Colonizing Mars
Introduction
On Dec 18, 2014 ground based optical array at CSA HQ identified a giant meteorite (Codename JERICHO) on a collision course with Earth. ESTIMATED TIME TO IMPACT 745 DAYS, 13 HOURS, 23 MIN. Data verified by a special presidential operational mission using ISS, HST and VLBI resources.
Atmosphere and Thermal
The way to bring oxygen to Mars is by heating the atmosphere since its really cold that way when the planet heats up the soil will defrost and release carbon dioxide and more carbon in the atmosphere would further accelerate the greenhouse effect, bringing the average temperature up to 32°. Mars' frozen underground water supply would melt and flow and form a river and when the water reaches Martian soil, it would break down latent peroxides, releasing oxygen into the atmosphere not yet enough to sustain human life, but enough to grow plants which would further increase the supply. or
Oxygen can be produced by splitting water into its constituent parts, hydrogen and oxygen. The oxygen will be used to provide a breathable atmosphere in the living units, and a portion will be stored in reserve for conditions when there is less power available. For example at night, and during dust storms.
Heating:
Long Term Solution:
Our long term solution is to use large mirrors that orbit Mars. The mirrors would be in high orbit above Mars. Mars has a very low surface pressure so heat isn’t trapped in the atmosphere. The mirrors would reflect sunlight which would heat the surface. Over time, the temperature would keep increasing, releasing greenhouse gases which would create an atmosphere for Mars and trap the heat (terraforming). The mirrors would have to be built on Mars because it would be hard to carry something that large. It would take hundreds of years to completely terraform Mars.
Short term Solution:
Mars has a very weak magnetic field, so solar wind is slowly blowing away the atmosphere which means that heat can’t be maintained. Our solution is to place a network of satellites in orbit around Mars which would create an artificial magnetic field. During this time, we would be able to create an atmosphere that would stay in place. Also, we will paraterraform Mars. This solution can quickly create a temporary breathable atmosphere for Mars. Paraterraforming is creating a large, pressurized habitat with a breathable atmosphere. It would create an Earth-like environment on the inside. It allows sunlight to enter without allowing the atmosphere to escape.
Food
We are going to build greenhouses to keep plants and use fluorescent cool white lamps as a light source since they simulate earth’s sky color and the sun’s light since plant’s are used to a blue sky, and also because Mars’ only gets 52% of sunlight than earth does. There will be a greenhouse for fruits and vegetables, and a different greenhouse for wheat and potatoes since they require different conditions. We will grow edible mushrooms underground in mars’ soil since mushrooms do not require sunlight or much water, and do not require high maintenance. Since the food guide includes meat and proteins, we will initially send insects to mars and keep them in a small simulated habitat to reproduce and provide a meat source, but we will also start to engineer man-made meat in labs using tissue cells transported from earth after we have a very large population. We will use man-made meat as it is very challenging to bring animals to the planet and raise them there. The supplies transported from earth to make the greenhouses and other habitats will consist of glass, plastics and aluminum since those materials are lightweight yet strong. By the time that the population of this planet reaches 1000, we will have started a very good sustainable system of food.
Energy
Waste Management
Transportation
Getting around Mars. Rovers would be similar to cars and if we use solar panels to fuel these vehicles it would also benefit the environment There is also an idea of using maglev as an alternative, a maglev is like a train, for fuel instead of using solar panels as fuel we can use a different source to keep some variety, we can use a strong electromagnet to elevate it above the tracks.We could also use airplanes but at first when we arrive we need the atmosphere to be thicker rather than thinner because then the airplane can't take off since it needs a more dense atmosphere.
Habitat
We will have a rover go on the planet in the area so we can find the best place to settle. Once you find the right place to settle send the first Red Dragon capsule (it is a giant dome able to withstand the storm and temperature) to settle. After that we will send several smaller Red Dragon capsules all to the same area and we will have tunnels connecting them together the tube will be made from the same materials of the capsule. The capsules will be arranged the circle and they will each be connected to each other but there is a tube going in the middle and then connecting to every capsule.
After this built the inside of the structure can be depressurized and each capsule can be assigned to a task (example storage capsule, medical capsule etc). After this one more unmanned payload will be sent to build a mineshaft were they can mine resources (with robots or humans) and that means they can be self surfactant from there were they can start to expand the colony or have more capsules come in at the same array and have the two colonies connect. So in this solution the colonists have many different options on how they want to expand once the colony is setup.
Water
The solution that we chose is to fuse hydrogen atoms with oxygen atoms to create our own water, using oxygen atoms from the atmosphere and hydrogen atoms from the rocket fuel and in the future, plants.
Fuel cells that are present in spacecrafts can produce water by fusing hydrogen and oxygen. We could do the same thing but on a much bigger space. The process of electrolysis can separate hydrogen from oxygen. Even though it’s a very dangerous process because both atoms are flammable on Mars we have lots of room, so we would build many facilities away from anything important and build many small miniature facilities so if one blows up we have many others, instead of one big facility that can blow up and completely stop water production. (one facility would store the water and make sure it’s clean, and another could be to disperse the water to everyone through pipes or like big containers that can be transported by using the methods used by the transportation group.
Recycling Water:
We will recycle water by using the same water recycling systems used in our spacecraft, l like the water recycling system used on the ISS that recovers urine and other fluids into drinkable water. Then we will transport our recycled water to the freezing room and make the water into ice cubes, and put them in our vacuum pack bags then transport it to people’s homes. (using the transportation methods used by the transportation group)
Using Water:
We would store our water by vacuum packing with like a sipping pipe on the top to help you drink, so it does not form in carbonic acid. We would store water as ice cubes and melt it when we have to use it.We will use our water carefully by practicing basic methods that we do here on Earth.