New Mars Forums

IF this is real then quite a good thing it seem:  https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … &FORM=VIRE  Quote:

Lots of big claims.  We will have to see.

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I am seeing some articles that suggest that there is interest in using Starship to build "Moon Base Alpha".  The articles suggest not only accessing water from the poles, but extracting Oxygen from the regolith.  The suggestion of 5 Starships converted to habitation by being put horizontal.  And the notion that each Starship might deliver 200 tons of cargo to the Moons surface.

Further they seem to believe that most labor would be done by robots as humans in balloon suits cannot do much work, and not very well.

Even hints of Oxygen from the Moon for trips to Mars.  Perhaps I have that wrong, but I thought I got that drift.

With the possibility that there may be Platinum family metals in many craters on the Moon, I think this would be wise.

I have read that SpaceX is now doing Atmospheric Separations at Starbase.  That is extracting Nitrogen, Oxygen, and Argon from the atmosphere.  I wonder if they will be able to either sell some of the Argon, or get involved in Argon Electric rockets in space.

While Argon Electric Rockets could bring materials to Lunar Orbit, they also could perhaps bring Starships back from Lunar Orbit efficiently.  The Moon is not going to need a huge population anytime soon, so most travel about the Moon would likely be robotic with a few transfers of humans.

It looks promising to me.

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Here is a related video: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … ORM=VRDGAR
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I differ from kdb512 in that I think that "Green" energy will be a "Fake it until you make it" situation.  I think it will eventually pay off big time, but it needs a childhood stage before it gets to a more useful adulthood.

I am very interested in: https://www.alberta.ca/premier
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Primarily as she wants to increase the amount of Oil Alberta exports but says they also want to achieve "Net-Zero" by 2050.

I am fairly ambiguous about what Canada decides to do with itself or within itself, but a more dynamic Canada or Alberta, or whatever, would probably be useful to Americans like myself.

As far as I am concerned Europeans seem now to want to return to a Feudal order of society, and I absolutely despise that.

But if Canada, Alberta, or West Canada, or all of Canada, will take a new path and accomplish all of these things that would be a very useful example of how to move forward.

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An interesting variation on this thinking could involve a "Rung World" ring.

Here is an illustration of it: https://www.reddit.com/r/IsaacArthur/co … ung_world/
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Even for 10 Hygea, this would be very ambitious.  But some day we might have enormous Rung Worlds around Jupiter, built of materials from Callisto, and maybe even all the moons, even IO.

In my version, however we would be having enormous solar heat engines which would include very large habitable radiators.  The Mirror Platforms being able to swivel could point to the sun.  I have a tendency to think of a habitable radiator where the entirety would be filled with water, but it may be possible that water could be made to cling to the surface of the radiator.  Probably a better solution is to have an inner chamber filled with air.  But I leave it somewhat open.  The great concern that freezes damage would be possible requires adaptations to deal with it then.  If you have a malfunction where you fear freezing the water in the envelope and damaging the envelope then perhaps you have to pump the water into the inner shell if you have one, until you can warm it up again.

Where previously I have suggested that the Heat Engine would be in front of a large concentrating mirror, the use of a secondary mirror might allow it to be flush with the mirror or even behind it.  Where before I suggested a cylinder as the shape of the radiator we might also consider the shape of a red blood cell.   Something I often consider.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_blood_cell
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The shape is supposed to be rather good at exchanging O2 and CO2, so I presume it may be good at radiating heat.

So, an aquatic world in orbit might shelter air filled habitats.  In the case where you wanted 1 g of so of synthetic gravity then I expect that a vacuum chamber needs to be provided or the synthetic gravity machine might be attached to the outside of the water world.

For 10 Hygea, I suspect that space elevators could connect to part of the rung world.

In the case of Jupiter, the rung worlds would be enormously large and there would likely be many of them.  Probably in the regions of lesser radiation belts, but with protection from the sun's emissions.

To lift mass from the moons, in part the magnetic field of Jupiter could be employed.

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For a 100% efficient mirror for Ceres you need 7 times as much mirror area as for the Earth.
For a 100% efficient mirror for the orbits of Jupiter you would need 25 times as much mirror area as for the Earth.
Troublesome but within reach, I think.

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From post #28:

Basically, a canister within a canister within a canister.  Between the two outer canisters is a water jacket.  Then the next layer is vacuum, then the inner cylinder may be filled with air.

The water jacket can be locked down to the mirror assembly and not rotate at all but be a habitable radiator with microgravity water, and be a radiation and impactor protection for the innermost air-filled cylinder.

Since the water jacket does not rotate relative to the mirror, electrical cabling to and from the mirror platforms could be accommodated.

The water jacket could support microbial and some other types of life.  Chemical stimulation of life would be the more natural notion, but you could put some lighting into the "Farm" of the "Habitable Radiator".

For humans to work inside of a microgravity water jacket, some sort of an environment suit would be desired, for sure.

Also there have to be water circulation pumps to keep temperatures of the water equilibrated.

Perhaps mastering air bubbles in microgravity could become an art.  Some aquatic insects may have something to teach.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquatic_insect

Also a centrifuge enclosure might work.  If you spun a cylinder or sphere with an open hatch in the microgravity water, and filled it with air, I think the air would tend to displace the water within.  The spin rate could be relatively slow, not so much to create synthetic gravity but to keep the water and air separate.

Another notion in microgravity water would be to make a slurry of water and air bubbles.  Of course this would have to be actively maintained, but perhaps some special kind of head gear would allow a personal helmet to pull air out of the mix using centrifugal force so that you could breath the water.

Another similar would be to put a very much larger amount of Oxygen into the water than is normal on Earth.  If you put less Nitrogen in then you could dissolve more Oxygen in the solution.

From post #26:

So, a very large waffle like platform of mirrors, with multiple focus, and each focus could accommodate some type of heat engine perhaps with a habitable radiator.

But alternately they could simply accommodate a greenhouse, spinning or not spinning.

The energy from the platform could be used to send power beams such as Lasers or Microwaves to project spacecraft, solar moth and solar sail being among methods possible.

Since Ceres, 10 Hygea, and Callisto are believed to be rich in water, then you could even use laser heated steam propulsion to get a payload started, a sort of booster.

Of course you could cook up rocket propellants as well, but those always have explosive properties.

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This guy feels doom also: https://www.bitchute.com/video/xZ9QQPnLlUkz/
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I sure hope the remaining strong economies hold out.

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I don't know the importance of the talking boy.  But Reagan was to a large degree appropriate for those times.  But I think he was useful, not a genius.  I feel that he missed the importance of respecting the privacy of citizens, even if he was powerful.  That was a fault.  A very bad one.  But he did his part in history and I tend to believe that when someone dies, you try not to hold grudges on them.

I am not an expert on tariffs, I am willing to see what our Orange President can accomplish.  These days are not the days of Reagan.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_o … ted_States
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In my opinion the great depression was when the former Northern Establishment fell.  The influx of stranger immigrants was simultaneous, and the beginning of the rise of the South from ashes began.

WWII Had the European Empires including the Soviet Empire bleed each other almost to death.  Then we stepped in.  I don't hold us in contempt for that; Europe was full of arrogant people who looked down on us anyway.

In Peter Zeihans story, we had to keep Europe out of the Soviet hands, or we would be next.  So, then free trade at our expense.  We had plenty being the last one standing, and it was better to be screwed over financially than to be obliterated.  We had our own resources including Oil, and then we had to plunder the world for resources for the "West".  It was that or die.

The Soviet Union fell, and as P. Ziehan said an empire of resources fell into the world markets.

All along the way we received contempt from the European Leftists and from Canida as well.

I believe that we were led into Viet Nam by the Europeans and then left to die there.

The so called civil rights movement degenerated into a new plantation method where descendants of former slaves were conducted into northern cities in order for Southern Hierarchy to come to drain wealth from the ghettos.  And from time to time these things are stirred up to damage our interest by outsiders.

I believe that Johnson may have been evil.

But God protected us anyway, to a reasonable degree and despite the hatred of those who do not like us we have done OK.

I believe that we are in the Asian pulse and no longer in the African pulse.  What was correct for the previous saeculum is not necessarily correct for this one.  And so now you may understand why we desire useful relations with the Russians, China and others.  To some extent Canada and Greenland might be considered colonial residue from Europe.  But I would never act on that.  You are developing into another America, I believe.  You will not have our name or as you say are not like us, but you live on the same continent and have had and will have similar experiences.

There is a "Roman" problem.  We need to be careful about this.  I do not have a hatred for Italy, in fact I am beginning to appreciate them more now.

But the "Roman" problem is that the Empire was never able to assimilate that which was north of them.  But they keep trying to conquer them.  Over and over and over again.

Ireland-South/Scotland-North, London-South, Stockholm-North, France-South, Poland-North, Rome-South, Moscow-North, and so on.  A ethnic mirror.  The Hierarchal Farmer South vs. the Warrior descendants of the Yamnaya.  Yes, I know there is mixing, for instance the Germans are almost equal parts of the South and the North and then also have the Western Hunter-Gatherer mixed in.  But I think WWII was southern mischief.  The Roman Empire was split long ago, and going to war with war peoples is about as stupid as you could be, to force the Russians to submit.

And so Canada is an echo of that.  And the USA is an echo of that, but we found a way to unity.  We tried to unify Europe but the dumb asses just wanted to go on a farmer conquest again.

And yes we have problems with that arm of our collective population.  We have just been being patient with them if we can.

But we are withdrawing our unifying force from Europe and maybe from Canada as well.

And thing are crumbling.

Why should we give tribute to a long dead Roman Empire?  One that took our peoples for slaves in history.

Brussels is in the line of the Romanoid cities, Dublin, London, Paris, Rome, Athens, Cairo.  (Of these the Greeks were the most like us in history but not necessarily now.

So, if we choose to live the way we want to I think we will give it a try.  And for the moment we have plenty of hammers to persuade jerks to leave us alone.

I hope you people can figure your things out in Canada OK.  I don't hate you but not gonna play sucker anymore if we don't have to .

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Some things that might be appended to the previous post:

These are ideas that could make some sense for worlds where abundant water can be obtained.  That is more towards the outer solar system, and ideally smaller worlds with less of a gravity well.  Ceres, 10 Hygea, Callisto.  Perhaps sufficient sunlight to make concentrating mirrors worth the investment.

I do not specify rate of spin, but if the human occupied space in the center has 1 g, then the water will have a bit more.

Here is another idea:

The grey area might be an air fill, the blue, a water fill.

The two, the grey and blue might rotate in opposite directions.  A partial vacuum is to exist between the grey and blue.

Here is an "Open Water" scheme:

Just some food for thought. 

For Ceres and 10 Hygea, we might entertain space elevators, possibly linked to sets of these sorts of "Habitable Heat Engine Concepts".

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Continuing with the previous post, I want to make sure that I don't plagiarize ideas that I appropriate/borrow from their originators.  From the Finns I got the idea of a Magnetic Bearing, (Cradle) that a rotor can rest in, in microgravity.
https://www.sciencealert.com/could-huma … anet-ceres
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I believe that their focus is on accommodating the habitats.  I am thinking more though about acquiring solar power.  So, for the moment I will suggest a plane of concave mirrors facing the sun when possible.  Each concave mirror assembly could host a sort of tripod, that could host a spinning object in a magnetic nest.

While the spinning object might be in a form resembling an O'Neill Cylinder; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O%27Neill_cylinder
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More often I want to consider a "Habitable Radiator".

A "Habitable Radiator" notion would not so much focus on windows to bring light in, but to foster life inside of a heat engine.

This diagram is crude because I only have so much skill in working with paint, and also, I only want to convey concepts:

So, it may be possible to maintain the condenser in conditions that would foster life.  This will be in conflict with running a turbine, so internal heat exchangers (Not shown) will be needed to use the water from the blue portion as coolant but not to run such water though the heat engine.  Such water would have dissolved gasses that would be corrosive for instance of the boiler and turbine.  But the blue portion of the cylinder with fins, would radiate heat to space, and produce cooling water that cannot be directly used in the heat engine.  So, then however the heat engine itself might run on CO2 which I have seen written might be better than water.

The blue cooling water could be kept temperate enough to allow life in it. Chemically driven life for instance.  The chemicals would be cooked up using some of the electric power produced.

Oxygen and then some type of fuel.  Acetate is a recent discovery, Methane might be OK, and Hydrogen might work, but will require special care.

I have not shown the cradle structure in the drawing, but it would link the mirror physically to the Habitable Heat Engine, using struts and a magnetic field.

It could be possible that the environment in the blue area might be tolerated by humans, especially if they have Personal Protective Equipment that is appropriate. 

Spin options for the Habitable Heat Engine are various.  As I see it you want the cooling water to congregate somewhere so spin can make that happen.  And to some degree the water layer that will cling centrifugally to the inner walls of the cylinder will offer radiation protection.

It may be possible to incorporate a human habitat into this sort of machine, but maybe robots would do most of the maintenance.

There are complex ways to alter this basic plan, you could have a cone and not a cylinder.

By presenting the cone point to the sun, the water can be used for radiation protection.  Just a notion.

These things more or less would be microbe farms.  And you could also then grow mushrooms on that organic material of the microbes grown.

However, it might be possible to grow aquatic plants of various kinds, presuming you could adapt them to mostly run on chemicals such as Oxygen and Acetate.  But in that case I recommend a little amount of artificial light.  That might give seasonal signals to the plants, and also would be a bit more useful if people or robots were working inside of these things.

I have already said that perhaps a Habitable Heat Engine might be linked directly to a human habitat.  That might be more complicated than desired.  Perhaps the Magnetic cradles of the mirrors could host either a Habitable Heat Engine, or a human habitat.  An "Or" rather than an "And".

I see this method as perhaps being most useful where you can get "Dirty Ices", such as Ceres, 10 Hygea, and Callisto for instance.

One of the objectives is to produce electricity to run lasers that may help support transport of materials using Solar Moth, and also Solar Sail methods among others.

https://isaacarthur.net/video/solar-mot … lar-sails/

Sending organic materials inward in the solar system, and sending Metals and Silicates outward in the solar system.

* If the water were to freeze in the water wet section that might damage things, so perhaps this needs more work.

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Ice worlds begin at Mars, as far as I am concerned.  Or I can just say that can be asserted.

Mars has a fairly large gravity and an atmosphere that complicates things.  So, the next ice worlds I am familiar with are Ceres, and 10 Hygea.  Those in the main asteroid belt, have other companions that are similar.  And then I am inclined to think that Callisto may resemble Ceres to a certain extent, but it is a moon.

The truth about these objects is that they lack any substantial atmosphere.  Titan and worlds further out than it may have substantial atmospheres, but may be short of accessible rocky materials.  This does not seem to be true for Ceres and Callisto, so they might be treated in similar manners.

https://isaacarthur.net/video/solar-mot … lar-sails/
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So, at these worlds, it might be profitable to use a Solar Moth techniques to send lighter materials like water, Carbon, and Ammonia inward in the solar system.  But then also to use Solar Sails to send heavier materials such as Silicates and Metals, outward to worlds like Titan.

Probably much of what might be sent inward might go to small asteroids being mined, and perhaps to our Moon.

The use of lasers to help power both solar moths and solar sails might make sense.  I might expand the concept of a solar moth to also allow for more propulsive methods than just thermal expansion of a gas, I might include electric propulsion methods as well.  Also, a solar moth might also be given a chemical rocket boost as well at the start of it's path from an icy world.

While I am looking forward to the option of using nuclear fusion, I think it is reasonable to consider concentrating mirrors for solar power, for devices in proximity to an ice world but in orbit, to power the lasers.  And these lasers might double to send power to the ice world that they are proximate to.

Pause.............

I have a tendency to imagine very large mirrors for collection of solar energy, and water dominated habitats for humans to occupy, and then of course places for robots.

These worlds may have significant Ammonia, Carbon, and water which are desired.

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Based on a post elsewhere by (th), I will respond: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 44#p232744

Yes, ice caves carved, melted, or evaporated, could offer protections.  And I think that Callibans suggestions were in relation to icy worlds like Titan, or Pluto.  For instance, Pluto's moon Charon could have vast networks of ice caverns in it going very deep.  Such chambers might be large enough to allow for spinning habitats deep under the moons surface.  And the fossil cold of billions of years, could be regarded as a resource, helping to "Sink" waste heat for some time.

Other forms of exploiting this cold would be to melt seas under the surface of such a world with waste heat you wanted to dispose of.

Evaporative cooling might be explored after some time when the fossil cold is starting to be used up.  For instance you could simply vent water which had heat pushed into it, vent the water to space.  If you had a artificial magnetic field around the ice world where you did this, chances may be that much of it would fall back in the gravity field to the surface of such a world.

So, although at first waste heat would use fossil cold, and then melting to avoid excessive heat build-up, then eventually evaporation might be used.

That then is the "Inni Method", but also possible is an "Outi Method": https://www.orionsarm.com/eg-article/5e9f5429cee4a  Quote:
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Isaac Arthur has expressed the opinion that such methods might even be used in the Kuiper Belt.  I tend to be a little more conservative and suggest, that it could be done out to the orbit of Saturn.

At Ceres the normal sunlight is still fairly strong, and at Callisto, it does get lower yet.  For Ceres the intensity is about 1/7th that of Earth.

It can be kept in mind that the mirror itself can be paper thin, but perhaps there would be rib structures that vehicles could travel on.

Included with the mirrors, may be "Habitable Radiators".  That is chambers where steam might be condensed, where also life could live.  And in associated with that then habitations for humans and robots.

So, as you might dig ice caves you might also take the water mined out to such a external mirror system orbiting near the ice world being mined.

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I have come across some interesting information.

I read that a solar panel could hold about 60% of its power production after 100 years.

To me that says that for certain installations the 25-year warrantee does not mandate that you would need to dispose of those panels yet even after 100 years.  The owners may want to, if new panels are much better, however.  But I believe that there is an ultimate limit on how efficient silicon panels and other panels can become.

So, it has been said that 90% of humans live in the sunbelt of this planet.  Even if China mass produces solar panels using coal, solar panels can be used for at least 100 years even now.  For a country like Australia for example, or the American southwest, solar panel installations could be producing an enormous amount of power for the amount of hydrocarbons burned to create them, presuming hydrocarbons will continue to be used.

It seems that the price of batteries is dropping, as well: https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/r … ORM=VAMGZC
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As well, here is a claim that hydrocarbon use is being displaced by solar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nj_fs13 … tricViking  Quote:

I am not particularly concerned about the political aspects of the above video.

There seems to be efforts to make solar panels self-heal: https://undecidedmf.com/how-self-healin … verything/  Quote:

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There seem to be efforts to do it with silicon also, but I am not sure about cost effectiveness: https://unswhoexgroup.com/self-healing- … lar-cells/

Anyway, if a solar panel can have 60% of its electric production after 100 years, then the average may be around 80% for 100 years.  And that would be without self-healing included.

The market for energy may continue to rise, at least for data centers, so maybe hydrocarbons will not fade before peak oil, but there are efforts to fuel data centers with geothermal and also nuclear fission.

So, I am really thinking that countries with lots of sunny land which tends to be arid, would really benefit from continue using solar panels beyond a 25-year warrantee.

And if precision fermentation will reduce farmland use then even countries with a lot of farmland could do the same thing.

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As further comment on this post of Calliban: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 11#p232611

And this similar post from Calliban: https://newmars.com/forums/viewtopic.ph … 47#p232647
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I would like to make some comments.

Presuming that a power source as effective as we anticipate Fusion will become does become actual, then the assessment of what to do with matter in a solar system and beyond may change.

Matter might be classified by accessibility to human uses.

Some people think that the plutoids will be higher in the sun's gravity well, and the individual objects the size of Pluto or smaller will have small gravity wells themselves.

Some people think that Star Lifting could be another valuable source of matter.  I expect that that is quite far away from our methods at this time, but the sun or another star could supply the power to do Star Lifting.

But there may be a thing between these extremes.  We generally think about irrigating inner planets with substances from the outer solar system.  But the inverse may be more profitable.

Among "Dry" objects in the solar system are Mercury, and some of the rocky asteroids.  And other objects such as Ceres and Callisto, may be icy, but may still provide rocky materials accessible on or near their surfaces.

The sun's power could drive solar sails.  Historically those are contemplated to be using the full spectrum of the sunlight.  But lately concepts have emerged where lasers are considered even for interstellar missions, so they likely to be sent to Plutoids nearer to our sun.  Here is an article on that, where holes are put into the sail: https://pubs.aip.org/physicstoday/artic … starsSails

What I am driving at is this.  Such sails sent to a plutoid might impact it and the materials then delivered by that method.  So, let's consider Titan, Triton, Pluto.  They each have an atmosphere of some sort.  So, very thin solar sails, and properly designed payloads would burn up in those atmospheres on arrival, probably without damaging anything on the surface.

Over time, some of Mercury and the Asteroid Belts could be delivered to the plutoids this way.  One like Eris, being large enough it may be possible to inflate an atmosphere on it for this purpose.

For Smaller ones you might have to impact the icy surface to deliver the materials.  That of course could be a challenge to not damage surface installations if any.

So, I will argue that perhaps aliens would do this, provided that fusion is indeed a proper power supply.

Where we are starting to lament that the Trappist Star system planets will not have an atmosphere, perhaps we could look at the situation another way.

Looking at Proxima Centauri, I see a really good possibility.  Even if 'b' is airless.
If the candidate 'd' does exist, then it will be quite a prize if humans ever get there: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxima_Centauri_d

Proxima Centauri Asteroid Belts: https://planetpailly.com/2020/03/03/tou … 0System%29.
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So, we have some chances of Plutoids which we are not equipped to detect at this time.

So, rocky and metal materials could be exported from the inner Proxima Centauri system to any plutoids further out.

And an alien people if they became advanced enough could engage in Star Lifting as well, to export the heavy materials from their star(s), out to the plutoid.

So, the point is even if red dwarfs are not suitable for habitable planets they may very well, be very useful for the materials that could be shipped out from the inner parts of such a solar system  out to where the valuable ices are and also the deuterium and perhaps Helium-3.

This would be a very different concept from the Dyson Sphere.  But maybe they would make rings around their star to collect sunlight, and project the power out to the plutoids as well.

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