Bio hydrocarbons

[tahanson43206]

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It seems reasonable (to me at least) to presume this topic has significant growth potential.

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[FOQ1]

The most essential hydrocarbon on Mars is going to be Methane (CH4). While a lot of this will likely come from the Sabatier process, material amounts will start as carbohydrates. That is, we will grow many hydrocarbons!

I personally think agriculture will be a primary industry ex-Earth for centuries. The food component is obvious, and so is the capacity to turn CO2 into O2. From a planning and safety perspective, it makes a lot of sense to greatly overproduce agricultural products far in excess of food needs. Enough that there is surplus oxygen production, and enough that carbohydrates can be converted to hydrocarbons.

An important feedback loop will be bio-digesting the inedible portions of the various crops to produce CH4. The leftover 'sludge' would further be dried and further bio-processed with mushrooms. The mushrooms are both food and an important tool to produce humus at volume. These processes combined allow for rapid scaling of more traditional agriculture to supplement hydro/aero-ponic production. You will want a growing media for all 'root' crops for example.

Out of scope but a tie in to my next thread, CH4 can rather easily be turned into C3H8 (Propane), and with even more effort, longer hydrocarbon chains. The process is known as Gas-to-Liquids. Everything we have grown accustomed to on Earth from Plastic, to Naptha, to PO, to w/e, can be derived from carbohydrate to methane to [x] processes. It will be more expensive, especially at first. But it is a mere technical challenge. And one that is already solved.