Biosphere 2, Up to Date

Do you remember Biosphere 2? It started out in the late 1980's and continued into the 1990's as a project to demonstrate how humans could migrate to alien worlds and create their own livable environment. An interesting idea. NASA was among the hopeful sponsors.

Or was that Biosphere 1?  What's the difference between 1 and 2? What happened to those people? Is this thing still going on? Well! With so many questions we wanted to visit. And luckily, it's in Arizona only about 50 miles from where we're staying.

Our Visit to Biosphere 2

Turns out, Biosphere 2 is carrying on, and open to the public with scheduled tours. We took a tour with a tour guide, Julianne and I, our Seattle friend Cynthia, and about 15 other people. The guide has been with Biosphere 2 since the beginning, and was very enthusiastic about both the past and the future. We had about an hour and a half inside, and more wandering and thinking time outside. It's a beautiful and solidly built complex of structures.

Main environment, with rain forest and ocean, among other things

The Original Biosphere Project

Biosphere 1, it turns out, is the Earth and its atmosphere.  "2" was the effort to create a viable living space separate from Biosphere 1.  Eight people did actually live inside Biosphere 2 for two years, recycling their own O2/CO2, recycling and using the same water over and over, growing their own food.  Two years seems like an eternity. But they managed it, despite some problems.

The way Biosphere 2 was designed to work, eight people would live sealed off from the outside world, growing all their own food and conducting biological and biophysical experiments. The environment would be like the real world, with the plants, animal life and water resources in balance, creating an earth-like atmosphere of oxygen, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen.

They set up small versions of a rain forest, an ocean, a grassland, a farm.

Living quarters and "lung," with our friend Cynthia

To equalize air pressure inside and outside in the expanding heat of the day and the contracting cool of the night, there were expandable membranes, the "lungs," connected to the biosphere by underground passages. These expanded in the day time and contracted at night. 

Four men, four women, many plants, some mammals including one other primate, fish, insects. The eight lived in quarters connected to the greenhouse, also shut off from the outside world, except for computer contact and email.

Rain Forest

The rainforest understory

Ocean with wave-maker at rear

To avoid inside plants from accessing outside water, or outside plants accessing inside water, a basement of steel plates sat under the whole thing. Amazing. They really tried to think of everything.

Underground Biosphere 2 with tour guide and tourists in the room where water is recycled.

Inside the lung, which can adjust air pressure in Biosphere 2

How Did It Turn Out?

It was not as easy as the Biospherians hoped.

They had a farm where they grew their food and raised domestic animals. But during the first winter of Biosphere 2, the weather in Biosphere 1 (the Tucson area) was rainier and cloudier than typical, so photosynthesis lagged. Thus the percentage of oxygen fell inside the complex.

It fell also for another factor which they had not accounted for:  Concrete, used extensively in the construction, absorbs quite a bit of O2 as it is curing, and this depleted the atmospheric oxygen even more.

So the biggest problem, which showed up early in the experiment, was that there was not enough oxygen.  The amount of oxygen in the air dropped from 19% (normal) to 14.5%. At 13% humans die.

Of course, the project managers violated the isolation of the biosphere to add more oxygen. Outsiders called this a failure, but the Biospherians didn't agree, and stayed on, emerging in 1993 after two years.

Other than that, they were close to self-sufficient, but not quite. Basic life tasks -- farming and the other tasks required to sustain life -- took 66 hours/week for each person. They had adequate nutrients but not enough calories, and so they were hungry - beyond hungry. In desperation, they ate their seed corn, and dipped into the emergency food supply.

Further, simple self sufficiency wasn't enough. A central part of the project was their scientific experiments. But they couldn't get around to them, they were working too hard. The science was not progressing.

Non-rain forest area of the Biosphere

Hunger, poor air, and frustration made them cranky, and they divided into factions. Is that human, or what? (We think the guide said that the lack of oxygen was the strongest factor in the crankiness but our memories are weak.  Maybe we need more oxygen ourselves. Or maybe we have personally experienced the crankiness of hunger.)

Lots of learning in these two years, but finally the managers decided to stop the project since the science experiments were not being carried out. So two years was how long it lasted.

For a more complete review of Biosphere 2 history, see this Wikipedia article. A TED talk by participant Jane Poynter is here. A fascinating description of the whole concept of biospherics is here.

Now--15 years later

After years of effort, several changes in ownership and direction, and financial crises, a new template has emerged for Biosphere 2. The facility is managed now by the University of Arizona, and they are open to scientists from anywhere in the world who may want to conduct research there.

Our tour guide didn't focus on the hard times, but about the chances for future projects and what can be learned from them.

Two really interesting projects are in process now.  Probably others too but these are the ones we were able to absorb.

Climate science and water resource use are the focus now.  The Biosphere 2 site is well-suited to experiments on earth atmosphere, which has become one of the key issues for our planet.

Rain forest, I couldn't resist the rain forest

Rain Forest

Scientists have found that the trees in rain forests (temperate and tropical) do not take up water from rivers but rely fully on rainfall reaching their roots. Learn more here.

Using the enclosed rain forest in the Biosphere 2, this project is now measuring the plant usage of water in rainfall conditions (how much intake, expiration, etc).  (We were visiting during one of the rainfalls--yikes!) Later they will induce drought conditions and measure what the trees do especially to see whether their roots reach for the "rivers" under extreme conditions.

Water Cycle

This experiment is just starting.  The area which was the farm area when folks tried to live in Biosphere 2 is being transformed into an area with bare soil.  The scientists will measure rainfall and where it goes on soil with no vegetation, to create a baseline.  How much evaporation, how much percolation, etc.  The total amount of water can be held constant; amount and type of dirt remain constant. Next grass and grass-size plants will be introduced and similar measurements will be made. Later yet--trees. Learn more here.

I do not recall what they said about temperature, sunlight and so on but we suppose they also will be measured. Those factors depend on the Biosphere 1 climate in the Tucson area. The research will take several years so stay tuned.

Beginning project with high school students, water and plant growth.
Different contributions of water have different tracers.

More views from the tour

We saw the rain forest and ocean. We went down into the underground passages that link the living quarters to the rest. We went up into the lung and felt the hurricane wind as we left through the outside door.

Tour guide, Cynthia, Julianne, rain forest and Biosphere 2 skin

Wind when exiting

Photos by Nancy
Text by both