Space Habitats

[NGTOne]

About 40 years ago, NASA was on a post-Apollo high, and was gathering ideas for what the future of space habitation would look like. The answer was less "submarine" and more "spinning cities in space". A few different designs were proposed, the chief ones being:

The Stanford Torus:

A large, doughnut-shaped station about 1.6 km across, that would rotate at 1 RPM to produce 1G at the edges of the ring. Estimated populations ranged from anywhere between 10 thousand and 100 thousand (based on design housing density - densities ranged from those of an urban suburb to those of a city core). It would also have agricultural and manufacturing sectors, using materials imported from the Moon. In the most optimistic scenarios, it was capable of self-replicating.

The Bernal Sphere:

A spherical station, about 16 km in diameter. It would also rotate to produce 1G along the equator of the sphere, with less as one got closer to the poles. Estimated population was anywhere between 20 and 30 thousand (with the entire population living near the equator, to benefit from the higher gravity there). A smaller version, about 500 meters in diameter, would house 10 thousand people, and rotate at 1.9 RPM to produce gravity. It would also possess agricultural and manufacturing facilities.

The O'Neill Cylinder:

A long, tubular station, optimized towards creating weather on the inside. The proposed design actually had two of them connected, rotating in opposite directions to produce gravity on their inner surfaces. Each one would be about 5 miles in diameter by 20 miles long (a sufficient volume of air to create [limited] weather effects). The "connectors" between the two cylinders would contain agricultural and industrial systems.

So, the question I put to the KSP community is this: are these designs efficient (for a given goal of permanently, comfortably housing a large civilian population in orbit, as opposed to on the surface of a body)? If not, what improvements could be made? Are there better designs?

Edited August 26, 2013 by NGTOne

[Nibb31]

The question is why?

What would be the purpose of putting so many people in orbit? If it's to deal with overpopulation, the main problem is finite resources, not real estate, and using up resources to build these would only make things worse. These colonies would rely on importing everything from Earth and would cost much more than colonizing Siberia or the Sahara desert. It would make more sense to build colonies where the resources are easy to get to.

[SargeRho]

They are easier to reach, but probably harder to build than surface habitation.

[jwenting]

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/spacestations.php

The answer to why they were never built is supposedly "the invention of the microchip made it possible to create viable unmanned satellites so manned observatories in orbit were no longer needed".

Why was this marvel never constructed? Because some clown invented the printed circuit. Freed from the tyranny of fragile and short-lived vacuum tubes, technologists could make unmanned satellites for Meteorologists, radio and TV signals, and watching hostile militaries. Such satellites could be assembled and launched at a fraction the cost of a manned station. They also did not require constant resupply missions to keep the crew alive.

Which would be a sad thing, what's arguably one of the greatest inventions of the 20th century causing the doom of Man's colonisation of space and with it quite possibly the eventual extinction of the species.

[Nibb31]

Which would be a sad thing, what's arguably one of the greatest inventions of the 20th century causing the doom of Man's colonisation of space and with it quite possibly the eventual extinction of the species.

The "extinction of the species" argument always sounds a bit weird to me. We have been on Earth for 200000 years, and the Earth has been around for 4.5 billion years. We are 8 billion individuals. I can't think of any cataclysmic event that would totally wipe out Humanity without leaving at least a few million survivors around the world. That is a much larger population than could be sustained by any self-sufficient space colony before many centuries.

As far as survival of the planet, we are safe for at least a few million years. Evolution alone will have turned us into something much different than the modern human species by then anyway. So whether we build colonies in space in 20 years or in 2000 years won't make much of a difference for our survival as a species.

And even if we are wiped out, what difference does it really make? It's not like we will be there to cry about it. We are just a tiny little spec of life in a remote corner of the universe that has only existed for a tiny fraction of a time. Nothing lasts forever, so why should our species? There is no reason to believe that we have some kind of mythological destiny or purpose or that we have more of a right to survive than the dinosaurs. If we what we recognize as modern humans ever disappears or evolves, then nature and life will find a way to fill the void with something better suited to the environment that we'll leave behind us. I'm ok with that.

Edited August 26, 2013 by Nibb31

[SargeRho]

I can think of one that happened a few times, and always killed nearly all life on Earth, and is bound to happen again. Large asteroid or comet impacting. This could easily bring us very close to extinction. The dinosaurs went extinct because they didn't have a space program.

Nobody said anything about having a right to survive. It's about being able to, not about deserving to.

[KOCOUR]

The Evolution alone will have turned us into something much different than the modern human species by then anyway.

Or maybe not, as this book says: http://www.amazon.com/Frozen-Evolution-Darwin-Farewell-selfish/dp/8086561739

[Nibb31]

I can think of one that happened a few times, and always killed nearly all life on Earth, and is bound to happen again. Large asteroid or comet impacting. This could easily bring us very close to extinction. The dinosaurs went extinct because they didn't have a space program.

The dinosaurs didn't have our intelligence. They couldn't shelter, warm themselves, or grow crops.

We could find ways to work around the lack of sunlight with artificial light and heating, we could build filtering systems to preserve our lungs from the dust. Sure, there might be a cataclysmic famine, we might lose a few billion fellow humans in the process, our culture and society might be destroyed, and we might even face a bottleneck event, but more than enough members of the species are likely survive to preserve the genetic pool. A few hundred more people on the Moon or Mars wouldn't make a difference if it's the species you're worried about.

Nobody said anything about having a right to survive. It's about being able to, not about deserving to.

And so what if we don't? Sure, the longer we live the better, and it's worth putting up a fight, but we are all going to die one day, and so is our species. It's just something that we've got to accept.

Edited August 26, 2013 by Nibb31

[SargeRho]

80000 certainly would make a difference.

And no, our species would not survive the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs. More so if it hit solid ground. Earth would be darkened for months, if not years. Crops would not grow, and the ones that were there will die and rot. Also fungi will dominate for that time. It'll be easier to build a 80000 colony on mars than to rebuild from scratch after such an impact.

And so what if we don't? Sure, the longer we live the better, and it's worth putting up a fight, but we are all going to die one day, and so is our species. It's just something that we've got to accept.

I agree that our species will go extinct some day, that doesn't mean we shouldn't do everything we can to delay that. Colonising space will do just that.

Edited August 26, 2013 by SargeRho

[King Arthur]

I can think of one that happened a few times, and always killed nearly all life on Earth, and is bound to happen again. Large asteroid or comet impacting. This could easily bring us very close to extinction. The dinosaurs went extinct because they didn't have a space program.

With current life support technologies, having space stations won't mean an asteroid won't make us extinct because, you know, no Earth == no resupplying == stations starve to death.

[Monkeh]

Iain M. Banks' 'The Culture', novels had it right with their orbitals.

Imagine a huge rock ring, thousands of kilometres across, slowly spinning. The spinning to produce gravity idea is good but will cause some strange effects due to Coriolis effect messing with your inner ear, so their needs to be a very large ring to minimise those.

This is the cover of his first Culture novel, 'Consider Phlebas':

If I remember correctly the Super AI minds of the colossal ships melt asteroids and planetoids together and use force fields to mould them into the ring shape.

This method gives you the most usable surface area to mass ratio or something. Planets are massively inefficient at providing square metres per tonne.

[SargeRho]

...So we have to develop those technologies. You know, like we always have done when we didn't have something we needed or wanted?

[Nibb31]

80000 certainly would make a difference.

Surely if we can build self-sufficient colonies on Mars or in orbit, with hydroponic farms and shielded habitats that could sustain that many people, we could maintain the same closed-loop life support on Earth, couldn't we? Besides, if we had the technology to send 80000 people to Mars, we would probably have the technology to detect and divert an asteroid in the first place.

And no, our species would not survive the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs. More so if it hit solid ground. Earth would be darkened for months, if not years. Crops would not grow, and the ones that were there will die and rot. Also fungi will dominate for that time. It'll be easier to build a 80000 colony on mars than to rebuild from scratch after such an impact.

Even if a Chicxulub asteroid hit us today, many of us would die, but we would certainly survive as a species. We have particle filters for breathing, we can build shelters or dig ourselves underground. Pretty quickly we would get power generators up and running that would provide heat and light. We could build hydroponic farms like we would on Mars. If we detect the asteroid in advance, we could prepare by stockpiling food and supplies and start building shelters. It wouldn't be fun, but there is no doubt that a small number of us would survive, and life would still be easier than on Mars. Even if it killed 99.9% of the world population, there would still be 8 million of us left, which was the total human population only 8000 years ago. That's more than enough for the species to survive, and 100 times larger than your Mars colony.

Edited August 26, 2013 by Nibb31

[DJEN]

Surely if we can build self-sufficient colonies on Mars, with hydroponic farms and shielded habitats that could sustain that many people, we could maintain the same closed-loop life support on Earth, couldn't we? Besides, if we had the technology to send 80000 people to Mars, we would probably have the technology to detect and divert the asteroid in the first place.

Surely, a 10+km asteroid would be quite easy to detect.

The hard part is deflecting it. Or busting it up and harvesting the pieces.

Even if a Chicxulub asteroid hit us today, many of us would die, but we would certainly survive as a species. We have particle filters for breathing, we can build shelters or dig ourselves underground. Pretty quickly we would get power generators up and running that would provide heat and light. We could build hydroponic farms like we would on Mars. If we detect the asteroid in advance, we could prepare by stockpiling food and supplies and start building shelters. It wouldn't be fun, but there is no doubt that a small number of us would survive, and life would still be easier than on Mars. Even if it killed 99.9% of the world population, there would still be 8 million of us left, which was the total human population only 8000 years ago. That's more than enough for the species to survive, and 100 times larger than your Mars colony.

Don't forget the global firestorms.

They're nasty.

dig ourselves underground

Oh.

The environment would be hard to salvage.

[DJEN]

I would personally prefer living on the surface of a planet than inside a ball/hoop/capsule/doughnut.

They look cool though.

[SargeRho]

Surely if we can build self-sufficient colonies on Mars or in orbit, with hydroponic farms and shielded habitats that could sustain that many people, we could maintain the same closed-loop life support on Earth, couldn't we? Besides, if we had the technology to send 80000 people to Mars, we would probably have the technology to detect and divert an asteroid in the first place.

Even a hydroponic farm needs light. We'd have to live completely under ground for possibly decades. If such an asteroid hit right now, we would have no chance of survival. Sending stuff to another planet and finding a grain of sand in space are two very different undertakings.

We may have not yet built a self-sufficient colony (had plenty of things like that back in the day though), we do have a closed, self-sufficient ecosystem that uses only the sun for power though

Edited August 26, 2013 by SargeRho

[Moon Goddess]

I'm a big proponent of manned space travel as a guard against extinction, but personally think it's going to be in the form of a generation ship. So anything we do now is just a learning process for that.

So a space habitat would help to learn how to house people in space long term in large numbers, but it's going going to be a guard against extinction itself.

I've been trying to find this quote I saw once but I can't find it, something about a planetary colony that goes thru a technological collapse to a dark ages, just goes to the dark ages, a space habitat going to the dark ages simply stops being.

[Nibb31]

Even a hydroponic farm needs light. We'd have to live completely under ground for possibly decades.

Wasn't that what you were proposing for a Mars base in that other thread?

Scientists estimate that it took 10 years for the dust to completely settle after the Chicxulub event. It would probably take much less before you get the same amount of light you would get on Mars (Mars gets about 40% of the daylight level of Earth). You wouldn't need to live underground either, you would just need air filtering. And we have this great invention called electricity for lighting.

I'm not saying it wouldn't be a cataclysmic civilization-ending event. I'm saying that although many species would go extinct, not all of them would. A lot of biodiversity was lost, many individuals died, but many species of flora and fauna survived the various extinction events. Those that didn't disappeared in the years after the impact because they were unfit for their new environment. Humans can more easily adapt to a new environment than other species, so there certainly would be a number of survivors.

If such an asteroid hit right now, we would have no chance of survival. Sending stuff to another planet and finding a grain of sand in space are two very different undertakings.

Bla bla bla... One is actually easier than the other, and it's not what you think it is.

But you are missing the point, which is that there is hardly any cataclysmic event in the foreseeable future that would wipe out 100% of humanity or 100% of life on Earth. Life is extremely resilient and humans are tough. Therefore a space colony as an insurance policy for survival of the species doesn't hold. And statistically speaking (which is what insurance policies are about after all), if this sort of event occurs at a scale of several million years, there really is no rush because whether we do it in 20 or 2000 years makes no difference on the geological scale.

The problem is that you have decided that you want a space colony, probably because of the romantic appeal of science fiction, and you are now looking for a reason to have one. You might as well just admit that you want one because it's cool, because there really is no real justification for one.

Edited August 26, 2013 by Nibb31

[SargeRho]

No, that wasn't what I was proposing. The part of the habitation units and the radiation shelters would be under ground. Not the entire colony. The hydroponics units would be above ground, or partially under ground with UV filtering glass and polyethylene, which assists in radiation shielding, windows and polyethylene frames.

Yes, of course a mars colony would be cool as balls. But that's not why I want to see them. I said why I want to see a Mars colony, and will say it again: To ensure our long-term survival, and to advance our species.

After such an asteroid, most people anywhere near the mexican gulf would die within minutes from the shockwave and fireball. Next we'll lose all crops, and with it the ability to feed ourselves and livestock. Disease will set in next. Poof, there goes most if not all our species. As for electricity: Such an impact causes an EMP, quite a powerful one.

Extracting ressources from human-inaccessible places is not a new thing either. In fact, Deep Sea Mining machines are being built right now. Similar, but of course lighter, machines could be used on Mars:

Edited August 26, 2013 by SargeRho

[Kerbart]

Iain M. Banks' 'The Culture', novels had it right with their orbitals.

Imagine a huge rock ring, thousands of kilometres across, slowly spinning. The spinning to produce gravity idea is good but will cause some strange effects due to Coriolis effect messing with your inner ear, so their needs to be a very large ring to minimise those.

This is the cover of his first Culture novel, 'Consider Phlebas' (snip)

Predated by about 15 years by Larry Niven's "Ringworld". Larry Niven also had some interesting solutions for having day/night cycles and keeping the sun centered in the ring.

[Nibb31]

I said why I want to see a Mars colony, and will say it again: To ensure our long-term survival, and to advance our species.

I will say it again (what a constructive discussion!): a space colony does nothing for our long-term survival because there is hardly anything that we couldn't survive as a species. As for "advancement", that's a totally subjective argument which is based on your own bias of what our "goal" or "purpose" or "destiny" is. The human race is extremely diverse and what you consider "advancement" might be a step sideways or backwards to other people from other countries, other cultures, with other priorities... It's ultimately meaningless.

After such an asteroid, most people anywhere near the mexican gulf would die within minutes from the shockwave and fireball. Next we'll lose all crops, and with it the ability to feed ourselves and livestock. Disease will set in next. Poof, there goes most if not all our species. As for electricity: Such an impact causes an EMP, quite a powerful one.

Scientists don't agree with you that an asteroid will destroy the entire human race. At least two studies state that an asteroid impact is survivable for humanity as a species: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impact_winter#Survivability

Survivability

As of 2003 there were about 2300 Near-Earth objects known; 650 of those were larger than 1 km (0.62 mi) in diameter.[4] More than one new one is discovered each year. 500 potentially hazardous objects are known, they are larger than 150 m (490 ft), and may approach the Earth closer than 20 times the distance to the Moon.[4] By the end of the decade we expect to know the orbits of 90% of the kilometer size near-Earth objects.[4][2] After this, the only unknown objects will be long period comets that will remain unseen until a few months before impact. Even then there would still be time to prepare. A US program in charge of this “Earth watch†is called the Near-Earth Object Program.[3][2][9] Knowing where the asteroids and comets are is the first step in the prevention and preparation for an impact. The next step to mitigation of an impact would be to either deflect the object: through surface or above-surface explosions, kinetic shock (sending an object to collide with the asteroid), or gravitational deflection; or destruction by drilling into the surface of the asteroid or comet to break it up using fusion nuclear explosives.[10][9] Even if the asteroid is too large to be destroyed or deflected there will still be time to prepare for the impact.[10][9] There would have to be shelters made and food stored to last at least a year, as well as cold weather plants developed to survive the decrease in temperature. There would still be millions of people who die in the initial impact, and the impact winter that follows, but the human race would likely survive an impact no matter the size.[10][9]

The references to the actual scientific papers are in the Wikipedia article.

As such, no matter how many times you say it again, you cannot claim that a space colony is essential for survival of our species, because our species is clever enough to survive pretty much everything without it.

Edited August 26, 2013 by Nibb31

[SargeRho]

Yes, we probably can survive most impacts, possibly even the bigger ones. But, it's not worth the risk. Life is too valuable to put on a single planet.

[Mr Shifty]

There is a classic Charlie Stross blog post on this topic:

http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2010/08/space-cadets.html

Humans are a climax organism that is fundamentally dependent on a couple of key ecosystems. There's the one we carry around in our guts  about a kilogram of bacteria and fungi, for a typical adult  without which we can't even digest most of our food. And there's the ecosystem we live in. (Or ecosystems. Because of our unique horizontally-transferable tool culture we can adapt to existence in terrestrial ecosystems other than the one our ancestors coevolved with. But there are limits; we don't thrive in Antarctica, or at the bottom of the ocean trenches.) We're also somewhat dependent on our extraordinary extended phenotype, from flint hand-axes to Space Shuttles. Maintaining that phenotype is a large-scale operation supported by a penumbra of extended cultural activities that maintain the ability to maintain the phenotype  primary school teachers, for example, don't bend metal but are absolutely vital to the activity of engineering insofar as you've got to start educating your next generation of engineers somewhere.

[Rondon]

Right back on track to the actual question at the start of the thread. It was something someone brought up about colonizing the moon,that if you needed a quite few(or lots) of people on the moon then an orbital station with artificial gravity and trips down and back. would be the most comfortable option and avoid health risks. In terms of design efficiency, hard to say really, but they should do the job.

[Omicron314]

I say we should colonize space because why the heck not? We don't exactly have anything better to do with our time. Besides, if we can make a large enough generation ship, we could convince all of our annoying politicians and despotic dictators that it would be a privilege to be on it and such, and then send it off to some obscure corner of the galaxy. There go most if our Earthly problems right there.