5 ms·
Easier to prioritise if everyone dies of asphyxiation without it, perhaps.
by omnicognate 5y ago
Easier to prioritise if everyone dies of asphyxiation without it, perhaps.
- micromacrofoot 5y agoYou'd think, but it seems we're currently hurtling an entire planet towards mass climate-related migration and food instability... Regardless, by the time we're creating massive space colonies we'll probably be manufacturing oxygen rather than maintaining massive forests.
- wnkrshm 5y agoOceanic photosynthesis is what you want to also look at to protect, more than half (est. 50-80%) of our oxygen comes from oceanic life like plankton, algae, bacteria. If the oceans go, we're screwed.
- undersuit 5y ago>we'll probably be manufacturing oxygen rather than maintaining massive forests. What's the difference?
- micromacrofoot 5y agoScale, time, labor, reliability. Forests are vulnerable to disease and replacement parts take years and years to grow.
- beebeepka 5y agoMachines would need lots of power, maintenance, and many years to design, build, install. Unless you're playing devil's advocate, I'd say you are shilling for a certain industry
- micromacrofoot 5y agoYeah I'm shilling for getting our heads out of our asses and taking care of forests on earth before we go fantasizing about forests in space that no one will ever build.
- beebeepka 5y agoOh, my bad. I thought you're talking about doing this on the planet. In this case, I agree, of course. But growing forests might also work
- Chris2048 5y agoTrees can't split every oxide.
- wonderwonder 5y agoI would think a space colony would have to be far more authoritarian than the earth. In space much more can go wrong without a central authority with almost absolute power which makes it easier to dictate green space.
- wruza 5y agoIt boils down to energy (there may be no free safe/good-enough sun in space). When you have to power a forest yourself, it is probably much easier to power a direct co2->co+o2 reactor.
- IntrepidWorm 5y agoMaybe- theres certainly a lot of frozen CO2 in comets available for harvesting. Where would the CO go, however? It's not the sort of thing you just want piling up next to your habitation zones.
- Chris2048 5y agomaybe detach another O and use the C for graphite/organics?
- wruza 5y agoModern (experimental) reactors cannot do that, afaiu. Btw, photosynthesis doesn’t produce CO not because it’s more efficient. It doesn’t split CO2 at all, it does CO2+water+light+catalyzers -> carbonhydrates+O2, and this O2 comes from water, CO2 goes to carbs as is.
- Chris2048 5y agoI assume we are talking about a future context. Of course CO could also be used to make some kind of carbon compounds: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/splitting-carbon-dioxide/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/splitting-carbon-...