/sci/ - Science & Math

nuclear, solar will get fucked by sand storms.

Reddit said that solar is about 2/3 as effective as on earth. Further away from sun bad. Thin atmosphere good.

>>8764924
Would likely be determined to some extent by availability of resources on Mars, for a base of long term sustainability and size. Obviously, solar will suffer from distance, but if resources for it are abundant, there is plenty of room at least.

>>8764932
Apparently The Matt Dameon movie and the recent nat geo series is wrong. Mars has like no wind because of the thin atmosphere.

>>8764932
The only thing you'd really need to do is dust off the solar panels from time to time. Notice that none of the mars rovers have ever have a problem with wind.

Solar power is going to be the best in cost & weight efficiency

Too much regulatory jewry involved with nuclear.

>let's colonize a barren lifeless planet and try to grow stuff on it

Why not just colonize the moon instead?

>>8765018
Antarctica would be a good practice location before we go for mars

>>8765018
>colonize the moon
>built massive solar power array
>use microwave lasers to transmit power back to earth
>all earth's energy problems are solved overnight
>growing concern over which nation should have control over the moon array, who should pay for it's up keep, who should benefit the most from it's solar power
>concerns turn into conflicts
>moon colonists are caught in the crossfire of warring nations
>moon colonists decide to retrofit giant microwave laser that transmits power into a death ray
>moon colony now has complete control over earth

>>8765177
so the moon is Mexico?

>>8764941
I got this. Also apparently you need them to track the sun on Mars because the potential is already so bad.

>>8765014
Weight efficiency?
Nuclear would weigh less than the number of solar panel equivalent, plus provides all day power without needing batteries.

>>8765018
Because despite it being much closer (relative to our scale), the Moon is a much harder nut to crack when it comes to colonization. Compared to doing the same on Mars, establishing a meaningful human presence there would be dramatically more challenging while offering a significantly reduced payoff.

>>8764924
Nuclear isn't renewable. And it'd be a bitch to obtain and refine all that radioactive garbage from mars if an independent self-sustaining colony is the goal.

Well, mars has sandstorms about every 2 years that last for months, so solar panels would get buried every 2 years.. Nuclear.

>>8765323
The benefit of the moon is proximity, low gravity, and 24/7 solar power. Perfect place to test robotic base construction using lunar material.

>>8764924
Memes and /sci/ butthurt

>>8764939
It has wind, but due to the low atmospheric pressure its not really gonna have the force to know over a rocket

>>8764941
I've read somewhere that dust storms can last for months at a time

>>8765542
24/7 solar power he says
>You must not know about moon dust, have fun repairing those panels every 15 minutes.

>>8764939
>Mars has like no wind

>>8765542
The extremely low gravity is also part of the problem. It's low enough that it's extremely likely to cause physiological problems, making long term habitation difficult or impossible. You'd need to shuttle people between Earth and the moon every 3-6 months to keep them healthy. It also poses major issues to construction, allowing dust and debris to fly around and clog machinery. Any kind of manufacturing capabilities there would require extensive re-engineering of most of our current machinery.

Mars, on the other hand, has enough high enough gravity that resulting physiological problems are likely greatly mitigated or a non-issue. It's also high enough to keep the dirt and shavings on the floor, yet low enough that getting into orbit is still cake compared to Earth.

>>8766247
Combined with the vastly greater variety and quantity of raw materials available there along with an Earthlike day-night cycle and closer proximity to the asteroid belt, Mars is easily a more appealing target, and colonies settling there stand a far better chance at becoming permanent and self-sustaining. With enough bootstrapping, people there stand a solid chance of figuring out how to live and even thrive there.

That's not to say doing the same on the moon isn't possible, but it's far more difficult in every single way and thus much more unlikely. I suspect the extent of our presence on the moon will be stuck at ISS-style science outposts and lunar resorts until our technology has progressed considerably.

>>8765018
The Moon has even less gravity and atmosphere, lot harder

>>8764924

Bio-fuels. We don't want to pollute another world with radiation and co2.

>>8764939
>no wind
are you kidding me? have you seen the dust storms? they'd put earth climate to shame

>>8766394
It's only picking up very small particles of dust. There really is no wind on Mars since there is no atmosphere. A person wouldn't even feel 100 mph winds on Mars. Think of it like this. Even if the water coming out of the hose is the same speed, it wouldn't feel a garden hose as much as a fire hose.

>>8764924
Cool cartoon bro

>>8765542
>24/7 solar power on the moon
How might you accomplish that? It gets dark pretty frequently.

>>8766577
One side of the moon always has light and the other side always has dark, not counting eclipses.

>>8764924
slave labor

>>8764924

In seriousness: geostationary solar with microwave power transmission. Nuclear for backup power during storms.

Reasoning:

1. Fragile solar panels wouldn't have to be deorbited, making setup much simplier. This also saves delta-v transportation costs.
2. Each individual panel would get more power on orbit than it would on the ground.
3. Minimal power infrastructure on the ground, just dishes. This is important considering how heavy power transformers are.
4. In the event of an emergency, power can easily be rerouted to specific ground stations or even other things in orbit. This is important considering that future spacecraft propulsion might be electric based (ie, VASMIR)

Only problem is that if something crashes into the power station, then everyone on the ground is fucked. But this can be avoided by having multiple power stations, a thing which is possible considering that they won't have to be deorbited and they can be placed any place where this is line-of-sight with the ground target.

>>8767155
>geostationary solar with microwave power transmission
This isn't even proven to work on Earth.

>>8765177

>>8767074
hmmm

>>8767074
>this level of spatial retardation
post tits

>>8767207

Microwave power transmission is proven to work, both under Tesla himself and with more recent experiments by the Dept. of Energy. Only thing left is to make a full size demonstrator.

>>8767074

>>8765286
but what happens when the duster gets dirt on it's solar panel!

>>8767258
send up some expendable human trash to do the hard work, in a century or so you'll have Australia in space, should anyone survive

>>8767258
easy

>>8767258
>>8767355
A little dock at the end which fills up the water and cleans it. Powered by all the other panels.

>>8767074
>One side of the moon always has light and the other side always has dark, not counting eclipses.

Apparently my source was wrong. Moon gets 2 weeks of light then 2 weeks of dark.

>>8767258

It also keeps the leafs out

solar at first.

nuclear power plants later. dumping their heat into permafrost/ice/dry ice to melt them as part of resource collection and terraforming.

>>8767756
What type of nuclear?
RTG may be a good first choice for a small number of people combined with solar. Later a graphene or other stuff of reactor may be best.

>>8764924
there is clearly no water on the planet, you can even see that from OPs picture

so why the fuck do we even want to colonize that shit?

>>8764939
The martian equivalent of a hurricane would be a very, very light breeze.
Take a look at the atmosphere. See how it's almost black? Martian atmosphere is nearing less than 0.1% Earth's atmospheric pressure

>>8765711
That dust is incredibly fine. We're talking finer than flour, so that dust devil really isn't saying much.

>>8768901
Dumping more mars pics because shit, we're going to Mars guys

>>8768912
Behold the dead caldera of Olympus Mons, largest known volcano in the Solar System

>>8768917
Behold the innovative work of Yurope! Watch as it lands and furthers our understanding of--- oh. Whoops. Better luck next time guys.

>>8768920
Here we see the area where Pathfinder landed. Can you find it?

>>8768390
retard

>>8768925
Here we see the brine water deposits of Mars. Perhaps there are extremophiles eeking out an meager existence within them? Could they be the answer to 'Are we Alone?'

>>8768931
As a symbol of America's success in colonising Mars, Donald decides we should make it a little more homely.

>>8768934
Mars' old highschool photo. She aged pretty poorly, but I'd still hit it.

>>8768936
Again, another interpretation of what Mars may have looked like when she was younger.

>>8768940
Did you think the oceans were big? Think again.

>>8768945
One day you'll wake up to this view.

>>8768954
One final view of the red planet. We'll be there soon.

>>8764941
aren't the mars rovers atleast somewhat powered by nuclear? or am i thinking of the craft they got there with

>>8769057
The Curiosity Rover is powered by a mini nuclear reactor

>>8765177
what is Red Mars. (kinda)

>>8767668
>implying a source was used

>>8769080
Really? I always thought it just fed off the heat of decaying isotopes like voyager and the like.

>>8769120
How hard is it to move all that water to Mars? Similarly, how hard is it to force that to collide into Mars?

>>8764924
you write the power as a superscript on top of the base.
[eqn](base)^{power}[/eqn]

>>8769513
AHEHEHEHEAHAHAHAEHAHAHEHAHEHEHEHEHEAHAHAHA

>>8764924
Depends on budget. If possible both. Tight budget solar.

>>8769546
Solar is much better in terms of power to weight
Unless regulatory jewry goes away, noone is going to spend billions on reactors for mars

>>8764932
>>8764939
>Mars has like no wind because of the thin atmosphere.
It also has like no liquid water because of the cold temperature (yeah, rare exceptions, direct sunlight on salty water, thin films on a dark surface, etc. not a major factor). So there's nothing to wash the fine dust out of the air.

Mars does get terrible dust storms that block most of the sunlight, so that is a factor to consider.

On the other hand, solar is going to be the most watts per kg, even averaged over the nights and dust storms. Plus there's no rules about who's allowed to use solar power. The biggest obstacle with nuclear power is that it's restricted technology. You can't easily experiment with it or deploy it. Every step must be approved by risk-averse bureaucrats.

If we're going purely on physical considerations, the consistent output of nuclear makes it very attractive (though less attractive on a windy planet than a windless, waterless one like the moon, where any spilled nuclear waste should generally stay where it landed until it decays, not get ground down and spread around). If you consider the social/regulatory realm, nuclear poses all sorts of difficulties that solar lets you avoid.

>>8765631
how are you going to get regolith into your panels
the bigger issue here is lunar phases but wait no we'll be on the poles so literally permanent sun except for eclipses
>>8767668
literally just get on the poles

I think large scale printable solar arrays would be the trick, all you need to do is ship a remote wet chemistry lab up there and you've got a flexible solar array that can be deployed using a simple inkjet printer

>>8770964
Bonus points for installing a flow lab for continuous production

>>8768901

>put RTG that can power it for decades
>put shitty low quality aluminium wheels that break down after few km

Who was the dumbass? Who?

>>8771117
they expected it to suffocate under the dust

>>8766374
You don't think 'bio fuels' produce co2? U don't think the Martian atmosphere already has a lot?

>>8771473
Isn't the Martian atmosphere almost entirely CO2?

>>8767074

>>8768912
>>8768917
>>8768920
>>8768925
>>8768931
>>8768934
>>8768936
>>8768940
>>8768945
>>8768954
>>8768958

>>8768917
I just saw this in a game and thought it was a glitch.

>>8767668
>>8767074
>>8766577
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_of_eternal_light

The moon does have a two week day/night cycle in general, but there are a few elevated spots near the poles where you can get massive amounts of constant sunlight

>>8772080
This must have been what my source (on leddit) was talking about. I thought they mentioned something about poles.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peary_(crater)

Looks like constant sunlight for 90% of the year.