Novel About Terraforming Ceres

[Rubidium_71]

In an ebook I read recently, the author has a future society construct a shell around Ceres consisting of transparent orbital panels that are joined together into a solid sphere. They are made from a smart material of some kind, referred to as "Smart Diamond" that allows in sunlight but blocks harmful cosmic rays. Fusion reactors were placed into the ice and eventually melted their way to the bottom of the new ocean as Ceres heated up over time. A warm, breathable atmosphere is retained by the orbiting shell. One hemisphere of the shell is also opaque, and people live on the interior surface of that hemisphere. They also inhabit some small islands on Ceres itself.
I am wondering how feasible this fictional approach might actually be, assuming our civilization ever advanced to the point where we could enclose a body like Ceres as it is described in the story. Could Ceres actually be made habitable by a technique like this?

Here's a link in case anyone wants to see for themselves...

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074SZVSMY/?tag=pfamazon01-20

 

[phyzguy]

It's believable that you could encase a breathable atmosphere, but what do you do about gravity? Ceres surface gravity is only ~0.03g. How could you "live on the interior surface of that hemisphere"? What keeps you from falling onto Ceres? Is the shell spinning? If it's spinning to provide gravity, why bother with building it around Ceres? Just build a spinning cylinder without Ceres in the middle.

 

[Rubidium_71]

In the story the shell was spinning to create gravity on the interior surface. The people there were genetically engineered to live in that low gravity environment, they actually flew back and forth between islands on Ceres and the outer shell. The reason the shell was built around Ceres was to exploit the natural resources there, mainly the water after it was thawed out.

 

[phyzguy]

OK, that makes sense. I was confused by your use of the word "hemisphere". On a spinning sphere, you would have to live around the equator. So, bottom line, I think the whole scenario could be made to work.

 

[Rubidium_71]

Yeah, the shell is described as half clear and half opaque. My own thought was that the clear side must always face the sun to collect the needed light and heat. The approach of enclosing a body that is too small to hold an atmosphere on its own was interesting. It would be quite a feat of astroengineering.

 

[stefan r]

... It would be quite a feat of astroengineering.

Ceres is easy. We can go much bigger. Check out this SFIA video. He has one about colonizing Ceres too.

 

[Rubidium_71]

Ceres is easy.

Thanks for posting the video... I'm glad to hear that enclosing and terraforming Ceres would be "easy." That reminds me of being told in grade school that "cities on the Moon" were only ten years away. ;)
But since we currently have a very long way to go before we even approach that kind of engineering, I won't get my hopes up. We may have some of the knowledge and materials, but it seems like humanity lacks the will to undertake projects of that scope.
In the book they took their method beyond Ceres as well, enclosing and thawing out objects like Mimas. The people in the story had some interesting solutions to various problems that arose as they went further out into the Solar System. :)

 

[member 656954]

I haven't checked out your reference, but if you've fusion power then why not 'hollow out' Ceres so you can live within the interior without the need for the Smart Diamond shell. You're not capturing much sunlight out that far, and if you've fusion power you can presumably create light (what am I saying? If you can encase a 500km-ish diameter dwarf planet, you can light the place up as well), so the transparent aspect is redundant.

It would be easier engineering - and safer for the inhabitants, I'd expect - to build your little worldlet on the interior surface so everyone is looking 'downward.' Then I'd put my energy into spinning Ceres up to create a higher apparent gravity within (though not sure if that wouldn't tear Ceres apart, you'd need to do that carefully). So make kind of a mini-Dyson Sphere concept. But as phyzguy notes, "Just build a spinning cylinder without Ceres in the middle" that definitely seems more sensible. In fact, make it a ring, Larry Niven style, then you've more usable surface area to boot.

Bottom line, it could be done, but even with such engineering prowess, you'd think economics still rules and on that basis, this would surely be a vanity project with dubious funding. I can imagine construction starting, then the shell company (like what I did there?) hitting a snag that burns through the cash faster than expected, and they go bust part way through. Then there's a somewhat completed Smart Diamond wrapper that slowly unravels, spitting chunks off into the shipping lanes, triggering lawsuits executed by machines on a minute-by-minute basis, ultimately nudging Ceres off orbit and onto a collision course with Mars. Then they have a real engineering problem

 

[Rubidium_71]

From what I read, using the natural resources on Ceres was the motivation for what they did. The spinning cylinder is great, but you're going to have to bring in water and a lot of it to start with. In the story they had established an ecosystem there and lived in relative harmony. Some people live on islands on Ceres, some do indeed live on the interior of the shell as you suggest. I am not advocating the thaw-shell technique described by the author to the exclusion of all other concepts, I just thought the book had an interesting approach.
When Mimas is talked about, the inhabitants do live exclusively on the interior surface of that sphere, leaving a big round ocean with a marine ecosystem in the middle to exploit.
The Smart Diamond shell doesn't unravel in the story because, well, it's a smart material that is capable of repairing itself. The description and illustration in the book depict a faceted sphere that let's in sunlight on one side. It was explained as being built one small piece at a time, each piece fusing to another until they had enclosed Ceres. I don't pretend to understand all the technical angles, but that part of it seemed sci-fi plausible.
Ceres colliding with Mars wouldn't be an engineering problem, it would be a disaster, but that didn't occur in the book. :)

 

[stefan r]

...
But since we currently have a very long way to go before we even approach that kind of engineering, I won't get my hopes up. We may have some of the knowledge and materials, but it seems like humanity lacks the will to undertake projects of that scope.
...

Getting too Ceres from Earth's surface is a bit rough. Certainly will not be building that rocket in my garage. The vacuum thing is dangerous and difficult too.

Ceres has escape velocity 510 m/s. Low Ceres orbit is 360 m/s. The equator is already rotating at 92 m/s, so 270 m/s. This can be done with a medieval trebuchet. I currently do not have a garage but if you provide me with one nearby I certainly have the will to reconstruct a trebuchet. Air rifles advertize muzzle velocities higher than 270 m/s. If we are on Ceres and we have high pressure air tanks then we should be able to weld a pipe apparatus that can fire pellets into orbit. We have this knowledge and the materials.

A Ceres space elevator could be built using polyethylene (spectra fiber). Human hair is not strong enough but silk is. Nylon would get the job done too. You can run tether lines to the poles. If you did this with enough lines you could circle the entire asteroid with a tent.

The tent does not need to fully support itself if you have added an atmosphere. You may want use leaded plate glass in order to hold the atmosphere down.

 

[Rubidium_71]

^ Some very good points there, somebody get Stefan a bigger garage! :)