simmars-forum-threads Utilities Buildings

[brambojr 0]

I forgot to mention that with a space elevator supplies could be brought to orbit and beyond at pennies on the dollar compared to present technology.

[majorpain 0]

I tried to make somthing but the entire thing floats when part is supposed to be undergroud

http://xs.to/xs.php?h=xs24&d=05153&f=power.jpg

 

[lhurgoyf 0]

I just got on board with this whole sim mars idea, and I think it could be very cool, but if you want to keep it realistic I think from an aerospace engineering point of view some of these ideas about mars are kind of made up.  (I haven

[ViperX883 0]

OK, I haven't contributed anything to this project, but being that I am a physicist maybe I can help a bit.

First, it is impossible to fuse atoms to create anything with a higher atomic number than Iron (53 I believe) and extract energy. Creating these elements actually requires energy, snd a whole lot of it. That is why they can generally only be created in novas. You can basically forget creating these elements unless you want to assume some currently unavailable futuristic technology. Regardless of what has been said, you *can* use fusion to create light elements like carbon and nitrogen. Such fusion occurs in the center of the sun, so if you can assume that we are capable of possessing technology that allows us to perform similar processes then this is feasible.

Second, someone said that fusing two hydrogen atoms released enough energy to power the eastcoats for a decade and produced some huge explosion. This is absolutely not true. Controlled fusion does not produce an explosion; that only happens in uncontrolled fusion such as an H-bomb. Also, fusing two hydrogen atoms does produce nearly enough energy to power the east coast for a decade. I could work out exactly how much energy it does produce, but suffice to say that you need a ton of hydrogen to produce that kind of power.

Third, AFAIK there really isn't an overabundance of hydrogen on Mars, so if you really wanna be realistic there isn't really any way to create light elements, power cities, etc etc using only the alotted H supply on Mars. You may consider using electrolysis to electrolyze some of the ice from the polar ice caps, but if you go that route there should probably be some kind of electrolysis or hydrogen production building.

Given all of these factors, the most likely candidate for energy would have to be solar based (if you want toremain in the confinces of present day technology). Thus microwave would probably be the bests bet.

However, don't forget that we can not get to mars yet and probably won't for some time. New tech will have developed by that time, and we certainly need to be much more advance before we can consider terraforming teh planet in teh way being proposed here. Considering this, I think that we shoudl allow for the creation of new technology and have some futuristic buildings that are suggestive of what we may one day be able to do. For instance, a matter-antimatter power plant is not at all unreasonable. This type of energy production is already being considered for future rocket propulsion systems. Another idea, though a much greater stretch, is a straight matter to energy converter. Since matter is essentially concentrated energy, you could assume that we may one day have teh technology to convert matter directly to energy. Remember Einstein... E=mc^2... that's a ton of energy.

Hopefully this is helpful. Keep up teh good work fellas.

[simtrooper 0]

Honestly, am I the only one who reads Popular Mechanics or Popular Science? In the October 2004 issue of Pop. Mech., there was an article on getting power from the moon. The answer? Helium-3 fusion. Most people think fusion is inefficient and has only one fuel for fusion. While every one of our current power sources use fuel to heat water to steam to turn a turbine which rotates a generator (except hydo dams, windmills, solar, and others that I'm too lazy to mention), Helium-3 fusion creates electricity directly, at a 70% rate of efficiency. If the moon has Helium-3, maybe Mars does.

[Aphid 5]

Just for a little help, here is a summary of all the ideas( a long one.. ) that are meantioned in the posts, because this is getting very chaotic for anybody, you'll have to read trough 6 pages of posts just trying to view what ideas have been thought of :

 

Anything marked with an asterisk could be effective. The not so very effective plants are described below.

 

Power ideas:

 

• Nuclear Plant *
• Hydrogen burning plant*
• Hydrogen Fusion Plant*
• Hydrogen split Plant
• Solar collector / farm plant
• Windmill or windfarm plant*
• Superturbine (windmill version)
• Microwave Plant*
• Antimatter / matter Plant*
• Crystal Power
• Helium-3 Plant*
• Waste to Energy
• Biomass (can only be used if there is also some kind of building using bacteria and algae, which could be burned here)
• Oxygen Plant
• Static energy from storms(*)

* these power plants seem to be the most effective of the lot. The Hydrogen split Plant could radiate Beta (about 1 to 10 tiles, maybe), so has radiation. So the Hydrogen Split plant must be placed way away of civalization which does not make it effective nor efficient(like coal, but worse) . Solar Power plants seem to be ineffective because of clouds, and Waste to Energy is a very old system, and is presumably ineffective compared to the rest of those Power plants mentioned. Biomass is ineffective for the same reason, it may be cheap, but polluting. The oxygen plant reduces the amounts of oxygen, which is not good. Static Energy from storms could of course only work in storms (dunno how much they appear)

 

Water Ideas

• Melting Ice (from the poles)*
• Make water (see hydrogen burning plant) out of hydrogen and oxygen*
• Transporting water from Earth
• Iron Plant(?)
• Using subterranean water (if present),Deep core water extraction unit*
• Water treatment / conservement*
• Water mining, strip and spot.*

Transporting water from Earth is very inefficient. Iron plants have been approved and disapproved throughout the post. I don't know what to think about it. It could be used for water but I don't know if it would be very effective.

 

Garbage Ideas:

 

• Thermal Depolymerization*
• Waste to Energy (I know it is also meantioned under power ideas)
• Landfills with a Dome*
• Recycling centres*

As meantioned in power, waste to Energy is ineffective

 

Atmosphere(gases) Ideas

 

• CO2 Extraction
• Ice Extraction (2H2O -> O2 + 2H2)
• Nitrogen Seperation*
• Algal atmosphere-changing life forms situated in buildings, bactria Farm*
• Lichen Farm*
• Transporting gases from Earth
• Air-Conversion*

The first two cost a lot of power. Transporting gases from earth is, of course, hugely ineffective and inefficient, even when using 22th century technology.

 

Other Ideas:

 

Gas pipes

Oxygen as pollution

 

It is obvious that some of the ideas need to be scraped off the board. If you have reactors doing a chemical reaction to get an utility, you shouldn't have reactors doing the opposite reaction to get another utility, that just doesn't fit!

This is not meant to discriminate anybody. It's just a summary which also lists the plants that must provide the most. Being ineffective does not mean it's bad, because most things have their own good sides (such as very long lifespan)

 

Please help me when I'm wrong I'm not a professor (yet).

Told you this post was long? Why are you still reading this?

 

-- edit: and should be so somewhere in the power description, sorry.

 

[abcbum 0]

You could have nuclear fission on mars, there is uranium and other radioactive elements on mars, juts like there is on earth. Also, the water pumping station, or whatever, should be really big, like 4X4, with a huge pole sticking into the ground to reach the permafrost, or underground water reserves, which are all over the planet. Also, ther could be be buildings to slowly concentrate certain things out of the thin martian air, they wouldnt do that much, but could be really cheap.

[hamsterofdoom 0]

Hi everybody. [first post yay!]

 

In order to properly colonize Mars, human settlers should also be focused on the long run, which means actually terraforming Mars. Thus, NIMBY power sources on Earth are actually the best bet for surface-based Martian power. I say this in defense of the Incinerator plant, which would be ideal for Mars since it gets rid of trash and produces greenhouse gases, which would warm the planet above its current frigid state.

 

However, incineration won't power a whole colony. Looking at a book I'm currently reading [about the colonization of Mars], it says that deuterium, or heavy hydrogen is five times more common on Mars than Earth. When combined with oxygen, it makes [you guessed it] heavy water, which is heplful in moderating many nuclear reactions, including the types found in both normal nuclear power plants and in [future] nuclear fusion plants. When light water [read: normal water] is used in nuclear reactions, the uranium must first be enriched, but not so when using heavy water.

 

Enter the human water supply. Obtained from electrolysis, specialized plants can filter out deuterium at the rate of one kilogram per six tonnes of water. Assuming a colony of 200,000 settlers with reasonable industries to match, electrolysis will produce 1000 tonnes of deuterium per year, enough to modulate 11 terawatts of electricity. The human race currently only consumes 10 terawatts per year. Thus, Martian deuterium production could power nearly the entire human race AND produce a ten-trillion-dollar gross income for the Martian colony. In terms of SimMars, that kind of surplus would make the game ridiculously easy, but this scenario could provide a guide for what the industrial sector will focus on, as well as an effective power source.

 

Also, simtrooper, the book says that Mars does not have any large quantities of Helium-3, unlike the moon. Sorry.

 

That book is The Case for Mars, by Robert Zubrin, if anyone's interested. It also contains information about possible metal-refinement industries on Mars, terraforming, and life-support systems. I'm citing this book as part of my 30-page paper on the human colonization of Mars and its future in space. I'm just an average SimCity user, but if I can be of any help in the science aspect of Sim Mars, don't hesitate to talk to me; I'd love to help somehow.

 

Okay, nothing like your first post being a long one, lol. I'm going to make it just a little longer: I can't end this post without saying this project is massive and amazing. The concept is awesome, and the building designs I've seen are [pardon the pun] out of this world. Keep up the good work, all of you.

[Mary Maurine Mayo 984]

Date: 7/28/2005 12:15:28 PM Author: hamsterofdoom

Hi everybody. [first post yay!]

In order to properly colonize Mars, human settlers should also be focused on the long run, which means actually terraforming Mars. Thus, NIMBY power sources on Earth are actually the best bet for surface-based Martian power. I say this in defense of the Incinerator plant, which would be ideal for Mars since it gets rid of trash and produces greenhouse gases, which would warm the planet above its current frigid state.

However, incineration won't power a whole colony. Looking at a book I'm currently reading [about the colonization of Mars], it says that deuterium, or 'heavy hydrogen' is five times more common on Mars than Earth. When combined with oxygen, it makes [you guessed it] 'heavy water,' which is heplful in moderating many nuclear reactions, including the types found in both normal nuclear power plants and in [future] nuclear fusion plants. When 'light water' [read: normal water] is used in nuclear reactions, the uranium must first be enriched, but not so when using heavy water.

Enter the human water supply. Obtained from electrolysis, specialized plants can filter out deuterium at the rate of one kilogram per six tonnes of water. Assuming a colony of 200,000 settlers with reasonable industries to match, electrolysis will produce 1000 tonnes of deuterium per year, enough to modulate 11 terawatts of electricity. The human race currently only consumes 10 terawatts per year. Thus, Martian deuterium production could power nearly the entire human race AND produce a ten-trillion-dollar gross income for the Martian colony. In terms of SimMars, that kind of surplus would make the game ridiculously easy, but this scenario could provide a guide for what the industrial sector will focus on, as well as an effective power source.

Also, simtrooper, the book says that Mars does not have any large quantities of Helium-3, unlike the moon. Sorry.

That book is 'The Case for Mars,' by Robert Zubrin, if anyone's interested. It also contains information about possible metal-refinement industries on Mars, terraforming, and life-support systems. I'm citing this book as part of my 30-page paper on the human colonization of Mars and its future in space. I'm just an average SimCity user, but if I can be of any help in the science aspect of Sim Mars, don't hesitate to talk to me; I'd love to help somehow.

Okay, nothing like your first post being a long one, lol. I'm going to make it just a little longer: I can't end this post without saying this project is massive and amazing. The concept is awesome, and the building designs I've seen are [pardon the pun] out of this world. Keep up the good work, all of you.

quote>

I was doing some research in to mars also and also found that Mars atmosphere is abundant in (Heavy water) Heavy water is used in Nuclear power plants. I came up with a Tokamak Model its small but the idea is there. Self contained tokamak.

 

Wondering since I am having trouble decifering information can heavy water be used for water. Could we make a plant that could convert heavy water to oranary water and what would be needed to do so.

 

lynks

 

[Willyd 0]

Date: 3/4/2004 3:53:15 PM
Author: guinea

----------------

On 3/4/2004 2:32:16 PM Arphaxad Locus wrote:

I think the main energy source should be geothermal (energy from volcanoes and lava). Given that Mars has some pretty impressive volcanoes (olympus mons), this would make a lot of sense. Also, hydrogen, microwave and solar would be the only power plants within the game that would make sense.

----------------

k if we are going to have geothermalenergy from volcainos that means that the water would have to be lava and that would not allow pasanger ferries across it as well think you cant exacly ride on lava so if we have water hydrp electrics aregoing to come in solar power sounds best

quote>
Also all the volcanos on Mars have been dormant for billions of years...

[hamsterofdoom 0]

Here you go pmiller:

 

Heavy water is not considered toxic, but some metabolic functions require normal (light) water, so consumption of exclusively heavy water can cause illness. In particular, the substitution of hydrogen by deuterium interferes with stereo-specific organic reactions. The biological effect can be thought of as similar to inhalation of pure nitrogen, the primary component of air

[Mary Maurine Mayo 984]

Date: 8/1/2005 7:01:15 PM Author: hamsterofdoom

Here you go pmiller:

'Heavy water is not considered toxic, but some metabolic functions require normal ('light') water, so consumption of exclusively heavy water can cause illness. In particular, the substitution of hydrogen by deuterium interferes with stereo-specific organic reactions. The biological effect can be thought of as similar to inhalation of pure nitrogen, the primary component of air

[Giniro 0]

Here are my ideas, i'm not quite sure if this is the right place to post it though. har har har. (sorry for the bad scans)

a small Commerical office
indoor park
a strange generator

I just finished this right now, a simple pixel idea. Not full detail. It's a small commercial office.

[Mary Maurine Mayo 984]

as I understand things we could not use the following ideas on Mars due to the fact that the core is solid and not molten

 

Geothermal Power

 

However I think I may have an idea for Power

 

In outpost 2 we have a power building called and

 

MHD Generator

Magnetohydrodynamic Generator.

 

the branch of physics that deals with the motion of electrically conductive fluids, esp. plasmas, in magnetic fields

 

As I understand it Mars does have several smaller magnetic fields that we could use this for.

 

Also A Gorf (Garbage and ore recycleing Facility) This could be used for the recycle center for Garbage. I would not suggest a Land fill as it will tend to destroy the Mars surface.

 

also one other little thing

 

I would place this next item in Hospitals

 

DIRT- Disaster instant repsonce team

 

This is designed to reduce the amount of damage to other structures due to metors and other disasters.

 

Hope some if these ideas work for the game...

 

Lynks

 

[Lucractius 0]

Not to go spilling to many of my wonderful ideas *looks around paranoid like* but MHD and Superconductive waveguides (god i love random ideas like that) would be interesting alternatives to just using regular old Power Lines

Superconductive Waveguides (or even just regular Waveguides) would be like using the microwave power plant method down pipes, channeling the Power carrying microwave beam round like plumbing, round corners etc like fiber optics and lasers, and MHD could also do this but wed be able to call them Plasma Conduits (now isnt that a Sci FI cliche!) instead of power lines.

If anyone needs the info on refining matreials from the atmosphere ... ill ahve to see where i lost my copy of Red Mars... good stuff in that book.

Oh and i just love this project. SimMars would have been awesome from Maxis... but this is just as good if not Better

[kharec84 0]

post deleted by writer

[Azure Skye 0]

Hi, I'm new here (heck, I haven't even played SC4)

I'm just here to suggest things that realistically work... sorta

1. Power
- Wind
- Static
- Bio reactor (bacteria that produces electricty when digesting garbage)
- Fission
- Heavy Water
- Liquid Metal
- Fusion
- MHD
~ Subspace Energy (wooo! Sci-Fi)
- Wide Wavelength Solar
- Solar Farm
- Microwave
~ Space Elevator
~ Magnetic/Gravitational (requires 'vator)
- Solar Wind

2. Water
- From Earth (not nearly as expensive as you might think)
- 'Deep Core mining'
- Polar Mining
~ Heavy Water Refinment
- Carbonaceous Astroid Mining

3. Garbage
- Thermal Depolymerization
- Landfill (just bury it under some soil, it might eventually decompose and help terraform the planet)
- Recycling
- Bio reactor

4. Atmosphere
- Bio reactor
- Lichen Farm
- From Earth
~ Heavy Water Refining
~ Ice Extraction
- Carbonaceous Astroid Mining

5. Transportation
- Walking
- Electric carts
- Maglev
- Pressure Tube
- Mag Tube

6. Other Concepts
- Pollution
- Mars has no real biome that can be ruined
- As Terraforming progresses, wind power and solar may become less effective
- Gas would have to be piped, possibly combined with Pressure Tubes
- Power lines would have to be buried
- Water piping could also be combined with gas piping

Also, I'm gonna have to shoot down Matter/Anti-matter. Where are we going to get the anti-matter (Its not very common to find in the ground)

And iron oxide (Fe2O3) doesn't really produce a whole lot of energy. But I have witnessed it produce a lot of energy, when 1. A very fine and pure powder of Fe2O3 was mixed with a very fine and pure powder of Al, then 2. a little bit of sugar is added on top, and a drop of HCl to start the reaction, and bam! you have a very big bright flare... fun! (we did it at camp) So I guess it would be possible, but you would have to import huge amounts of Al and HCl

-Azure Skye
On an ironic note: I just downloaded Outpost 2