This is not an article on how to relocate your CELSS, but rather about how matter and energy get moved around in the habitat.

Ecosystems are fundamentally reliant on the cyclic flow of matter driven by the flux of energy through the system. Most of us past elementary education are familiar with the most basic of these processes, the hydrologic cycle.

Most aquaponists are also pretty familiar with the nitrogen cycle.

There are also many other cycles for the various macronutrients and micronutrients critical to the function of an ecosystem and its constituent organisms. And of course they are all interrelated- the nitrogen cycle depends on the transport of water, and vice versa (to a lesser degree). These also effect the flow of dissolved nutrient minerals, erosion and sedimentation.

For example, in a CELSS you have to account for the salinization of the water table, and have some mechanism for desalinizing it. Sometimes that mechanism will be human elbow grease, but the more you rely on that, the less stable your system will be. 

Transfer Mechanisms

Back in the dark ages when I was in college, the chemical engineers had a class they called Meatballs, which I believe was shorthand for Mass and Energy Transfer and Balance. Almost wish I'd taken it, but I was a mechanical engineer dual majoring in physics and probably had enough on my plate.  The term mass transfer is commonly used in chemical engineering for physical processes that involve diffusive and convective transport of different chemical species within a system. For a ChemE, that would typically be a pharmaceutical factory or petroleum refinery. As regards CELSS, it occurs to add a few other processes: 

• Diffusion


• Absorption / Adsorption


• Evaporation


• Drying 


• Precipitation


• Membrane filtration


• Distillation

At any rate, I've been talking with Paul lately about how he moves things around in his biospheres. I've recently added a page on pumps. And of course I've assigned myself some additional reading: