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Once you are out of a gravity well as a civ, why would you bother with them economically aside from tourism? Unless we get antigravity, or loop launch / space e
by AtlasBarfed 5y ago
Once you are out of a gravity well as a civ, why would you bother with them economically aside from tourism? Unless we get antigravity, or loop launch / space elevator / space hook sized planetoids (I think Mars is the practical limit of space elevators last I looked).
Red dwarfs appear ideal. Very long lived, and there do seem to be planets and asteroid material in them. A globular cluster of mostly red dwarfs would be an ideal long-term place for an "interstellar" civ. The stars drift as close as 1/3 light year.
Look at what some of the projected mineral yields of asteroids are. And comets can probably get you other element mixes as needed.
Yes, I think Lithium will be be available artificially with some form of fusion. Or you capture solar wind material perhaps.
- hakuseki 5y agoGravity wells are where most of the resources are. For example, Earth outmasses the asteroid belt by a factor of over 1,000.
- chasil 5y agoThere is a core of a failed planet in the asteroid belt. That will be a rich source of iron and precious metals. https://globalnews.ca/news/7429663/metal-asteroid-16-psyche-quadrillion/ https://globalnews.ca/news/7429663/metal-asteroid-16-psyche-...
- AtlasBarfed 5y agoIs the factor just a 1000x? That would actually be an argument in favor of asteroids. All you need for space habs for construction (well, maybe not all the organic matter) is in asteroids. Maybe all we need material-wise is probably in the larger asteroids that we are trying to track for collision detection. Here, let's cut the difference: MOONs! Why bother with planets if their moons have all the resources and none of the lifting issues. I guess our moon is pretty resource poor since it formed from Earth's crust. But then again, have we surveyed what's under the surface?