JebKeb

Moon mining would probably be the best place to start. The moon is similar chemical composition, close and reasonably safe. Considering we'd be rich enough to mine in space, we could probably also make a giant space catapult or rail gun to return capsules filled with shipping containers of product.

OK, let's get to business. Let's start at the very start - What is the best method for CO2 capture? I'm thinking a Siemens cycle device would go well. but are there other chemical absorption methods that are stable? (quicklime scrubbing doesn't work - the seperation process is unstable)

Umm, please explain?! I guess the i was a mistake.

What's in Uranus's moons? I suspect water ice and maybe some organic ices.

I don't see the dinosaurs of ICE cars and oil companies turning away soon. I don't like my idea, but it seems to be the best way to stop the planet melting. Wood gas is uncalorific, dangerous (carbon monoxide) and requires lots of modification. First you need an LPG engine, then you have to put a giant wood gasifier on the back. It might not seem like much, but if you do it for billions and billions of cars, the price adds up immensely.

Woah. The problem seems to be, with biofuela they are not completely compatible with engines today and I don't see any great advantages switching to them over synthetic fuel apart from EROI? Synthetic fuel can use the multibillion dollar oil infrastructure by constructing a few basic plants. The oil industry has less stuff to worry about. It can probably be cheaper than oil. Anyone else got methods of producing hydrogen?

Let's pretend I have a space mining company. Where would we go? What would we mine for? Here's what I'm thinking of. Sulfur on Venus Iron on Mars Methane on Mars Precious metals on asteroids Crystals on Io? Hydrogen on the gas giants Water on Europa, Ganymede and Callisto Organics on Enceladus? Hydrocarbons on Titan Nitrogen compounds on the gas giants and Triton? Also, what's out in the Kuiper Belt apart from ice?

I've been researching into making synthetic petroleum products for quite a while. I think now I should share it with the forums. First, CO2 from the air is captured with a Linde cycle device or some other method. Next, it is mixed with H2 from electrolysis and mixed with a nickel catalyst. CO2 + 4H2 -Ni + 350C-> CH4 + 2H2O The methane is seperated and pumped into the natural gas grid. The other methane is taken and catalytically partially oxidised into syngas. 2CH4 + O2 -Rh + 850C-> 2CO + 4H2 This syngas is then put through a Fischer-Tropsch reactor to yield synthetic alkanes and other hydrocarbons, which can be shipped off to an oil refinery. (2n+1)H2 + nCO -Co + 340C-> CnH(2n+2) + nH2O Is this in any way worthwhile (money making) or is it useless?

The spaceplanes have horrible payload margins, so we're switching to rockets - SpaceX style. Problem is, the landing legs aren't long enough... I am being serious, anyone able to help on this issue?

Thanks for clearing this up. I was rather sceptical of it when I first heard the concept, but still thought it would work because I didn't have a very good understanding of electric motors.

Don't go searching around for anything more about magnets crushing things...pls...

Neodymium appears to be a very strong magnet. Would it be possible to replace the electromagnets in a electric motor with normal magnets and have it spin. Then...use it to spin a generator *gasp* It isn't a pertpetual motion machine - the energy in the magnetism was added when the neodymium was formed in a supernova or some other dramatic event. It shouldn't last forever - I think it would decay and lose it's magnetism slowly as the energy is used up. But that would probably take billions of years. If it works, we have probably solved the world's power problems. But it won't be safe enough to replace batteries... Not that impressive, but still. The magnets to run a car generator would be much stronger.

The space shuttle has been in development for ages. I think we're going to need RCS engines... One of our happy test pilot avatars in our simulation database after the landing.

Eerm, I wasn't talking about rocket fuels... Still, thanks for that small amount of info. EDIT: "usefuel" hahahah

I'm trying to make fuels through a process called the Fischer-Tropsch process. Here is the basic equation. (2n+1)H2 + nCO ---> CnH(2n+2) + nH2O So if I was trying to produce petrol, would I aim for octane? 17H2 + 8CO ---> C8H18 + 8H2O I know there would be competing reactions with smaller amounts of the feedstock going off in their own smaller reactions to produce butane and others, but would they produce something usefuel? I think it would need some altering in some way after production. And seperation from the water.

What are all the compounds in petrol and diesel? As in, list of things like octane, benzene, ect... I know the ranges of compounds, but what are they? I'm not talking about additives. I mean the actual constituents.

Can't do dev until I get 1.1. Closing this thread, because it's so ancient.

There. Here's your picture.

Let's say there's about 1 cubic metre of soil for every square metre and the soil is around 30% oxygen. The surface area of Mars is roughly 150 million square kilometres, or around 150 trillion square metres. So that's about 50 trillion kilolitres, or 50 quadrillion litres. This is around the same amount of oxygen as in half of the water in the Atlantic ocean. oooOOOooo Which is better for petrol (gasoline) production? The Fischer-Tropsch process, where hydrogen and synthesis gas is turned into naptha, diesel and kerosene but can be tweaked to provide petrol. Or the Mobil process, where methanol is dehydrated into dimethyl ether, then dehydrated again into an unrefined synthetic petrol. If I only use the Fischer-Tropsch process there'll be less expense to build the plant, but, the tweaking might create unfavourable byproducts like methane. If I also use the Mobil Process there'll be more expenses and complications, but it produces far more useful things (propane, ethane) and has been tested throroughly. I'm swinging towards the Mobil Process.

In my career world, I'm trying to make an SSTO for refuelling and passenger services. I've been trying to make an SSTO for a while, and the present design just doesn't work. It runs out of fuel FAR too early. Here it is. So, can anyone give me any methods of building one or some maths to find out the delta-V savings if with wings? Thanks, JebKeb

It looks like I can't add a poll to this thread so in a few days I'll start a thread on general renewable fuels from biomass. It'll be a while away and I am planning to name it "Closed-loop petroleum replacement development."

I am having a mental battle. I have two methods of doing this, and they are both very different. The first method is the one I've been writing about presently. The second very attractive option is carbon capture. We capture the carbon, mix it with steam and apply UV light and we have syngas. (I have other methods of producing syngas, so if the current system is shoddy, no worry.) Then some of the syngas is taken and put through a catalyst. (There are several options.) The vapours that leave the reactor are condenses and refined into naptha and diesel. That is known as the Fischer-Tropsch process. The rest of the syngas is mixed with CO2 and dehydrated yielding dimethyl ether. The the DME is dehydrated futher over a zeolite catalyst to produce an unrefined petrol-like thing that can be refined into petrol. This is the Mobil process. So, which one should I choose? The second one removes more CO2, but the fuel is more toxic. The first one has unknown products on the biodiesel end. Anyway I'll leave you to decide while I try as well. P.S. Ironic, isn't it? A large climate denying oil company might help save the planet.

Wow! I've really forgotten about this place! I'll try and get Proksolar for 1.0.5 running. (That's sad, I got no help and the version switched over ) I'll boot it up, find the bugs and try to fix 'em.

I've developed the final flowchart. It should be arriving soon.

The space program has been rather cash strapped, so we've been developing a fully reusable moon shuttle on Jebediah's copy of KSP. This moon shuttle just been to the Mun, docked to the example target. Well, it barely scrapes through with 3 litres of fuel and it doesn't have landing legs, but it is a proof of concept. The real one will have one engine, a probe core and landing legs. A fuel shuttle is now to be designed, as well as a space shuttle. I'm not going to upgrade my career to 1.1 until I've got the aerospikes.