Silicate production
The mining waste from the Martian moons is ideal for producing standardised "building blocks" for a wide range of applications, which can then be shipped by railgun!
- Habitats for workers on Mars and its moons
- Coatings for spacecraft and space stations
- Base structures for autonomous cargo transporters in space
- Counterweights for space elevators
Silicate utilisation
1. Giant Solar Arrays (Pure Silicon)
Silicates consist largely of silicon dioxide. When we separate out the oxygen (which we use for life support or rocket propellant), pure silicon remains.
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From this silicon, we can produce high-purity photovoltaic cells directly in a vacuum.
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Since there is no atmosphere to filter the sunlight, these solar panels built from lunar dust deliver massive amounts of energy to power the electrolysis, the RF pulse systems and the carbyne synthesis deep inside Deimos.
2. Geopolymer Concrete and 3D-Printed Structures
When we hollow out the interior of Deimos, we have to stabilise the walls!
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We melt down the silicate slag and mix it into a kind of space concrete (geopolymers).
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Huge autonomous 3D printers can use it to print massive support pillars, airtight hangars for the graphene drones and shielding several metres thick.
3. High-Purity Quartz Glass and Glass Fibres
On Earth, melting glass without tiny air bubbles or impurities is extremely difficult.
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In the microgravity and pure vacuum of Deimos, flawless quartz glass can be produced.
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From it, we draw optical fibre cables for the vast internal data networks of our facilities or manufacture high-precision lenses and mirrors for optical communication systems and lasers.
4. Silica Aerogel
This is perhaps the most fascinating material for our cargo drones. Silicon dioxide can be used to produce aerogel.
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It is extremely light, yet insulates against heat and cold better than almost any other known material.
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We can line the inner walls of the graphene monocoque drones with aerogel to protect sensitive electronic cargo from the extreme temperature swings between direct sunlight and the shadow of Mars – without significantly increasing the drone's mass.
Carbon / Graphene / Carbyne
1. Carbon Harvesting
Deimos and Phobos consist largely of material similar to carbonaceous chondrites. This means that carbon is already available in abundance, right on site.
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Instead of mechanical mining, we use directed thermal pulses or microwaves to heat the carbon-rich regolith.
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The volatile carbon compounds evaporate and are captured, broken down and purified in special vacuum chambers inside the hollowed-out lunar production facilities.
2. Synthesis in Microgravity and Vacuum
On Earth, producing carbyne is extremely difficult because the long chains, just one atom thick, collapse under gravity or react with impurities in the air. The interior of Deimos offers perfect industrial conditions:
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Ultra-high vacuum: Prevents unwanted chemical reactions (cross-linking) during synthesis.
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Microgravity: Allows the atomic carbon chains to grow, in theory, to unlimited length without breaking under their own weight or due to thermal convection in the reactor.
3. Stabilising and Spinning the Macro-Tether
Since pure carbyne chains are highly reactive and can immediately clump together into graphite on contact with each other, they must be protected at the molecular level.
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The coaxial process: In the first step, we produce hollow, double-walled carbon nanotubes (CNTs). The carbyne is then synthesised inside the protective interior of these tubes.
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The outer nanotube acts as a molecular sheath that stabilises the carbyne, while the inner carbyne chain provides unrivalled tensile strength.
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Huge, free-floating spinning machines inside Deimos then weave these microscopic tubes into massive macro-tethers thousands of kilometres long.
Hybrid propulsion
The SpaZeLift uses different propulsion systems for horizontal and vertical movement.
The four core propulsion concepts:
- HALEU
- VASIMR
- PPL (plasma pellet)
- Conventional rocket engines
Vertical propulsion
conventional + nuclear thermal
Horizontal propulsion
conventional + electric propulsion (VASIMR / Hall-effect)
If we want to move loads of more than 1,000 tonnes while using an ultra-light graphene monocoque structure, we have to strike a careful balance between raw power (thrust) and fuel efficiency (specific impulse) when choosing the propulsion system.
Since we produce the propellant directly on Deimos by heating and breaking down the regolith (in-situ resource utilisation), we have three primary options for the heavy-lift drones:
1. Chemical Propulsion (Hydrolox or Methalox)
This is the classic "brute force" method.
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Propellant: We use electrolysis to split the water bound in the moons' rock into liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. Alternatively, we can use the available carbon to produce methane.
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Advantages: Enormous thrust. When a gigantic mass needs to be accelerated quickly or slowed down from a rotation (such as when docking with the SpaZeLift), only a chemical engine delivers the instant, massive force needed to overcome the inertia of more than 1,000 tonnes.
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Disadvantages: Very thirsty. Propellant consumption is enormous, which means that a large part of the drone's internal volume is taken up by tanks.
2. Solar Electric Propulsion (Ion Thrusters)
Here we use the huge solar panels built from the silicon regolith of Deimos to generate electricity. This electricity accelerates a gas (such as argon, which can be obtained from the Martian atmosphere) to extreme speeds.
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Advantages: Unbeatable efficiency. An ion thruster needs only a fraction of the reaction mass of a chemical engine.
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Disadvantages: Extremely low thrust. It would take weeks to bring a fully loaded heavy-lift drone up to Mars transfer velocity.
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Area of use: Perfect for the return flight. The empty drones can use ion propulsion to return to the moon at extremely low cost and with minimal propellant, while using a different propulsion system for the loaded outbound flight.
3. Nuclear Thermal Propulsion (NTP)
This is the "sweet spot" for orbital heavy-lift logistics. Instead of burning propellant, we use a small, shielded nuclear reactor to heat a reaction mass to extreme temperatures and expand it through a nozzle.
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Propellant: We simply pump the liquid hydrogen, extracted from the rock of the Martian moons, through the hot reactor. There is no need to carry heavy oxygen for combustion.
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Advantages: NTP offers about twice the efficiency of the best chemical engines, along with enough thrust to move massive 1,000-tonne components quickly.
