Cases for the colonisation of Mars

[DC]

You know, sometimes I wonder about you.

sure you do, i am Human

 

[Soapy Sam]

Because Australia is full.

Where else would we send the troublemakers?

 

[R.Mackey]

Mackey, would you be willing to expand on this? In our current phase of Mars exploration, do you have specific jobs in mind for which you think humans would be the better "tool"?

Are these jobs which robots are currently doing, or jobs which are not currently being done in this phase?

I'm certainly willing to give you my own personal opinion which represents nobody else and no agency whatsoever but, well, this is kind of difficult to answer, because our "current phase" of Mars exploration is rather limited. We have a handful of orbiting assets, and exactly two surface rovers whose speed is measured in centimeters per minute. Clearly astronauts would do better than what we have in place now, but then, we have absolutely no way to get them there. It's somewhat a moot point.

Do you envision shifting existing funds from jobs robots are doing, to support human-based jobs? If so, how much of a shift, and which robot jobs would you eliminate?

The sum total of Martian robotic exploration is a drop in the bucket compared to even the current astronaut program. There's no point raiding those funds. Nor do I see any reason to. If and when we get serious about a crewed mission to Mars, they will need robots along with them -- survey and relay spacecraft, orbiting return vehicles, surface crawlers, factories, etc. What I forsee is not a reduction in the robotic presence at all, but merely a change in operating concept.

Or do you envision an increase in funding, to support human based jobs? If so, how much of an increase do you anticipate, for each human job created?

That's a political question. I'm just a scientist. Crewed expeditions to Mars will be fabulously expensive barring several dramatic technological breakthroughs, and even then it won't be cheap at all.

Either way, what benefits do you envision from creating human jobs in this phase of our exploration of Mars, and how do you think they compare to the associated costs?

If you buy my argument that the search for life is the most important goal, then you can make a pretty strong case for astronauts. Let's say the major science goal is to drill a 1 km core in the most areologically favorable location, and analyze it for signs of life, microfossils, and climatological evidence. Pretty simple mission, right?

Not so simple for robots. We don't have an automatic drill with that kind of reliability. There's a lot that can happen -- breaking the drill, breaking the pipeline, chewing up drill bits, getting lost in shifting sands or what have you. Try it on Earth if you don't believe me. But, if you have astronauts around, if you have the time and the spare parts available, it's not such a difficult challenge. We do it right now at unhospitable sites such as Antarctica, and the equipment isn't even expensive.

Then you have the analysis problem. What is a robot going to look for? What are the odds that cameras and spectrographs and so on just won't capture what we need? It's not so easy to anticipate every test we'd want to run. This is borne out by the experience of Apollo 17, when Harrison Schmitt, a trained geologist, recovered more useful samples than the rest of the program -- and all robotic missions then and since -- in a mere 75 hours, and without moving more than eight kilometers from the landing site.

Yet again, there is plenty of need for the robotic side. How exactly do we tell them where to drill? How do we get them there? How do we keep the basics of their little Mars travel-trailer running so that they have time to do their work? All of this calls for large-scale, automated, tireless search by the robots. This allows for a high/low intelligence mix where both support each other. And that is what I believe we will eventually attempt.

The Mars Direct mission could be about $55 billion. Man is expensive, but he is still (and likely will remain for the next 50 years) the most flexible computer sent out, and with the best adaptive capacity available. The rovers, as ingenious and versatile as they are, have covered only 5.2 kilometers between them. The exploration they've done could be done by two men in, easily a week, including all the science these marvelous platforms have carried out.

Actually, MER has accomplished about 24 kilometers between them. Nonetheless, this is comparable to an ambitious three or four day work schedule of an astronaut team. But then again, MER is reality, whereas we have no way whatsoever to get astronauts to Mars.

Mars Direct could be done within the NASA budget for the space shuttle within ten years, leaving the unmanned programs pretty much as they are now. Current maintenance/flight status for the shuttles runs about $2.5 billion per year. Development and build costs were probably on the order of $5-6 billion per year for the first ten years of the program.

While the Mars Direct concept is fairly well thought out, there is absolutely no way it can be done for a program cost of $50B. This is sheer fantasy. It shouldn't be attempted for such a low amount, either, or else we'll fall into the same trap where promises get broken, political will fades, and programs get cancelled without accomplishing anything. A better planning number would be about ten times that, $500B. I'm serious. Going to Mars is not going to be an easy project at all.

Mars Direct also sweeps under the rug a few technical challenges that simply have not been solved. The biggest, again, is radiation. We do not know how to keep humans alive for that long outside Earth's magnetic field without many tons of structure. The Mars Direct proposal suggests that only 0.3 tons of shielding would be sufficient. This is wrong, full stop.

Another daunting technical challenge is the return voyage. Most proposals call for the transfer vehicle to remain in Mars orbit, with only a small capsule (think LM-style) boosting the astronauts up to it when it's time to go home. That return vehicle will sit in orbit for almost two years, its cryogenics boiling away the whole time, and its engine must restart or else. The Mars Direct alternative is to manufacture fuel on the surface, which is interesting, but that means we are now launching something far larger -- think Saturn I size -- from an unprepared site with no ground crew. There are no rockets rugged enough for this style of operations.

And then there's the issue of the Mars transfer vehicle itself. Mars Direct supposes this will be assembled in orbit. Well, fine, but you have to count the cost of those launches and those astronauts as well -- there will be no vehicles with that capability once Shuttle is retired. It could take something on par with our current Lunar sortie architecture just to build and service the Mars Direct system.

I'm not saying Mars Direct is a bad idea or even a suboptimal approach -- we just don't know enough about it yet -- but it serves no one to trivialize the technical challenge. Again, a crewed Mars mission will be extremely difficult, risky, and expensive. All the more reason to do it, I says, but we need to do it right.

 

[bokonon]

I can cite one possibility. So far we have sent two Viking landers, a Pathfinder vehicle, the Polar Lander, two Mars rovers, the Phoenix and soon the Mars Science Lab. At this point, we still do not have a definitive word on whether there is life on Mars, despite experiments on each of these landers/rovers to look for it.

Probably because the answer is "no," and the only definitive answer would have to be "yes."

The reason is because we haven't been asking the right questions, and that's a problem because robots need very specific questions to answer, and the next question depends on the answers to the previous ones.

Nonsense. We've been asking questions based on information previously obtained, just as you propose.

A single manned landing would have that answer within, probably, a week of landing (I'm using the Mars Direct proposal here for comparisons; it expects the team of four to land on Mars and spend 18 months there).

Only if they found extraterrestrial life. If they didn't, the question would remain open.

The rovers, as ingenious and versatile as they are, have covered only 5.2 kilometers between them. The exploration they've done could be done by two men in, easily a week, including all the science these marvelous platforms have carried out.

A flying rover could cover more territory too. That doesn't mean the information obtained would be any better than what we got from the rovers that are there.

 

[theprestige]

I'm certainly willing to give you my own personal opinion which represents nobody else and no agency whatsoever but, well, this is kind of difficult to answer, because our "current phase" of Mars exploration is rather limited. We have a handful of orbiting assets, and exactly two surface rovers whose speed is measured in centimeters per minute. Clearly astronauts would do better than what we have in place now, but then, we have absolutely no way to get them there. It's somewhat a moot point.

(Bolding mine.) Could you be more specific? I thnk I've already grasped your general premise. Better in what way? I mean, I understand (and sincerely appreciate) that astronauts would be more mobile and more versatile than robots (given a suitably diverse and robust set of tools), and that therefore they'd be able to accomplish more than robots. What I'm interested in are the specifics of your proposal, if you have any. Astronauts could certainly do more on Mars, but they would also cost more. They would also incur a dramatically increased risk of death.

The sum total of Martian robotic exploration is a drop in the bucket compared to even the current astronaut program. There's no point raiding those funds. Nor do I see any reason to. If and when we get serious about a crewed mission to Mars, they will need robots along with them -- survey and relay spacecraft, orbiting return vehicles, surface crawlers, factories, etc. What I forsee is not a reduction in the robotic presence at all, but merely a change in operating concept.

Would it be fair to characterize this change as being essentially the addition of a team of mechanics in a shirt-sleeve environment to perform contingency repairs and manufacturing tasks too complex for our current- and next-generation robots?

That's a political question. I'm just a scientist. Crewed expeditions to Mars will be fabulously expensive barring several dramatic technological breakthroughs, and even then it won't be cheap at all.

This is my own opinion as well. So: Since we're going to be spending all this money, I'm still interested to know what specific manned operations we would be spending it on, if you have any specifics in mind.

If you buy my argument that the search for life is the most important goal, then you can make a pretty strong case for astronauts.

I wasn't aware of that argument, and I'm not sure I buy it, but I'm happy to stipulate that some goal is important enough to make manned missions worth considering.

Let's say the major science goal is to drill a 1 km core in the most areologically favorable location, and analyze it for signs of life, microfossils, and climatological evidence. Pretty simple mission, right?

Not so simple for robots. We don't have an automatic drill with that kind of reliability. There's a lot that can happen -- breaking the drill, breaking the pipeline, chewing up drill bits, getting lost in shifting sands or what have you. Try it on Earth if you don't believe me. But, if you have astronauts around, if you have the time and the spare parts available, it's not such a difficult challenge. We do it right now at unhospitable sites such as Antarctica, and the equipment isn't even expensive.

Antarctica is still far more hospitable than Mars. And that equipment will be far more expensive once you factor in the cost of transporting it to Mars.

So that 1 km Martian core is going to be the most expensive (and risky) core in the entire history of drilling, by several orders of magnitude. Is it worth it? Maybe. Maybe not. I imagine one reason it hasn't been proposed as a major science goal is because nobody can agree that the fabulous expense of such a mission would be worth it.

Then you have the analysis problem. What is a robot going to look for? What are the odds that cameras and spectrographs and so on just won't capture what we need? It's not so easy to anticipate every test we'd want to run. This is borne out by the experience of Apollo 17, when Harrison Schmitt, a trained geologist, recovered more useful samples than the rest of the program -- and all robotic missions then and since -- in a mere 75 hours, and without moving more than eight kilometers from the landing site.

Again, I'm appreciative of the powerful capabilities of human explorers, compared to their robotic counterparts. What I'm wondering is whether the cost and risk of sending a human sample collector to Mars, and bringing him back, really do make this option more attractive than the more limited robotic one.

Yet again, there is plenty of need for the robotic side. How exactly do we tell them where to drill? How do we get them there? How do we keep the basics of their little Mars travel-trailer running so that they have time to do their work? All of this calls for large-scale, automated, tireless search by the robots. This allows for a high/low intelligence mix where both support each other. And that is what I believe we will eventually attempt.

I too believe we will eventually attempt it. I just don't believe that it's really such an attractive option right now.

I don't agree with the apocalyptoids who argue that our time on this planet is so short that we must immediately begin a crash program in Mars colonization.

I don't believe that our science questions are so urgent and interesting as to justify the expense and risk of sending humans to Mars to answer them--at least not at our current level of technology.

I had hoped, since you are actually involved in space exploration operations, that you had some specific Mars operations in mind. That based on your experience and observations you were confident that there were specific jobs humans could be doing on Mars, now or in the forseeable future, that would return such a wealth of information as to be worth the cost and risk.

I dream of the day when that's true. I hope it will be in my lifetime. But I've lived my entire life on the cake of "humans could do it better, if we ignore the cost" and "someday all our dreams will come true". It's tasty food, but very rich. Nowadays I'm scanning the menu for a basic, nutritious plate of rice and beans.

 

[Z]

I have a question: what is the justification for making Mars rovers move so slowly? Is it due to lag time in instructions from Earth to Mars, to prevent accidents and errors? Or did they just piece together motors from cheap parts, and that was as fast as they could move?

Just curious.

 

[Earthborn]

I have a question: what is the justification for making Mars rovers move so slowly?

I'm no expert, but my guess is that it is mostly an energy issue. The things have to be powered by fairly small solar cells on a planet quite a bit away from the sun.

 

[Z]

I'm no expert, but my guess is that it is mostly an energy issue. The things have to be powered by fairly small solar cells on a planet quite a bit away from the sun.

Hadn't considered that. Good point.

 

[shadron]

While the Mars Direct concept is fairly well thought out, there is absolutely no way it can be done for a program cost of $50B. This is sheer fantasy. It shouldn't be attempted for such a low amount, either, or else we'll fall into the same trap where promises get broken, political will fades, and programs get cancelled without accomplishing anything. A better planning number would be about ten times that, $500B. I'm serious. Going to Mars is not going to be an easy project at all.

All the data that I have (it's been a long, long time since I was connected with a space mission) is that the original Bush-driven Mars mission conceived by NASA (the 90-day report, 12/1990) was priced (by NASA, I think) at $450 billion, which congress rejected in all aspects. The same group priced the Mars Direct (or rather, the NASA-modified Design Reference Mission, what Zubrin called Mars SemiDirect) at $55 billion. Now, yes, one has to understand that that was NASA costing, and that is generally always gotten overrun in the long haul, and that was in ~1994, and inflation is always a problem. I think 500 billion is pretty high, but your guess is probably better than mine. As an example of perhaps typical cost overrun, the Mars Viking project final cost was $1.06 billion, which included $194 million in overruns, or 18%. (Of course, for today's dollars, multiply both by 4, but that was then, when NASA's budget was about $4.5 billion - today, it's about 4 times that - surprise.)

I'm not saying Mars Direct is a bad idea or even a suboptimal approach -- we just don't know enough about it yet -- but it serves no one to trivialize the technical challenge. Again, a crewed Mars mission will be extremely difficult, risky, and expensive. All the more reason to do it, I says, but we need to do it right.

I fully agree. Very good point about drilling a 1km core, by the way. Men with a fair machine shop of generalized, flexible tooling can do a lot of things, and meet a lot of contingencies.

 

[bokonon]

Why drill a core before a tethered rover has explored that canyon that's as big as a continent?

I agree with theprestige's closing comments. I'm sure, given sufficient longevity, that humanity will explore Mars in person someday. I just don't think it should be a priority now. Colonize the Sahara, colonize the continental shelf, colonize earth orbit, colonize the moon, then maybe someday, if there's a compelling reason to do so, make the leap to another planet. Put the cosmic cowboys on hold for a couple of centuries in the meantime; those planets aren't going anywhere.

 

[DavidS]

I'm no expert, but my guess is that it is mostly an energy issue. The things have to be powered by fairly small solar cells on a planet quite a bit away from the sun.

There's also a long delay of some minutes for sensor data to reach the earthbound controller and any corrective control signals to get back. Round-trip travel time for a towtruck is somewhat longer. Moving slowly and carefully isn't such a bad idea.

 

[Dorian Gray]

Yet another reason to colonise Mars:
To escape mention of Michael Jackson!

Also a reason NOT to go to the moon.

 

[shadron]

Why drill a core before a tethered rover has explored that canyon that's as big as a continent?

I agree with theprestige's closing comments. I'm sure, given sufficient longevity, that humanity will explore Mars in person someday. I just don't think it should be a priority now. Colonize the Sahara, colonize the continental shelf, colonize earth orbit, colonize the moon, then maybe someday, if there's a compelling reason to do so, make the leap to another planet. Put the cosmic cowboys on hold for a couple of centuries in the meantime; those planets aren't going anywhere.

If it didn't sound so nationalistic, I'd retort that you need to tell that to the Chinese, not the cowboys.

The only problem that I see with these other projects is that they all require some fraction of the resources the Earth has. If we can develop some source of plentiful cheap energy, then, sure, everything is pretty much open to solution then.

 

[shadron]

I'm no expert, but my guess is that it is mostly an energy issue. The things have to be powered by fairly small solar cells on a planet quite a bit away from the sun.

I think it is mainly an issue in not wanting to go nose first into a sand dune or other obstacle that the rover won't be able to clear. The directions have to be coded here on Earth, sent up on a 15 minute minimum speed-of-light delay, executed, and the the pictures from the new point returned to Earth. There certainly also is the issue of power; 140 watts of power at peak, for 4 hours per day, of which 100 is needed when driving.

http://marsrover.nasa.gov/mission/spacecraft_rover_energy.html

 

[shecky]

Why do proponents of human space exploration bring up the deficiencies of robots when buttressing their arguments? It seems to me that robot technology will only get better. Even now, robots can do many things humans simply can't.

I can't think of a single rational reason why we should begin worrying about sending humans to Mars any time soon. Colonization is probably the wackiest reason to think about sending humans there.

 

[Random]

Venus. Can't fix a planets gravity. Mars is going to have 1/3 g unless you can find a few more Mars sized planets to drop on it.

But 2001/O'Neill type stations are going to have Earth like environments long before we can think about terraforming.

Terraforming Mars vs Venus:

Venus has more mass and we know it can support an atmosphere indefinitely (quite a lot of atmosphere actually). Conversely, we know Mars can’t. On the other hand, if we can thaw out the Martian polar caps, that could give us a Martian atmosphere that could easily last longer than humanity.

We can land on Mars and set up bases on the surface. With Venus we would be sitting in orbiting space stations for a long time looking out our windows.

Mars has a rotational period fairly close to Earth, so any plants we decide to put into a pressuring greenhouse would not be able to tell the difference. They would have less sunlight that far out, but we could adjust the CO2 levels of the pressurized greenhouses to compensate. Any particular spot on Venus would spend a little under two months in darkness.

Neither Venus nor Mars has a magnetosphere to protect it from cosmic rays, so that is a wash.

If we can unlock the CO2 trapped at the Martian poles, and give the planet a CO2 rich atmosphere, it may be possible to simply plant crops out in the open and allow plant life to slowly convert the atmosphere to one with more Oxygen. Venus, well aside from the rotational period, we have surface temperatures that can melt lead and clouds of sulfuric acid in the atmosphere.

 

[shadron]

Why do proponents of human space exploration bring up the deficiencies of robots when buttressing their arguments? It seems to me that robot technology will only get better. Even now, robots can do many things humans simply can't.

I suppose because at the current state of the art, it is true. Perhaps in 100 years it won't be, but then, in this regard at least, 100 years from now I will be beyond caring.

Actually, no one is suggesting killing the robotic exploration. If you like robots, go for it.

I can't think of a single rational reason why we should begin worrying about sending humans to Mars any time soon. Colonization is probably the wackiest reason to think about sending humans there.

Like mumps, some people have a drive to explore and some don't. You don't have to go if you don't want to.

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

Mars has a rotational period fairly close to Earth, so any plants we decide to put into a pressuring greenhouse would not be able to tell the difference. They would have less sunlight that far out, but we could adjust the CO2 levels of the pressurized greenhouses to compensate. If we can unlock the CO2 trapped at the Martian poles, and give the planet a CO2 rich atmosphere, it may be possible to simply plant crops out in the open and allow plant life to slowly convert the atmosphere to one with more Oxygen. Venus, well aside from the rotational period, we have surface temperatures that can melt lead and clouds of sulfuric acid in the atmosphere.

Can you identify a plant that can survive the conditions necessary? Especially the initial conditions when you first intend to introduce plants?

I'm not a biologist but I'm under the impression that most, if not all, things in the plant kingdom depend on an oxygen atmostphere. They are eukaryotes like us and respire. Despite being net producers of oxygen I think plants require an oxygen atmosphere just like we do, especially at night when they aren't photosynthesizing. I'm also under the impression that pressuriizng the Martian atmosphere to any appreciable degree will raise CO2 to levels that would be toxic to most Earth life, including plants. A heavily CO2 atmosphere will also make water more acidic than nearly all water on Earth (not to mention absorbing the CO2 you're trying to release in to the atmosphere. And not to mention possible chemical reactions that might precipitate carbon based solids from that CO2 you're trying to liberate)

I'm not aware of any extremophile plants that can come close to that. I think the bacteria(ish) kingdoms would be a better place to look. Even there I think we're talking traits that may never have been needed on Earth.

With Venus we would be sitting in orbiting space stations for a long time looking out our windows.

Doesn't seem like a problem to me. By the time we're capable of terraforming either planet we're going to have large space colonies that will be far more inviting than the surface of either planet. Some "proposals" for terraforming Venus start with space based construction of a sunshades thousands of miles across. Others propose mining Mercury for elements that can absorb the Venusian atmoshere and pelting it with meteorites made of the stuff for a long time. Similarly, some plans for Mars call for hitting it with comets. In those cases, large space stations will be necessary simply because the surface of the planet will become more uninhabitable as we work.

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

Speaking to the OP and Buzz Aldrin's video. Buzz has a better plan than might be guessed from the six minute interview, but still I think it's a disservice to talk of colonizing Mars in the casual terms he does. It simply isn't possible, even if we're talking about colonizing in a "tin can" style. We don't have the infrastructure. And in that regard I find a bit of a disconnect in the interview because he talks about us having rushed the Moon race because we were motivated by beating the Russians. Presumably he's referring to the fact that most space advocates at the time thought we should develop a near Earth infrastructure first and go to the Moon with the intention of going their continuously and scaling up as we go. We skipped the infrastructure and have suffered for it.

He mentions sending a team to Mars using two of the upcoming Orion space craft. That certainly doesn't seem like a sustainable model and it certainly can't be the backbone of any colonization effort, not even a small one.

The Orion mission objectives listed in the wikipedia article are quite rational. The manned Mars landing is cited as something potentially possible but not necessary. Greater emphasis is put on Near Earth Asteroids, the Moon, and even the moons of Mars. Those are all potential places we might find the resources needed to support the near Earth space infrastructure we're going to need before going to Mars in a sustainable fashion (never mind a massive colonization/terraforming effort).


Some of the near Earth infrastructure we're going to need for the future includes:

• Mining oxygen and water from some off Earth source with little gravity.
• A large space ship, presumably built in space, that is dedicated to travelling solely in space (possibly including landing on low gravity objects)
• A large space station.
• Ultimately space stations that spin to produce gravity.
• Mining of metals, presumably an offshoot of extracting oxygen.
• And a perennial need: cheaper ways to get off Earth.

Hopefully these will be pursued as parts of the Orion missions.

 

[Mitchell314]

*cut* Neither Venus nor Mars has a magnetosphere to protect it from cosmic rays, so that is a wash.

IIRC, Venus's atmosphere handles EM radiation. I don't know if it's any use against charged particles though. OTOH, Mars has nothing to help us. Putting a couple feet of dirt (and ice?) between you and the sky couldn't hurt, so long as it's enough to protect from the secondary nasties from the cosmic radiation hitting the topsoil.

*cut*If we can unlock the CO2 trapped at the Martian poles, and give the planet a CO2 rich atmosphere, it may be possible to simply plant crops out in the open and allow plant life to slowly convert the atmosphere to one with more Oxygen.

Plants? They would have to be pretty hardy, even if you could thicken the atmosphere, get the planet warm, and start up an active hydrologic cycle that involves liquid water. Algae and/or anaerobic bacteria would be relatively easier. But if you could start a run-away greenhouse effect, and do some genetic tinkering, you just may get something working.

*Cut* Venus, well aside from the rotational period, we have surface temperatures that can melt lead and clouds of sulfuric acid in the atmosphere.

So don't make your plants out of lead.