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contras1970 | 6 years ago
well, actually... you need lower-energy atoms for higher-energy ones to rub against to carry away the excess. there's not many atoms in vacuum, so the default problem in space is overheating. see eg. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/External_Active_Thermal_Contro... or https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_cooling_and_ventilation...
> you have to first survive the freezing trip to Venus. So you need heating and air conditioning. A lot. Of both.
the heating part is very, very wrong. the AC would be Atmospheric Control, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Space_Station#Sy....
killjoywashere|6 years ago
Wat? Conductive and convective heat loss are certainly things, but heat radiates away too, and that is exactly how the systems you describe perform. The fact that the hull doesn't radiate much heat away itself isn't suprising, but all things being equal, the system still dies cold. Put the other way: if heat was truly the problem, is there any outcome where ISS melts, short of re-entry?
contras1970|6 years ago
i don't think so. should the cooling system fail, the sources of heat (mechanical work, biological processes) would cease way before that.