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(Previous Question)

In the (near) future, after space travel has become affordable to even the common man, cloud cities are deployed on Saturn as it has favourable conditions such as Earth-like gravity, and rings for night view.

Each cloud city is discussed thoroughly in my previous question, but I will do a quick recap.

The cloud-city in question is a giant zeppelin that is supported lifted by heated hydrogen. The heat, in question, comes from long cables that are plunged into the deep atmosphere to extract the heat, sort of like geothermal cables. The population of the city is variable, can range from a meagre scientist outpost of 500, to a bustling city of about 5,000,000. Electricity is harvested by wind turbines that harvest Saturn's immense winds for algae-O2 generators and plants for food. The city's livestock consists of goats, cows and sheep. Pets are also there on the spacecraft, mainly cats and dogs, but exotic pets are also allowed.

However there is a major problem: Saturnian Weather.

On Saturn it rains this: enter image description here

Yes folks, that's a rough diamond.

Saturn's diamond rain poses a major hazard for these cloud cities, they can damage valuable equipments such as wind turbines, and can put dents and abrasions on the surface of the airship-hull, which can cause the balloon to leak its lifting gas and fall down into the interior, killing all the residents in it.

Furthermore, Saturn's immense turbulence wreaks havoc on the cloud-city, causing violent acceleration and deceleration, being extremely uncomfortable for the residents.

How to shield a Saturnian Cloud-city from Saturn's treacherous weather?

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  • $\begingroup$ Is there some reason you are trying to put your habitats so deep in Saturn's atmosphere? Conditions extreme enough to form diamonds are likely to be a more direct problem for habitats than some "dents and abrasions". $\endgroup$
    – Christopher James Huff
    Commented Oct 17, 2022 at 16:53
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    $\begingroup$ Several of your questions have mentioned "geothermal cables"...you can't reasonably extract heat across the distances that would be involved with "cables". Possibly you could arrange some form of near neutrally-buoyant fluid transfer loop using lift cells along its length to support its weight, but good luck keeping the winds from tearing it apart, and losses would be enormous. And if you have wind power, why do you need such an awkward heat source? $\endgroup$
    – Christopher James Huff
    Commented Oct 17, 2022 at 16:57

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You would as many of the commercial airplanes do on Earth: fly so high that you can avoid most of the weather phenomena by either going above or around them.

Diamond form in Saturn atmosphere because of the decomposition of carbon based compounds leading to the formation of graphite first and then, where the conditions allow it, turning it into diamond.

If you can, stay above the diamond formation zone. If you call it the adamantosphere, you want to be above the adamantopause. You will get a dark coating of graphite over time, but I guess you need to do some cleaning once in a while, or not?

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