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Outer moon colonization


Spaceception

Moon colony's  

22 members have voted

  1. 1. Which moon would be best for a colony?

    • Don't vote for the Gas giants
      0
    • Ju[iter;
      0
    • Io
      0
    • Gaynmede
      1
    • Europa
      4
    • Callisto
      5
    • Saturn;
      0
    • Titan
      7
    • Rhea
      0
    • Iapetus
      0
    • Enceladus
      4
    • Uranus
      0
    • Titania
      1
    • Oberon
      0
    • Miranda
      0
    • Neptune
      0
    • Triton
      0
    • Pluto
      0
    • Charon
      0


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7 hours ago, fredinno said:

It's basically non-existant..

You can make Oxidizer from the oxide rocks on Titan. Be sure to bring a LOT of power, though, to do that...

We haven't even sent probes to the trojans yet!

You forgot Miranda, and Charon of Uranus and Pluto, respectively.

 I mean look at this thing!Miranda.jpg

I added it, although, if we were to colonize those worlds, we'd likely need a space elevator with a massive station on the end to provide gravity.

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Ganymede and Titan have similar surface gravities to our Moon, so, if people can live on the Moon, they'll be able to live on Ganymede and Titan. If you don't mind living on a radiation-bathed volcano, Io has more gravity than the Moon :P

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2 minutes ago, SargeRho said:

Ganymede and Titan have similar surface gravities to our Moon, so, if people can live on the Moon, they'll be able to live on Ganymede and Titan. If you don't mind living on a radiation-bathed volcano, Io has more gravity than the Moon :P

Yeah, but the gravity on Miranda is 0.079 m/s compared to the Moon, 1.62 m/s, waaaay too weak for our bones, but great for a possible mining colony/Vacation resort. :)

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Artificial gravity by rotation is also possible on bodies which already have some gravity. So a low gravity is not that bad, as you might think. It requires more complicated buildings, that is right. But it is not impossible to live there.

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3 hours ago, Kaos said:

Artificial gravity by rotation is also possible on bodies which already have some gravity. So a low gravity is not that bad, as you might think. It requires more complicated buildings, that is right. But it is not impossible to live there.

Something like this (Only on a moon and scaled up really big)? Brooks_CENTRIFuge.jpg

Edited by Spaceception
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49 minutes ago, Spaceception said:

Something like this (Only on a moon and scaled up really big)? Brooks_CENTRIFuge.jpg

Yep, pretty much. Miranda has little gravity, so the main problems should be clearance and disorientation when you get out of that thing.

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all those places seems great for visit, but I don't imagine a self sustaining colony in any of those places.
I can imagine a robotic refueling station in case we still use chemical rockets by that time... 

By the way.. you've forgotten Enceladus, the most water active moon.

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6 minutes ago, AngelLestat said:

all those places seems great for visit, but I don't imagine a self sustaining colony in any of those places.
I can imagine a robotic refueling station in case we still use chemical rockets by that time... 

By the way.. you've forgotten Enceladus, the most water active moon.

There's an option for Enceledus, look again.

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7 minutes ago, AngelLestat said:

all those places seems great for visit, but I don't imagine a self sustaining colony in any of those places.
I can imagine a robotic refueling station in case we still use chemical rockets by that time... 

By the way.. you've forgotten Enceladus, the most water active moon.

It's on there. And there's water on a lot of these places (Drinking water, O2, fuel cells, etc), which solves most of your problems, you can also use nuclear for power (And by the time we're ready to put people on these places Fusion will likely be an option), Hydrophonics with artificial lighting, and there's probably metal on a few of these, or maybe we could mine some of the Asteroid moons for metal, and use 3-D printing when metal isn't an option.

Edited by Spaceception
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With that little gravity on some of the moons, it might not be that difficult to come from one moon to another. So you do not need to find all the resources on one moon. Then it does not matter where you build the colony, you just gather the resources where they are and build the colony anywhere.

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14 hours ago, fredinno said:

It's basically non-existant..

You can make Oxidizer from the oxide rocks on Titan. Be sure to bring a LOT of power, though, to do that...

We haven't even sent probes to the trojans yet!

You forgot Miranda, and Charon of Uranus and Pluto, respectively.

 I mean look at this thing!Miranda.jpg

Yeah. But we are very talented at "studying at a distance", and we'll only get better at it. But a probe would certainly be good to have. But we're talking about when colonization will occur. We don't know when. Decades? Centuries? Millennia? I don't know. But decades isn't likely, not in any way. Centuries seems the most likely. 

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16 minutes ago, Kaos said:

With that little gravity on some of the moons, it might not be that difficult to come from one moon to another. So you do not need to find all the resources on one moon. Then it does not matter where you build the colony, you just gather the resources where they are and build the colony anywhere.

Exactly.

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22 hours ago, Kaos said:

On many space related topics I am for far fetched plans, but colonizing the outer moons of the solar system should not happen before we have managed to construct at least one more or less self-sustaining colony on Mars, Moon, Venus or a near Earth asteroid, in my opinion.

The outer moons combine a set of disadvantages against these closer targets: Much less solar power, more complicated to reach, more complicated to come back, longer communication delay to earth, we know less about them.

Given a time where we already have several colonies at the closer celestial bodies, we should study them much closer to get more knowledge about them, before we make that a far-reaching decision, it will need a lot of effort, we should choose wisely.

So at the moment, all of the decisions are equivalently taken without deep knowledge, so I choose Europa, because it has at least water and because of the film Europa Report.

Europa report was pretty good. :) Spoiler alert below!

Spoiler

I liked the part where they found life, but the crew dying was sad.

 

Edited by Spaceception
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2 hours ago, fredinno said:

There's an option for Enceledus, look again.

>_< it wasn't there before XD
See.. now it has 2 votes :)

8 hours ago, Kaos said:

Artificial gravity by rotation is also possible on bodies which already have some gravity. So a low gravity is not that bad, as you might think. It requires more complicated buildings, that is right. But it is not impossible to live there.

Yeah, but you will need to buy those rights to the venus corporation, and we don't sale to avoid competition in the solar system.
http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/93905-nasa-is-considering-a-manned-mission-to-venus-before-mars/&do=findComment&comment=1629108

But, even with the extra cost for that, it does not solve the radiative shielding issue.
Maybe in enceladus would be possible use a thermal nuclear reactor, not to produce electricity.. just for thermal, then you increase the temperature until the point you separate oxygen from hydrogen, this will create a thin atmosphere around, and then you ignite a cigarette to create extra heat which..  will to create more atmosphere?   :S   
Not sure.. but I guess it should be a way to find some twisted way to live in enceladus.  
 

Edited by AngelLestat
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1 minute ago, AngelLestat said:

>_< it wasn't there before XD
See.. now it has 2 votes :)

Yeah, but you will need to buy those rights to the venus corporation, and we don't sale to avoid competition in the solar system.
http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/93905-nasa-is-considering-a-manned-mission-to-venus-before-mars/&do=findComment&comment=1629108

But, even with the extra cost for that, it does not solve the radiative shielding issue.
Maybe in enceladus would be possible use a thermal nuclear reactor, not to produce electricity.. just for thermal, then you increase the temperature until the point you separate oxygen from hydrogen, this will create a thin atmosphere around, and then you ignite it to create extra heat which..  i dont know.. to create more atmosphere?  
Not sure.. but I guess it should be a way to find some twisted way to live in enceladus.  
 

I dunno, I added Europa and Enceladus, but in real life, maybe they should be preserved moons if they have life, ya know? We don't want to wreck Alien life in our own solar system, maybe we should wait until we have more data about extraterrestrial life before we colonize worlds with life, so we don't accidentally kill any future colonists with an Alien virus, or we wipe them out with our viruses.

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agree, but I guess we would be able to find life in any celestial object before we sent the first guy there.. Not sure with mars..
And then when we finally find it, there is something amazing about life..  we can kill it! XD
Is all more fun after that.

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10 minutes ago, AngelLestat said:

agree, but I guess we would be able to find life in any celestial object before we sent the first guy there.. Not sure with mars..
And then when we finally find it, there is something amazing about life..  we can kill it! XD
Is all more fun after that.

Yay!! Alien Extinction!!!

I kinda don't want there to be life on Mars, so we can Terraform/colonize it without the annoying UN butting in.

Also, we should put scientific bases on Planets/Moons with life, but colonizing is iffy iffy.

Edited by Spaceception
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On 1/15/2016 at 7:08 PM, peadar1987 said:

I can't imagine us going to Saturn before Jupiter. Longer transit time, more delta-V, less sunlight for power, it's just a far riskier mission. Otherwise Titan would be amazing.

If the tables found here are valid (Scroll to "Delta V Required for Travel Using Hohmann Orbits"); Flying from Earth to Jupiter requires 24,192 m/s. For Saturn it is surprisingly less; requiring 18,259 m/s to make the journey. The reason I suspect is that an impulse required to insert into Saturn's orbit would be smaller as it's local orbital velocity would be slower than Jupiter's. (Note this assumes departure is accomplished using Hohmann Transfer. Alternative departure technique could yield different results)

Further if the technology is available to conduct a journey to either gas giant; the type of power generation for either mission would be something more potent than either RTGs or Photovolatic Cells. One thought is the use of an advanced nuclear reactor. NASA was investigating using small compact reactors back in the early part of this century that drove a turbine to produce power. With similar advanced power producing capabilities; the lack of sunlight wouldn't necessarily be that great of a concern for an attempt to colonize Saturn.

Finally the radiation belts of Jupiter would be a significant risk for human colonization of the Jovian system to overcome. To my knowledge only Callisto is far enough away from the radiation soup trapped near the orbits of the other 3 Galilean moons to be a suitable prospect for colonization. To colonize Europa or Gaynamede would require colonist to seek refugee underneath the surface of these moons to escape the threat of radiation. If my recollection is correct Saturn does not have such a harsh radiation environment.

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11 minutes ago, Exploro said:

If the tables found here are valid (Scroll to "Delta V Required for Travel Using Hohmann Orbits"); Flying from Earth to Jupiter requires 24,192 m/s. For Saturn it is surprisingly less; requiring 18,259 m/s to make the journey. The reason I suspect is that an impulse required to insert into Saturn's orbit would be smaller as it's local orbital velocity would be slower than Jupiter's. (Note this assumes departure is accomplished using Hohmann Transfer. Alternative departure technique could yield different results)

Further if the technology is available to conduct a journey to either gas giant; the type of power generation for either mission would be something more potent than either RTGs or Photovolatic Cells. One thought is the use of an advanced nuclear reactor. NASA was investigating using small compact reactors back in the early part of this century that drove a turbine to produce power. With similar advanced power producing capabilities; the lack of sunlight wouldn't necessarily be that great of a concern for an attempt to colonize Saturn.

Finally the radiation belts of Jupiter would be a significant risk for human colonization of the Jovian system to overcome. To my knowledge only Callisto is far enough away from the radiation soup trapped near the orbits of the other 3 Galilean moons to be a suitable prospect for colonization. To colonize Europa or Gaynamede would require colonist to seek refugee underneath the surface of these moons to escape the threat of radiation. If my recollection is correct Saturn does not have such a harsh radiation environment.

Hmmmmmm... The Delta-V may be lower, but it looks like it'd take a shorter amount of time to get to Earth to Jupiter, than Earth to Saturn, So which is better to colonize first?

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I'm placing my bets on Enceladus. It is a moon with an underwater ocean.

Since water can be split into hydrogen and oxygen gas through electrolysis, the hydrogen gas can be used as cold air jets to propel a spacecraft around, while the oxygen can be used for you know, breathing and stuff.

The water also serves as a natural coolant for RTGs as a power source.

Additionally, placing a vessel at a depth which the pressure is at 1 atm allows for less structural demands, and the inhabitants would be safe from getting crushed under the weight of the ocean.

The main concern is, the freezing temperatures and a way to drill through the thick ice sheet. Once we get past the barrier, i think colonization of the moon would be pretty easy.

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25 minutes ago, Rdivine said:

I'm placing my bets on Enceladus. It is a moon with an underwater ocean.

Since water can be split into hydrogen and oxygen gas through electrolysis, the hydrogen gas can be used as cold air jets to propel a spacecraft around, while the oxygen can be used for you know, breathing and stuff.

The water also serves as a natural coolant for RTGs as a power source.

Additionally, placing a vessel at a depth which the pressure is at 1 atm allows for less structural demands, and the inhabitants would be safe from getting crushed under the weight of the ocean.

The main concern is, the freezing temperatures and a way to drill through the thick ice sheet. Once we get past the barrier, i think colonization of the moon would be pretty easy.

We'd have to see if there's life first, we don't want the Moons first mass-extinction caused by us being careless with Alien life, and accidentally infecting it with our viruses. Otherwise, we'd just put a scientific base on it.

Edited by Spaceception
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6 hours ago, Bill Phil said:

Yeah. But we are very talented at "studying at a distance", and we'll only get better at it. But a probe would certainly be good to have. But we're talking about when colonization will occur. We don't know when. Decades? Centuries? Millennia? I don't know. But decades isn't likely, not in any way. Centuries seems the most likely. 

Any sort of colonization will take centuries.

5 hours ago, AngelLestat said:

>_< it wasn't there before XD
See.. now it has 2 votes :)

Yeah, but you will need to buy those rights to the venus corporation, and we don't sale to avoid competition in the solar system.
http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/index.php?/topic/93905-nasa-is-considering-a-manned-mission-to-venus-before-mars/&do=findComment&comment=1629108

But, even with the extra cost for that, it does not solve the radiative shielding issue.
Maybe in enceladus would be possible use a thermal nuclear reactor, not to produce electricity.. just for thermal, then you increase the temperature until the point you separate oxygen from hydrogen, this will create a thin atmosphere around, and then you ignite a cigarette to create extra heat which..  will to create more atmosphere?   :S   
Not sure.. but I guess it should be a way to find some twisted way to live in enceladus.  
 

You don't have radiation shelling on most moons anyways-just surround the HAB in regolith (In a shell).

2 hours ago, Exploro said:

If the tables found here are valid (Scroll to "Delta V Required for Travel Using Hohmann Orbits"); Flying from Earth to Jupiter requires 24,192 m/s. For Saturn it is surprisingly less; requiring 18,259 m/s to make the journey. The reason I suspect is that an impulse required to insert into Saturn's orbit would be smaller as it's local orbital velocity would be slower than Jupiter's. (Note this assumes departure is accomplished using Hohmann Transfer. Alternative departure technique could yield different results)

Further if the technology is available to conduct a journey to either gas giant; the type of power generation for either mission would be something more potent than either RTGs or Photovolatic Cells. One thought is the use of an advanced nuclear reactor. NASA was investigating using small compact reactors back in the early part of this century that drove a turbine to produce power. With similar advanced power producing capabilities; the lack of sunlight wouldn't necessarily be that great of a concern for an attempt to colonize Saturn.

Finally the radiation belts of Jupiter would be a significant risk for human colonization of the Jovian system to overcome. To my knowledge only Callisto is far enough away from the radiation soup trapped near the orbits of the other 3 Galilean moons to be a suitable prospect for colonization. To colonize Europa or Gaynamede would require colonist to seek refugee underneath the surface of these moons to escape the threat of radiation. If my recollection is correct Saturn does not have such a harsh radiation environment.

Ganymede is ok for radiation, at least for probes.

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1 hour ago, Rdivine said:

I'm placing my bets on Enceladus. It is a moon with an underwater ocean.

Since water can be split into hydrogen and oxygen gas through electrolysis, the hydrogen gas can be used as cold air jets to propel a spacecraft around, while the oxygen can be used for you know, breathing and stuff.

The water also serves as a natural coolant for RTGs as a power source.

Additionally, placing a vessel at a depth which the pressure is at 1 atm allows for less structural demands, and the inhabitants would be safe from getting crushed under the weight of the ocean.

The main concern is, the freezing temperatures and a way to drill through the thick ice sheet. Once we get past the barrier, i think colonization of the moon would be pretty easy.

So? Water is everywhere, especially in the outer solar system. The rare thing is LIQUID water.

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