Cloud Cities on Venus: Viability & Feasibility

[GTOM]

There are plans for almost everything.

https://www.space.com/29140-venus-airship-cloud-cities-incredible-technology.html
Like build floating cities on Venus in the far future, since gravity is Earth like at there, and the upper atmosphere isn't so harsh.
I would like to hear your opinions about the feasibility of such a project. Let's suppose we could get there with a large enough spacecraft that can build.
But how much it could be viable? Is there any resource valuable enough to extract from the atmosphere, and transport elsewhere that lacks volatiles? Could we extract resources from the ground without extreme costs? Could the planet serve as a refuelling station in order to reach and mine other celestials (Mercury for example)?

 

[sysprog]

Uh, no, no no, Icarus,-- let's please do like your Dad Daedalus, and be rightly scared of getting too close to the Sun.

 

[omnipojack]

Uh, no, no no, Icarus,-- let's please do like Daedalus, and be rightly scared of getting too close to the Sun.

This seriously made me laugh out loud!

But sysprog is right, I don't think Venus really has anything that would make it viable for people to live there. Autonomous mining maybe if, like you mentioned, there's something on the planet that's valuable. I imagine that if we ever become capable of harvesting something from Sol itself it would be an asset. But that brings us back to Icarus.

 

[sysprog]

... and we're kinda stuck here ... "Mars ain't the kinda place to raise your kids" (Bernie Taupin and Elton John) ... Mars is too cold, and Venus is too hot, and Mercury is baking hot on one side and freezing cold on the other -- let's stay on Earth and try to not eff it up into un-inhabitability . . .

 

[JayS0]

Advantages: abundant sunlight, good air pressure, some protection from radiation, atmosphere could be mined for carbon and nitrogen
Disadvantages: have to protect against acid, can't use resources on the surface, can't "live off the land", have to bring our own oxygen and hydrogen, or extract them from acids

 

[sysprog]

Advantages: abundant sunlight, good air pressure, some protection from radiation, atmosphere could be mined for carbon and nitrogen
Disadvantages: have to protect against acid, can't use resources on the surface, can't "live off the land", have to bring our own oxygen and hydrogen, or extract them from acids

oh and hey, O2 and H, why ain't you two got married? we're thirsty, where's the water?

 

[JayS0]

put them into a fuel cell or just burn them together; there's your water.

 

[berkeman]

Like build floating cities on Venus in the far future, since gravity is Earth like at there, and the upper atmosphere isn't so harsh.

Here is a PF thread about this from a couple years ago:

https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/nasa-proposes-cloud-city-above-venus.788825/

 

[GTOM]

Here is a PF thread about this from a couple years ago:

https://www.physicsforums.com/threads/nasa-proposes-cloud-city-above-venus.788825/

Ok i read it, although my question is a bit different. I supposed we can solve many present day issues with nuclear powered spacecraft , the question is, could be such settlements lucrative?

 

[MikeeMiracle]

Got to be careful using the term "Nuclear Powered" here. Some mean this to be a nuclear reactor like the type that generate electricity on earth. It's also been used to describe thermoelectric generators that used radioactive decay to generate the heat required to make them work, this was used as far back as the Voyager missions and is used on probes too far away from the sun to generate enough power from solar.

To power a city you would need a nuclear reactor and we have never attempted to put one of those in space, we don't know if they could survive being launched into space.

 

[Ian J Miller]

Think of the mass of this thing and think of all the hydrogen you would need to float it. Your "balloon membrane" would be what? It has to be UV resistant, which eliminates almost all known plastics and elastomers, it has to be sulphuric acid resistant, it has to be hydrogen fluoride resistant, so it is made of what? Oh, and it has to be 100% leak resistant. Have you ever tried to keep hydrogen or helium in an enclosed container for how long?

 

[Nelli]

There are plans for almost everything.

https://www.space.com/29140-venus-airship-cloud-cities-incredible-technology.html
Like build floating cities on Venus in the far future, since gravity is Earth like at there, and the upper atmosphere isn't so harsh.
I would like to hear your opinions about the feasibility of such a project. Let's suppose we could get there with a large enough spacecraft that can build.
But how much it could be viable? Is there any resource valuable enough to extract from the atmosphere, and transport elsewhere that lacks volatiles? Could we extract resources from the ground without extreme costs? Could the planet serve as a refuelling station in order to reach and mine other celestials (Mercury for example)?

I believe this idea has merit. Venus could have resources that could be of value. I never thought about it before but it has me doing some research.

 

[sysprog]

I believe this idea has merit. Venus could have resources that could be of value. I never thought about it before but it has me doing some research.

Let's stay here and do the best we can. Send robots to Venus if you're curious. I'd rather die honorably of old age on Earth than die of wanton stupidity for trying to live in a Venusian city.

Why would people smart enough to get to Venus be stupid enough to go there?

Maybe it's because it has that love goddess name.

In my view it's kinda like Galois being such an extreme genius that he could lay out abstract algebra for us when he was 19 and 20, and then go and get himself killed at age 20 by being such an idiot that he got in a duel with a seasoned military veteran.

I don't mean to insult Galois; maybe it really was a matter of honor; but what an enormous set of contributions and what a tragic and regrettable loss.

 

[GTOM]

I believe this idea has merit. Venus could have resources that could be of value. I never thought about it before but it has me doing some research.

What kind of resources?

 

[Nelli]

There are plans for almost everything.

https://www.space.com/29140-venus-airship-cloud-cities-incredible-technology.html
Like build floating cities on Venus in the far future, since gravity is Earth like at there, and the upper atmosphere isn't so harsh.
I would like to hear your opinions about the feasibility of such a project. Let's suppose we could get there with a large enough spacecraft that can build.
But how much it could be viable? Is there any resource valuable enough to extract from the atmosphere, and transport elsewhere that lacks volatiles? Could we extract resources from the ground without extreme costs? Could the planet serve as a refuelling station in order to reach and mine other celestials (Mercury for example)?

Maybe the idea of a floating city sounds like sifi, but the idea of research to see if Venus has materials that we could use such as fuel for ships sounds possible. I use to think life couldn't be on Venus until I took a biology class in college that changed my mind. If life can exist in Sulfuric Acid H2SO4; then life could exist on Venus. The one thing science has taught me is more is possible than we first thought. We use to think the world was flat. lol