrost in Canada's North experience issues with this in some locations.
It is all well and good to quote those things that made it past your confirmation bias that other people wrote, but this is a discussion board damnit! Let us know what you think! And why!

Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #14 on: 05/12/2016 06:13 pm »
Interesting for the modular, movable construction.

I am surprised at the elevated pods. This leaves the underside exposed, increasing the amount of surface area exposed to radiant x convective thermal loss. Putting it on the surface with closed cell foam insulation under the bottom and sides that aerodynamically deflect convective winds would be much more efficient in such a cold environment.
However the downside is that escaping heat causes the ice below to melt which causes uneven subsiding leading to stress and damage to the buildings.  This happens even on "land" that is frozen, buildings sitting on permafrost in Canada's North experience issues with this in some locations.

I agree that such can happen, however if you have enough insulation, that does not necessarily have to happen.

Offline nadreck

Interesting for the modular, movable construction.

I am surprised at the elevated pods. This leaves the underside exposed, increasing the amount of surface area exposed to radiant x convective thermal loss. Putting it on the surface with closed cell foam insulation under the bottom and sides that aerodynamically deflect convective winds would be much more efficient in such a cold environment.
However the downside is that escaping heat causes the ice below to melt which causes uneven subsiding leading to stress and damage to the buildings.  This happens even on "land" that is frozen, buildings sitting on permafrost in Canada's North experience issues with this in some locations.

I agree that such can happen, however if you have enough insulation, that does not necessarily have to happen.

True, but that level of insulation argues against the need to do it for any efficiency reason. At that level of insulation your heat loss by convection in the -50 air would not be all that significant.
It is all well and good to quote those things that made it past your confirmation bias that other people wrote, but this is a discussion board damnit! Let us know what you think! And why!

Offline RonM

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #16 on: 05/12/2016 06:24 pm »
Interesting for the modular, movable construction.

I am surprised at the elevated pods. This leaves the underside exposed, increasing the amount of surface area exposed to radiant x convective thermal loss. Putting it on the surface with closed cell foam insulation under the bottom and sides that aerodynamically deflect convective winds would be much more efficient in such a cold environment.
However the downside is that escaping heat causes the ice below to melt which causes uneven subsiding leading to stress and damage to the buildings.  This happens even on "land" that is frozen, buildings sitting on permafrost in Canada's North experience issues with this in some locations.

I agree that such can happen, however if you have enough insulation, that does not necessarily have to happen.

The US Amundsen–Scott Station is also elevated.


Offline Lar

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #17 on: 05/12/2016 07:27 pm »
Would a mars habitat have to do this? I guess it depends on water content of the surface formation they place it on.... high water content formations (such as buried glaciers) might have this issue too?
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
"We're a little bit like the dog who caught the bus" - Musk after CRS-8 S1 successfully landed on ASDS OCISLY

Offline nadreck

Would a mars habitat have to do this? I guess it depends on water content of the surface formation they place it on.... high water content formations (such as buried glaciers) might have this issue too?
There are other potential solutions, and potentially in some locations you can dig in to things that won't melt and shift. But this is one reason I wan't to see cores drilled deep enough to answer the civil engineering issues.
It is all well and good to quote those things that made it past your confirmation bias that other people wrote, but this is a discussion board damnit! Let us know what you think! And why!

Offline Robotbeat

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #19 on: 05/12/2016 07:38 pm »
Would a mars habitat have to do this? I guess it depends on water content of the surface formation they place it on.... high water content formations (such as buried glaciers) might have this issue too?
No. Not enough precipitation to make this matter.

People say Mars is harder than Antarctica, and it clearly is, but there are some ways in which it is easier.
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Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #20 on: 05/12/2016 10:58 pm »
If you build on bedrock you shouldn't need pile/pier/post foundation. I believe Mars has locations that are sandy enough or perhaps with soil moist enough, however to require some type of in ground foundation. Drilling for posts or driving piles is going to require a lot of payload mass in the form of tools. I would think that building on rock and securing with anchor bolts might be more efficient in terms of mass required in construction tooling.  That is at least until Mars eventually has its own manufacturing infrastructure. It's similar to early colonial settlement of the Americas; tools and materials had to be brought from Europe for some time before manufacturing took hold in situ.
« Last Edit: 05/12/2016 11:04 pm by TomH »

Offline Lar

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #21 on: 05/12/2016 11:16 pm »
Would a mars habitat have to do this? I guess it depends on water content of the surface formation they place it on.... high water content formations (such as buried glaciers) might have this issue too?
No. Not enough precipitation to make this matter.

People say Mars is harder than Antarctica, and it clearly is, but there are some ways in which it is easier.
I don't think it has anything to do with precipitation. I think it's more a matter of the moisture content of the soil. We keep hearing about veins or sheets of ice that are covered by very thin layers of non ice material. Building on those might have this problem. And high water content is a factor in base selection.
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
"We're a little bit like the dog who caught the bus" - Musk after CRS-8 S1 successfully landed on ASDS OCISLY

Offline Robotbeat

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #22 on: 05/13/2016 12:20 am »
Would a mars habitat have to do this? I guess it depends on water content of the surface formation they place it on.... high water content formations (such as buried glaciers) might have this issue too?
No. Not enough precipitation to make this matter.

People say Mars is harder than Antarctica, and it clearly is, but there are some ways in which it is easier.
I don't think it has anything to do with precipitation.
Yes, it does. Accumulating snow is why the south pole base must be built on stilts and why the old base had to be abandoned and disassembled.
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Online MickQ

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #23 on: 05/13/2016 02:38 am »
As Chris noted, having the Antarctic bases elevated allows wind blown snow to pass under the structures and not build up against the sides therefore requiring removal.  The elevation also allows better visibility both from and to the station.

Offline Lar

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #24 on: 05/13/2016 02:52 am »
Meh.

I'm more thinking about the considerations for siting a structure on top of something with high frozen water content. And what happens if that water melts under the structure.  The permafrost angle, in other words. It's not about precipitation per se.

If you're going to misinterpret what I say, at least misinterpret the whole thing instead of cutting most of the quote away.
« Last Edit: 05/13/2016 02:53 am by Lar »
"I think it would be great to be born on Earth and to die on Mars. Just hopefully not at the point of impact." -Elon Musk
"We're a little bit like the dog who caught the bus" - Musk after CRS-8 S1 successfully landed on ASDS OCISLY

Offline Hotblack Desiato

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #25 on: 05/13/2016 07:45 am »
Quite close to me, there is a structure, that has similar features to the begich towers in alaska.

It's called Alt-Erlaa.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wohnpark_Alt-Erlaa (no english page available, use your favorite translator service)

https://spfaust.wordpress.com/2012/08/26/alt-erlaa-architecture-that-serves-a-social-purpose-social-housing-that-looks-feels-like-luxury-housing/

Basically the same features as the begich towers, but 6 distinct towers connected at ground level, each sports pools on the roof (except I think the small one) and indoor, tennis courts, malls, schools, doctors and so on (one church, no police), and a subway station. made for 9000 people, who run a tenant council, a towers-newspaper and a tv-channel.

True, they are not somewhere at the end of the world, fighting with a cold climate and grizzlys and penguins, they are in the middle of vienna (fighting their way through an environment consisting of angry vienna-citizen), yet that thing already stands for 40 years and is one of the nicer parts of vienna.


Besides, there are other buildings in vienna, that might be interesting too:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasometer,_Vienna

In the late 90ties, vienna had the idea of repurposing the 19th-20th century gas tanks (town gas made of coal) as a living quartier and shopping mall. Well, the shopping mall wasn't terribly successful, now they try to promote it as a location for concerts. But each of the towers has appartments aswell. So that's what domes on the martian surface may look like. Besides, they were gas-tight pressure vessels for 80 years (the internal storage was removed since then, but the outer layer needed to be tight aswell, in case of something happening).

Might be worth taking a closer look at those two buildings.
« Last Edit: 05/13/2016 07:56 am by Hotblack Desiato »

Offline philw1776

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #26 on: 05/13/2016 08:53 pm »
Cappadocia Turkey has yardang "cave" dwellings.  There are many examples of yardangs on Mars, q.v. Apollonaris Sulci which is a NASA study candidate for a 1st manned exploration site.

https://www.pinterest.com/jeanniegenie/ancient-dwellings/

The stuff adheres but is very easy to drill into and hollow out.

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Offline Ionmars

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #27 on: 05/14/2016 10:10 pm »
...
I'm more thinking about the considerations for siting a structure on top of something with high frozen water content. And what happens if that water melts under the structure.  The permafrost angle, in other words. It's not about precipitation per se.
...
...
You will be glad to know that because of the near-vacuum atmospheric pressure, water on Mars sublimates directly from solid to gaseous state. You will have other civil engineering problems, but not permafrost.  :)

Offline nadreck

...
I'm more thinking about the considerations for siting a structure on top of something with high frozen water content. And what happens if that water melts under the structure.  The permafrost angle, in other words. It's not about precipitation per se.
...
...
You will be glad to know that because of the near-vacuum atmospheric pressure, water on Mars sublimates directly from solid to gaseous state. You will have other civil engineering problems, but not permafrost.  :)

When it sublimes away, will the resultant material left behind still evenly support the weight above it?
It is all well and good to quote those things that made it past your confirmation bias that other people wrote, but this is a discussion board damnit! Let us know what you think! And why!

Offline Impaler

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #29 on: 05/15/2016 06:05 am »
Sublimated ice on mars would become vapor migrating through the soil and would most likely move laterally or downward away from the heat source forming either new ice lenses or entering the atmosphere, either way their would be subsidence.  This issue of permafrost subsidence is very important and one that never gets the attention it should in Martian building concepts.  If bases are placed in areas of high water availability and their are ice lenses underground as large as many people hope then sublimation induced subsidence will be an issue. 

Solutions include highly flexible couplings that can simply take the torquing and internal spaces that have adjustable flooring that maintains a level surface even if the outside of the module shifts over time.  A pro-active solution is to place a set of refrigerant pipes on the outer bottom surface of a modules and intentionally maintain the original soil temperatures directly under the structure via refrigeration.
« Last Edit: 05/15/2016 06:10 am by Impaler »

Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #30 on: 05/15/2016 09:46 pm »
...
I'm more thinking about the considerations for siting a structure on top of something with high frozen water content. And what happens if that water melts under the structure.  The permafrost angle, in other words. It's not about precipitation per se.
...
...
You will be glad to know that because of the near-vacuum atmospheric pressure, water on Mars sublimates directly from solid to gaseous state. You will have other civil engineering problems, but not permafrost.  :)

When it sublimes away, will the resultant material left behind still evenly support the weight above it?

My thoughts exactly. I would expect the sublimated material to leave microcavities and for the substrate to become pumice like. I would further expect that not to be of load bearing strength.

Offline scienceguy

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #31 on: 05/15/2016 10:01 pm »
Is the whole surface of Mars permafrost? Are there some areas of exposed bedrock (which would be better to build on)?
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Offline guckyfan

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #32 on: 05/16/2016 05:39 am »
Is the whole surface of Mars permafrost?

No. Permafrost implies a lot of water in the ground. There are plenty places with water, but there are a lot more places without appreciable amounts of water in the ground.

You do need a place with plenty of water nearby and an area without water to build on though which is a restriction to contend with. Or you have to build with the permafrost problem in mind which is a lot harder. Though it is done in Siberia, it is possible.

Offline Ionmars

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #33 on: 05/16/2016 12:02 pm »
Frozen underground water on Mars can be confusing to describe because it formed differently than underground water on Earth. Wikipedia describes frost like this: "Frost is the coating or deposit of ice that may form in humid air in cold conditions, usually overnight. In temperate climates it most commonly appears as fragile white crystals or frozen dew drops near the ground, but in cold climates it occurs in a greater variety of forms. Frost is composed of delicate branched patterns of ice crystals formed as the result of fractal process development."

So permafrost on Earth is composed of water crystals that formed on the surface in contact with air, then was subsequently covered by  overburden i.e. more frost or snow and it never again reached melting temperature.

Glacier is another confusing term because on Earth it is formed by falling snow that builds up such depth that it compresses the underlying layer into solid ice.

On Mars there was once surface water and flowing water about 4 billion years ago and more of an atmosphere. All that has changed since then and most of the water sublimated off into space. Remnant frozen water still exists underground because it has been covered over by blown regolith that prevents the sun from reaching it.  We need a new word for it.

Offline JasonAW3

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #34 on: 05/16/2016 07:33 pm »
Big problem that I see with a foundation for surface structures on Mars is actually the same sort of issues that stations at the Antarctic have.

     Thermal loss.

     Essentially, the ground on Mars is going to act like a REALLY BIG heat sink.  Now while this could be a good thing, to an extent, many issues come into play with such a situation.

     First; if there is underground frozen water, it will start to melt, likely causing shifting of any structures built above.

     Second; Too much Heat Loss.  Insulating the bottom of any surface structure is going to provide Mass Penalties shipping structures up from Earth.

     Third; should surface structures be built on stilts, you avoid many of these heat leeching issues, but you'll still have sinking issues unless the total mass is spread over a large area, and you'll still have drifting of martian dust from the inevitable dust storms.

     Fourth; While building underground would, to an extent, alleviate some of these problems as well, you'd still have to build a sort of "Thermos Bottle" structure around the main part of the structures to avoid heat loss there as well.  Mechanical isolation from conductive surfaces works far better than even the highest R value insulation.  Besides, near vacuum is pretty much the standard on Mars and has no real Mass penalties.

     Fifth; While building in Lava Tubes would save a LOT of construction effort, you'd still have to build your structures mechanically isolated from the floor walls and ceiling of said tubes as they too are going to be VERY cold. (At least 3 to 4 billion years of chilling).

    Thermal heating of the interiors of these lava tubes am also result in cave-ins and other shifting of the structure of the tube.  (One has to figure that around the "skylight" areas, the structures are BOUND to need more reinforcement, as they had a collapse in the first place, which is likely to leave the area around these holes likewise unstable).

     Overall, this thermal issue is not insurmountable, but requires a lot of thought before landing people in colonies on Mars.
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Offline The Amazing Catstronaut

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #35 on: 05/16/2016 08:08 pm »
Heat loss will be mitigated somewhat due to the minimal atmosphere on mars - so most heat loss will be through the ground. The problem will be more directed than in Antarctica.
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Offline Ionmars

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #36 on: 05/16/2016 08:26 pm »
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Fourth; While building underground would, to an extent, alleviate some of these problems as well, you'd still have to build a sort of "Thermos Bottle" structure around the main part of the structures to avoid heat loss there as well.  Mechanical isolation from conductive surfaces works far better than even the highest R value insulation.  Besides, near vacuum is pretty much the standard on Mars and has no real Mass penalties.
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     Overall, this thermal issue is not insurmountable, but requires a lot of thought before landing people in colonies on Mars.
This is such a great point you are making. This argues for double container construction for every habitat built on Mars. The inner container would be separated from the ground by stilts to minimize the cold sink in the ground from seeping into the living hab container.

Up to now I thought we would just employ resistance heating built into the floors. Bur this approach would mean extra heating just around the stilts. Much more energy efficient.

Edit: Where on Earth do we have this double wall construction?
« Last Edit: 05/16/2016 08:29 pm by Ionmars »

Offline docmordrid

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #37 on: 05/18/2016 02:19 am »
Submarines, oil tankers, insulated tanks....
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Offline TomH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #38 on: 05/18/2016 04:07 pm »
Heat loss will be mitigated somewhat due to the minimal atmosphere on mars - so most heat loss will be through the ground. The problem will be more directed than in Antarctica.

If you have wind, then you compound thermal loss via convection. If you have moisture on the surface of the building you compound thermal loss via evaporation. If you have moisture on the surface and wind together, you exponentially compound thermal loss via convection and evaporation together. A calm atmosphere actually provides insulation. A calm atmosphere with relatively high humidity provides a true thermal blanket. No atmosphere allows radiant heat loss directly into the empty coldness of space.
« Last Edit: 05/18/2016 06:22 pm by TomH »

Offline lamontagne

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #39 on: 05/18/2016 04:49 pm »
The Raglan mine is a mining operation that has been active for about 20 years.  It's in a permafrost zone in Northern Quebec.  The mine buildings are on piles sunk down to the bedrock, the living quarters are above ground.
One interesting variation in construction is the mining truck garage.  As it was too expensive to elevate a slab supporting these massive trucks, the slab was build on grade, with some piping that uses the thermosiphon principle to keep the permafrost frozen under the building.  This could be done on Mars, to avoid melting the permafrost.  as long as the heat gain is lower than the heat loss, the soil will remain frozen.  Insulation reduces the heat transmission rate.
There are about 500+ workers on a fly-in fly out basis.  that wouldn't work on Mars though  ;-)

There are many variations on this pattern in Northern Canada.  It's become something of a standard.


Offline lamontagne

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #40 on: 05/18/2016 04:53 pm »
Before fly-in fly out became the norm, mining was done with complete communities and infrastructures.  The Fermont city, with its windbreak wall is another interesting mining community.  In this case there are not only workers but schools, shopping centers and restaurants in the wall.  Individual houses are behind the wind break.
It's not on permafrost though.
The mine, an iron mine called Mt Wright, is about 20 km away.


Offline JasonAW3

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #41 on: 05/18/2016 05:05 pm »
Good ol Camp Century in Greenland

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



     Unfortunately, they had the same sort of subsidence issues I mentioned in an earlier post.  In this case, the thermal issues caused the ice around the camp to melt, causing foundation problems. 

     Thermal isolation like a double walled facility would have helped, but ground pressure on the ice would have to have been spread out over a large surface to minimize pressure related subsidence.
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Offline JasonAW3

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #42 on: 05/18/2016 05:13 pm »
Clearly you'd need "synthetic limestone"

I don't know how you would concentrate the calcium. I'm not sure how much calcium is in Mars regolith. On Earth, you get it from limestone, beds of shells and bones that have not yet compacted to sedimentary rock, and you can distill it from well water. Even if there is as much on Mars as on Earth, the mechanisms to concentrate it would be difficult at best. I am not sure what else could sat as a binder. This doesn't even consider the hardness and purity necessary in the sand and gravel aggregate.
Or you could use a different element.   One possibility is sulfur.

I found:

"A Novel Material for In Situ Construction on Mars:
Experiments and Numerical Simulations"
Lin Wan, Roman Wendner, Gianluca Cusatis

http://arxiv.org/abs/1512.05461

found via:

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/545216/materials-scientists-make-martian-concrete/

Here's a crazy idea; Melt the regolith and make it into basaltic rock.

     Essentially, by melting the rocks and dust, you can collect the released gases and fluids while making a usable building material.  Either mold it into whatever shape you need or simply mold it into interlocking bricks. (Like stone Legos).

     You'd still need some form of sealant for pressurized structures with the bricks, but the use of solar heating should provide sufficient energy to either melt the dust and rock into a molten mass or at the least, fuse the dust and rocks into building blocks.

     Remember, simple works.
« Last Edit: 05/18/2016 05:14 pm by JasonAW3 »
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Offline Hotblack Desiato

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #43 on: 05/18/2016 05:42 pm »
Clearly you'd need "synthetic limestone"

I don't know how you would concentrate the calcium. I'm not sure how much calcium is in Mars regolith. On Earth, you get it from limestone, beds of shells and bones that have not yet compacted to sedimentary rock, and you can distill it from well water. Even if there is as much on Mars as on Earth, the mechanisms to concentrate it would be difficult at best. I am not sure what else could sat as a binder. This doesn't even consider the hardness and purity necessary in the sand and gravel aggregate.
Or you could use a different element.   One possibility is sulfur.

I found:

"A Novel Material for In Situ Construction on Mars:
Experiments and Numerical Simulations"
Lin Wan, Roman Wendner, Gianluca Cusatis

http://arxiv.org/abs/1512.05461

found via:

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/545216/materials-scientists-make-martian-concrete/

Here's a crazy idea; Melt the regolith and make it into basaltic rock.

     Essentially, by melting the rocks and dust, you can collect the released gases and fluids while making a usable building material.  Either mold it into whatever shape you need or simply mold it into interlocking bricks. (Like stone Legos).

     You'd still need some form of sealant for pressurized structures with the bricks, but the use of solar heating should provide sufficient energy to either melt the dust and rock into a molten mass or at the least, fuse the dust and rocks into building blocks.

     Remember, simple works.

You could also take the basaltic rocks on mars, pulverize them and use them for 3D laser-sinter printing. This way, you get exactly shaped bricks, that can be stacked to any building you want.
(alsready posted that somewhere else).

Rockwool is just basaltic rock, molten and extruded to form fibers. With that rock + rockwool insulation, you should be able to create whatever you need.

For the internal pressure vessel, you could then either use iron or steel and weld it to form a pressure vessel, or go the Bigelow Aerospace way and use kevlar fabric and produce a bubble with that material.

Besides, if enough water is present, and planetary protection is obsolete (if they find out that Mars is just a dead rock in space) you could first produce a larger bubble with water-ice (3D-printed water, it then freezes), fill it with oxygen and do everything without the need of a pressure suit. Essencially construction work like on earth, and then watch the ice-bubble sublimate away (or cut it into pieces and recycle it).

Offline kaoru

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Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #44 on: 05/19/2016 03:41 am »
Before fly-in fly out became the norm, mining was done with complete communities and infrastructures.  The Fermont city, with its windbreak wall is another interesting mining community.  In this case there are not only workers but schools, shopping centers and restaurants in the wall.  Individual houses are behind the wind break.
It's not on permafrost though.
The mine, an iron mine called Mt Wright, is about 20 km away.
I'm actually from western Labrador born and raised where Fermont is a 30 minute drive.  It's not a wind break wall, just a large building that houses everything.  Why?  At -40 C why walk out doors and never mind the hassle shoveling snow ad nausem.  It takes a different kind of person to live up north for other reasons though.  The biggest problem is *boredom*, not the climate or living arrangement.  Living in a single building becomes boring.  I think this will be the biggest challenge facing Mars colonists.  Most people in my hometown usually have a wood heated no electricity no water cabin to escape the boredom.  Here's the family cabin to put into context the issue.

With all that snow and staving off boredom, my father did this for 40 winters and counting...  The pic is of an igloo attraction at the airport to greet participants in the winter games.

Sculpting snow was my dad's solution.  My solution was science and technology.  Anything that interested me I would devote time to.  To this day I'm still doing projects to occupy my mind that most people would think is a waste of time/money.  This is the mindset needed for Mars I think...

Kaoru
« Last Edit: 05/19/2016 03:58 am by kaoru »

Offline Hotblack Desiato

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #45 on: 05/19/2016 08:37 pm »
I found an other community (albeit really small) in austria, which has to deal with a lot of problems that would occur during the early stages of a mars Colony.

It's called the "Sonnblick Observatorium" (roughly translated to sunview observatory).

I don't know how many people work there, but I don't expect them to be more than 10.

It's located at 3106m height in the austrian state salzburg, on the "Hoher Sonnblick" in the Hohen Tauern (A group of mountains within the austrian alps).

As you can see, even located within Austria, it's quite hard to get people and supplies to that station.

EDIT: and yes, it looks like a place where you would search for a James Bond villain ;-)
« Last Edit: 05/19/2016 09:16 pm by Hotblack Desiato »

Offline CuddlyRocket

The biggest problem is *boredom*, not the climate or living arrangement.  Living in a single building becomes boring.  I think this will be the biggest challenge facing Mars colonists.  Most people in my hometown usually have a wood heated no electricity no water cabin to escape the boredom.

That's a complaint levied against living in small communities since time immemorial; it may not be specifically related to living in a single building.

Offline First Mate Rummey

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #47 on: 05/24/2016 10:57 am »
Also have a look at the Concordia Antartic Base Station (official site, wikipedia).

It has one of the coldest temperatures ever recorded on Earth.
In the 9 months winter period there is no way to left or reach it (about 16 people living).
The summer can hosts about 35 people.
The nearest station is > 500 Km away.
It has a low speed Internet connection (512kb/s).

Personal note: I am enabled to go there paid for 1 year mission, but cannot due to real life difficulties staying away for so long.  :(
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Offline scienceguy

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #48 on: 05/26/2016 02:40 pm »
Arctic Bay, Nunavut, Canada

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_Bay
« Last Edit: 05/26/2016 02:41 pm by scienceguy »
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Offline GWH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #49 on: 06/06/2016 05:24 am »
I think some of these remote communities in Canada in particular are prime candidates for cross over commercial applications of tech for mars, namely growing food in a contained environment, and energy storage. The dependency on diesel for power generation and shipped in food and associated costs are staggering.

Offline Hotblack Desiato

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #50 on: 06/06/2016 08:22 am »
And yet they have (somewhat half of the year) a good environment for creating solar power.

Light available for 24 hours a day, vast areas, so they can install the panels almost vertically, gaining the same exposure as on equatorial locations and yet it's so freezing cold, that the panels run at high efficiencly (solar panel efficiency is indirect proportional to the temperature of the panel), and nearly no panel degradation (degradation is also heat related).

The same thing will happen on Mars, low temperature means low degradation and higher efficiency. Just wipe of that dust once a month.

Offline GWH

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Re: Earth communities with similarities to a colony on Mars
« Reply #51 on: 06/08/2016 04:42 pm »
And yet they have (somewhat half of the year) a good environment for creating solar power.

Light available for 24 hours a day, vast areas, so they can install the panels almost vertically, gaining the same exposure as on equatorial locations and yet it's so freezing cold, that the panels run at high efficiencly (solar panel efficiency is indirect proportional to the temperature of the panel), and nearly no panel degradation (degradation is also heat related).

The same thing will happen on Mars, low temperature means low degradation and higher efficiency. Just wipe of that dust once a month.

Yes some means of energy storage is needed, especially one that produces significant heat as a by-product when used.  IF a sabatier reactor and localized production and storage of methane could be made economically competitive vs shipped in diesel in these locations it could provide a means to bootstrap this tech. (I don't mean simply building a sabatier reactor, but rather gaining operational data on a large scale, fully automated and reliable facility).

The solar part of the equation is already happening: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/colville-lake-solar-power-1.3604310

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