(2019 Archived) - An Address to the Pioneering Steps of Today and the Mid-Atmospheric Construction of Cloud-Cities

 Having written this in 2019, and originally published in 2021.. when I was 15 and 17, there would be inaccuracies that I would correct here. Having removed it, I'm publishing  again, for sake of completion so that the efforts wouldn't have gone to vain:

The geodesic spheres of the Venusian cloud-cities could grow to become quite large – some of them would have diameters ranging from 1.2 to 1.6 kilometres (0.8 to 1 miles) ^[7]!Typically, Buckminster Fuller’s CloudNines are ideally meant to be constructed on the ground. But, on Venus, there isn’t any ground to construct on! – The surface is simply too hostile. But then, it would only leave us with the resort of constructing the Cloud-city in the middle of the Venusian atmosphere. Is it even possible?

Without addressing this issue directly at first, we have to consider the fact that the Cloud-cities and even Cloud Nine are quite ambitious plans for our time; we’ve never made a full scale Cloud Nine before! Also, without being disheartened by this fact, we have to accept that every grand plan has its humble beginnings – the same is true for Venusian colonization. We have to find a humble way – a pioneering step to initiate Venusian colonization, which is compatible with present technology, funding and global charisma.

This would bring us to HAVOC – a series of proposed missions which intend to be that pioneering step. I was quite reluctant to write about HAVOC in this book, as I intended to focus on the WHY-aspect of Venusian colonization – I intended it solely for Exodus to Venus: The Civilization of Cloud Cities, which was more deeply HOW-eccentric and well-illustrated. But now, I feel that it would be more appropriate to bring some of that HOW-aspect here – but in a much more abbreviated form. Though HAVOC is relatively new, it’s concept of using airships isn’t.

Once upon a time, in the 1980s, a largely unknown Soviet-Russian named G. Moskalenko came-up with this remarkable idea of having an airship as a manned laboratory on Venus ^[65]. It’s quite a nice idea for the time, but what’s so special about it? Well, he chose airships mostly because they could stay-up in the atmosphere for extended periods of time, without requiring much fuel or energy. Moreover, Airship flight would be quite effective on Venus, as the thick Venusian atmosphere provides significant buoyancy for generation of lift. Similarly, and most importantly, it should be noted that mass scaling isn’t a critical factor as “the high density environment of the Venus atmosphere, the lift produced by the envelope volume was more than sufficient to lift the airship and its associated systems” ^[66]; that is, we can make the airship as enormous, as impractically humongous, as we want them to be.

Now we face another problem: What should we power the airship with? It’s obviously solar energy! “The solar flux at the orbit of Venus is 2600W/m², which is much greater than the 1360W/m² available at [the] Earth[’s] orbit” ^[66]. It, as a matter of fact, is a ~91.176470588% increase in solar flux, which could significantly boost the performance of solar-powered vehicles. Additionally, there is sufficient solar energy, to power a vehicle, within or even below the cloud-layer: “At the bottom of the cloud layer (45km altitude), the solar intensity is between 520 and 1300 W/m² depending on wavelength of radiation collected” ^[66]. Simply, it implies that air-flight using airships are still technically possible within, and even below the cloud decks.

Now, we can have solar-powered airships, which could play a role as manned laboratories of Venus. But, could those airships be used for living in? I mean, mass scaling isn’t a critical feature in the airships feasibility, which would give us the ability to make them as large as we want – perhaps, large enough to house a colony? Dale C. Arney and Christopher A. Jones, from the Space Mission Analysis and Concepts Directorate at the Langley Research Centre in Virginia, have been exploring the idea ^[67]. Eventually, this idea escorted to theformulation of the High Altitude Venus Operational Concept, which we now know as HAVOC. I still doubt whether HAVOC has any connection with Moskalenko, Landis or Colozza who have also thought of airships of Venus. Nevertheless, I believe that HAVOC is our pioneering step of Venusian colonization.

HAVOC is meticulously planned in five separate phases ^{[39, 67]}:

Phase I: Exploratory mission with Robotic Precursor.                                           

Phase II: 30-day manned mission to Venus Orbit.                                                 

 Phase III: 30-day manned mission to Venus Atmosphere.                                  

Phase IV: 1-year manned mission to Venus Atmosphere.                             

Phase V: Permanent residence in Venus Atmosphere.

The first phase of this mission would be an exploratory mission done by a unmanned-robotic and solar-powered airship. The airship and its robotic-cargo would de folded up in an aeroshell, and transported to Venus with a spacecraft, which is obviously launched into space with the assistance of a rocket. It will rendezvous (meet/ meet at) with Venus orbit, and later de-orbit in order to enter the atmosphere. It will then jettison its aeroshell and deploy a parachute, allowing the airship to unfurl and inflate. Afterwards, the redundant parachute is jettisoned and the airship will float above the cloud-tops^{[39, 68]}. I suppose the longer-run reason for this mission would be the scientific study of the Venusian atmosphere, as the airship would never come back and theoretically circumnavigate Venus indefinitely (if left unharmed). Nevertheless, I believe that it would rather be for gaining experience on the ‘inflation’ stage – presumably for timing.

If this mission were a success, HAVOC could move-on to the next phase – the 30-day manned mission to Venus Orbit. Unusually, I couldn’t find much information for this alleged phase. But, based on logic and comparison of the previous and consequent missions, I could try to give a reasonably accurate interpretation of it: The crew will be blasted-off into space in a single vehicle, with the assistance of a single rocket, and head outwards to Venus in a journey of ~110 days. Afterwards, the crew will rendezvous with Venus orbit, and orbit Venus for 30 days. Afterwards, the crew will return to Earth in a journey of ~300 days, rendezvous with Earth orbit, enter and descend into the Earth’s atmosphere, and finally land (crash) into an ocean ^[1]. As we can see, the entry and descent into the atmosphere is completely omitted. Frankly, I even doubt whether there’s an airship involved at all! – Perhaps, just only the transit vehicle. I believe that mission would be done for the purpose of checking whether the crew would survive the journey.

Afterwards, HAVOC can finally move to Phase-III, which happens to have the most drama. This would be the first mission where two humans would be able see 6 Venusian sunrises and sunsets from the perspective of the Venusian cloud-tops. They would be the first humans to witness the bluish cloud-top skies of Venus and the warped constellations, perhaps with a new blue star.

The above illustration is of the airship used in this phase of the mission. You can see the solar array on its envelope, and on its tail-fins. By the way, all HAVOC airships would rely on the buoyancy of Helium in order to float above the cloud-tops. There’s a gondola slung under the airship, which is permanently attached to the envelope. An atmospheric habitat, where the crew would stay for the entire 30-day atmospheric stay, and two propellers are firmly attached onto the gondola ^{[39, 67]} – in fact, I believe that they’re actually part of it. Other than that, there’s the main cargo of the airship, which is a detachable rocket known as the ‘ascent vehicle’, which could detach-itself and boost-up to Venus orbit at the end of the atmospheric stay. But, we cannot simply send an airship through interplanetary space! Then, how does the airship get there?

Figure 3:A diagram of the ascent vehicle, which is divided into the rocket stages and ascent habitat^[39].

Well, similar to any space mission, the crew and material are first launched into space, with the assistance of a rocket. It should be known that, the crew and the airship will undergo the interplanetary voyage separately; the airship folded in the spacecraft, and the crew will follow in a transit vehicle.  After the perilous journey to Venus, both the airship and crew will rendezvous in Venus orbit, where the transit vehicle will link-up with the airship, with the crew proceeding in entering the un-inflated airship ^[67]. 

Afterwards, the airship will enter the Venusian atmosphere in an aeroshell, and descend in a ‘Venus Atmosphere Rendezvous (VAR)’ ^[39]. It would then deploy a parachute, and the aeroshell will drop away. The exposed airship will then proceed with unfurling and inflating. The parachute, which becomes redundant, will be jettisoned ^[67]. The inflated airship will gently float at an altitude of 52km, at the Venusian equator, where the atmosphere is most stable; and proceed with atmospheric operations ^{[67, 39]}.

The crew will spend their 30-day atmospheric stay, in the atmospheric habitat, and move into the ascent vehicle when it ends. The ascent vehicle is a two-stage rocket with a tiny capsule known as the ‘ascent habitat’, which would house the crew during ascent: The ascent vehicle will be dropped and ascend to Venus orbit, which is an epic leap-of-fate. While falling, the rockets of the ascent vehicle would ignite and ascend up the atmosphere. Stage-by-stage, the ascent habitat would have been boosted up-to Venus orbit, where the crew will again meet with their transit vehicle (The transit vehicle had been orbiting Venus during the entire atmospheric stay). The transit vehicle would again take them on the perilous journey back home, followed by a rendezvous with Earth orbit ^[67]. Then they will descend through the Earth’s atmosphere, and probably impact the Pacific Ocean, as with the case of Apollo11. If the mission were to be successful to this extent, the crew will be well received and likely world-famous. But, more importantly, humanity will be a step closer to Venusian colonization.

If the phase-III HAVOC mission was rather hard to visualize, I would recommend looking into the following link on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0az7DEwG68A. It’s a lovely and rather-epic animation of the phase-III HAVOC mission, published by the Langley Research Centre. Enjoy!

It’s worth noting that all missions up-to this would technically be part of the Phase-I colonization of Venus – the missions were exploratory, experimental, short-lived and quickly abandoned. Now, we shall return to establish a truer colony. The following mission would be quite similar to the phase-III mission, but presumably much more complex – I believe it to be rather the transition from phase-I to phase-II colonization of Venus. Well, this phase-IV mission of HAVOC is also relatively left un-discussed, and partly for many reasons. I believe one of them to be that it isn’t as much a priority now as the first three missions. For that reason, I believe that the dimensions and plans of the mission aren’t very much designed yet, and the potential problems are not worth solving at present. Similarly, even at the most ideal situation; HAVOC would only likely fly from the late 2020s, owing to its dependency on the massive Block IIB configuration of the space launch system ^[67]. Thereby, I believe that the phase-IV mission would likely take place after the half-life of this century – the late 2050s, the 2060s; it’s still speculation. Similarly, it would require development in self-sufficiency, resource management systems and methodologies of using the Venusian environment for the crew’s benefit and for extracting resources – overall, the mission would have to try to be self-sufficient via imports from the Earth.

This mission would likely have a crew much larger than two, perhaps with an airship of undreamt-of dimensions – it’s likely to be enormous. Or, perhaps this mission might be done with a multitude of airships? Regardless of the situation, I estimate that the airship(s) would circumnavigate Venus about ~80 times during the entirety of the atmospheric stay – that is, the crew would likely get to see ~80 Venusian western sunrises and eastern sunsets from the perspective of the cloud-tops. I believe that either the crew will happen to use their resources in a self-sufficient system, or that supplies will arrive for them via aeroshells, or both – either way would give it a phase-II character.

Similarly, considering the longevity of this mission, this might be the first mission where atmospheric EVA would be feasible! – The first atmospheric-walk, nice to think of it. This mission is likely to have a great deal of research and experimentation, which would give it a phase-I character. It is for these reasons for which I believe this mission to be the transition from phase-I to phase-II Venusian colonization ^[1]. Regardless of how the mission might be played-out, it would obviously be quite advanced – it would be quite a huge leap from the phase-III HAVOC mission. Still, the mission could be re-done based on the success, non-success, and even potential failure of this mission. However, if it were to be a success, the most likely option, it would be one of humanity’s greatest achievements. Succinctly, the success of this mission would be synonymous to success in establishing a Venusian presence – like a proto-colony. I mean, if we can sustain a proto-colony in the Venusian cloud-tops for a year, we could do so for much longer periods of times; perhaps for decades, scores, centuries, even millennia! That is, we can move-on to our next phase – establishing a permanent presence on Venus.

HAVOC too has the eventual aim of establishing a permanent presence on Venus in its final phase, but not with the cloud-cities though. Presumably, HAVOC intends to do so with the assistance of large floating structures, which are solar-powered and float on the buoyancy of the Helium, as depicted from the below illustration. The colonists would live in these structures, extract recourses and utilize them in a self-sufficient system. Similarly, it seems as if the airships would be used as a sort of transportation. For the time-being, they’re quite fine, but we would have to move into cloud-cities later. I would sometimes imagine the lives of those who’d call these floating structures – ‘home’ ^[1]:

I believe that they will be amazed at the blueness of the sky above, and the whiteness of the clouds below; for an alien world, it does a good job at resembling the Earth! It would be interesting to see the sun rise from the west and set in the east, but twice as slowly. I believe that the colonists would maintain and harvest communal farms, while potentially surviving on some supplies from the Earth, which arrive in aeroshells. While not farming or performing EVA, I believe that that they would spend their time experimenting or enjoying their leisure, perhaps communicating with their kith and kin, or perhaps with creative activities or forms of entertainment. The night might be of their fancy too, perhaps with stargazing with altered constellations; Orion’s belt not straight, and the Great Dipper warped. But the highlight of the night sky would be a distinctive blue star, reminiscent of the colonists’ origins; The Earth^[1]. Most importantly, I appreciate the role those pioneer colonists would play, in the utopian future humanity would behold.

After some years in these structures, we’d have to shift to the cloud-cities. Of the entire affair of building Venusian cloud-cities, I don’t think construction would be an issue – we’ve plenteous experience of building geodesic domes and spheres before. But, we’ve never really built a floating one – let alone, building that while suspended in the middle of the atmosphere! The only step now would be to experiment on constructing Buckminster Fuller’s Cloud Nine. This would likely start simple, perhaps with the construction of a prototype which would be about 50-100 metres in diameter, perhaps. Seeing this prototype afloat would be quite an awe-inspiring moment – a moment relatable to the first people to the hot-air balloon. Afterwards, we’d be perfecting the model with regards to stability, manoeuvrability and other critical factors. Perhaps after perfecting several prototypes, we could gradually scale-up to the real thing – we could construct several Cloud Nines in proportions that would make Fuller the happiest man ever.

Now, after mastering the art of Cloud Nine - making, it’s now the matter of mastering the art of constructing them up-in-the atmosphere. How it would be done would be quite vague to me, but I know there’d be skilled engineers flying miles above our heads, in the Earth-made HAVOC-ish structures of the proposed phase-V and gradually make the first mid-atmospheric Cloud Nine. It might take many series of prototypical system and trials-and-errors sequences; they’d be ready for Venus. One might ask why a pre-made Cloud-Nine designed-for-Venus couldn’t be sent directly to Venus with all inhabitants. Well, sending a mile-wide sphere along with a population of thousands upon a single mission is quite very infeasible, impractical and too risky. Over the years, with an ever-expanding regime of HAVOC-ish biospherical structures; the raw-materials would have to be sent to Venus – a good supply of infrastructure. After that healthy infrastructure-supply becomes well-established, the Venusians would do the crafty engineering required for constructing a Cloud Nine above the cloud-tops, while living and assembling stuff in the giant floating structures of the phase-V HAVOC missions. This will be a highly ambitious target for the Venusian colonists, considering how hard establishing an interplanetary supply of infrastructure, really is.

After, the Venusians could move into their first cloud-city and live on firm terra for the time-being.Now, knowing how a cloud-city would have to be mid-atmospherically built, one might be asking as to why I would suggest taking all these troubles of constructing cloud-cities rather than living on the large floating HAVOC-ish biospherical structures? Why incur that additional expenditure if we could just modestly live on much-larger airships? Well, my main reason would be that it would that he first cloud-city would revolutionize Venusian lifestyle, as it would provide much more room for habitation, perhaps even redundant space to an extent. The habitation volume will be much more immense, than anything they lived-with, on Venus before.

Over the years, it might grow to house an entire population of thousands of Venusians. It alone might be able to house Venusian civilization for an entire century!  Moreover, by ‘revolutionize’, I meant that the first cloud-city (Let’s call it Venutropolis) would open many corridors of opportunities, not only by dramatically increasing their quality of life, but by also letting them do things that they could never have done before: For instance, the Venusians could now begin mining and more industrial activities, as Venutropolis would give an appropriate platform to do so. They now have much-more room for manufacturing purposes, for generating usable resources, and to create new technology and innovations for new systems, such as transportation. Similarly, they would have the much-required room for assembling new infrastructure, using the resources that they find themselves, within the premises of Venutropolis. Similarly, Venutropolis could provide room for exporting material back to the Earth, more consistently than any similar means attempted before. 

Moreover, the large floating HAVOC-ish biospherical structures would require extremely large masses of Helium – Helium which isn’t quite prominent in the Venusian atmosphere and quite rare to find in the solar system (accept the sun, perhaps). Meanwhile, Venutropolis and the future cloud-cities solely rely on the buoyancy of readily available atmospheric Nitrogen and extractable Oxygen – pressurized at 1 bar at a comfy temperature, that is. With decades passing, many more Venusians would have arrived to Venutropolis, and get quite cramped after a while.

When writing Exodus to Venus: the Civilization of Cloud-Cities, I assumed Venutropolis to be ‘Prima-V’, and separate cloud-cities would be buit after tense population growth – I was wrong to assume that. It isn’t that it isn’t possible; I now believe it to be more unlikely than I thought: Cloud-Cities aren’t meant to be universally spherical – many spherical shapes could be merged to form a geodesic structure which would likely resemble a cloud. That must’ve been why Fuller named his proposed idea as ‘CLOUD’Nine. Thereby, Venutropolis is likely to undergo persistent gradual construction over the decades of population-growth and possibly double, triple or quadruple in size. It would amoeba-ishly evolve into a giant cloud-like structure – to form a colossal flying conurbation, a gargantuan floating metropolis; the first colony. It could potentially increase its size to cover Venus, but it would likely undergo a schism well-before that for a multitude of thinkable reasons. It’d be a spectacular event, like the mitosis of Amoeba and the binary fission of Yeast, on a grand scale. Like the prokaryotes, it would replicate to form many cloud-colonies and eventually cloud-archipelagos.

It is likely at these stages that the Venusian industries and planetary commercialization kicks-in: It is likely that the Venusian atmosphere would have become haven for phase-III Venusian colonies, which would be self-sufficient via exports to the Earth.  Venusian cloud-archipelagos would have gained their sovereignty and be like ‘Venusian Nation’, Entire collections of Cloud-Colonies might specialize in agriculture, industry, import and export. Moreover, the surface would have quite a mining and industrial frenzy: I’d imagine it as if some mega-industrial revolution were going on, in an incarnation of hell. I would imagine rovers, scaled like large dump-trucks scuttling to-and-fro. Similarly, high above or slightly below the cloud-tops, I imagine seeing similarly large factories, which are fully automated and very much in line with each other. I’d imagine the factories and mining machinery to be quite reminiscent of the black smokers that hide in the deep-abysmal ocean trenches, and they would be connected by strong long ballooned cable systems, with hoppers ascending and descending in-and-out of the hazes of the Venusian atmosphere. The utter amount of them would make it seem as an escalator to heaven. The industrial gamut of Venus during phase-III colonization would simply be a well-organized chaos which would manufacture unfathomable quantities of resources ^[1].

Well, for the purposes of this chapter, knowledge the pioneering steps needed todayand the feasibility of building and expanding a cloud-city would be quite feasible is quite enough. If interest, I’ve described a more detailed distant-future-eccentric view of the cloud-archipelagos in Exodus to Venus: the Civilization of Cloud-Cities. Presuming that this chapter achieved its purpose, we would have now accumulated ample reasoning and evidence in favour of a Venusian civilization of cloud-cities. But, why isn’t it that relatively well known? Would we be making the biggest blunder humanity will ever make, by not pioneering Venusian colonization before it’s too late? What would happen if we didn’t do so in time?

Bibliography

Achinthya Nanayakkara (31.03.2025)

Originally written - 2019