New Mars Forums

That's pretty interesting about the potential water savings.  I wonder why the NASA estimate was so high?

This is less cheap in a war zone.

This guy ...

http://www.spacefuture.com/archive/a_fr … gies.shtml

... says a cost to first power of $8-15 billion for a 250 MW system, with a 30 year lifetime cost of $50-60 billion.

But this is for a massive structure (the cabling and power management masses more than the old school solar cells, and the whole thing is thousands of tonnes).  I don't think anyone has seriously proposed/priced a gossamer design.

110 kW

Yeah, no comparison.

~10 km^2 with microwave.  Hmmm, guess they'd better go with laser.

Depends on how sophisticated the opponent is.  Good thought though.

BTW, they're discussing it publicly here ...

http://spacesolarpower.wordpress.com/

These Mars Deployable Greenhouse designs submitted for NASA's MarsPort 2002 competition might be a good starting point ...

http://projects.olin.edu/marsport/

http://www.mae.cornell.edu/europa/Final … 002pdr.doc

What sort of comments were you looking for?

I think progress in each of these areas helps allow for a manned trip to Mars.  The better you can plan, the more efficiently you can allocate mass, and the lower your contingencies have to be.

You seem unsatisfied with the program's efforts, SpaceNut.  Is there specific research you'd like to see happen, and that could likely be accomplished with a relatively modest increase in the program budget?

There are another couple of Falcon 1's to go up before the first Falcon 9.  It'd be nice to get an unqualified success on the board.

Goddamn good question.  I'm sure they'll say they're underfunded.

It looks like the action is taking place in an at least partially terraformed Mars.  That's usually assumed to be some way off.  Is there an approximate year in which the story is set?

http://www.thespacereview.com/article/931/1

...
In recent months, however, a new potential champion for space solar power has emerged, and from a somewhat unlikely quarter. Over the lasts several months the National Security Space Office (NSSO) has been conducting a study about the feasibility of space solar power, with an eye towards military applications but also in broader terms of economic and national security.

Air Force Lt. Col. Michael “Coyote” Smith, leading the NSSO study, said during a session about space solar power at the NewSpace 2007 conference in Arlington, Virginia last month that the project had its origins in a study last year that identified energy, and the competition for it, as the pathway to “the worst nightmare war we could face in the 21st century.” If the United States is able to secure energy independence in the form of alternative, clean energy sources, he said, “that will buy us a form of security that would be phenomenal.”

At the same time, the DOD has been looking at alternative fuels and energy sources, given the military’s voracious appetite for energy, and the high expense—in dollars as well as lives—in getting that energy to troops deployed in places like Afghanistan and Iraq. Soldiers, he noted, use the equivalent of one AA battery an hour while deployed to power all their devices. The total cost of a gallon of fuel delivered to troops in the field, shipped via a long and, in places, dangerous supply chain, can run between $300 and $800, he said, the higher cost taking into account the death benefits of soldiers killed in attacks on convoys shipping the fuel.

“The military would like nothing better than to have highly mobile energy sources that can provide our forces with some form of energy in those forward areas,” Smith said. One way to do that, he said, is with space solar power, something that Smith and a few fellow officers had been looking at in their spare time. They gave a briefing on the subject to Maj. Gen. James Armor, the head of the NSSO, who agreed earlier this year to commission a study on the feasibility of space solar power.
...

[ Sweet!  That could bootstrap everything. ]

Russian scientist calls for fusion research program by year's end
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20070816/71818954.html

A leading Russian nuclear scientist said the country must adopt a federal targeted program on the research and potential use of fusion power as an alternative energy source by the end of 2007.

A government meeting adopted Thursday the main provisions of a draft strategy for developing a fusion power industry up to 2015 and beyond, and instructed the Federal Agency for Nuclear Power to prepare a revised version of the document by October 1.

The strategy stipulates the allocation of 515 billion rubles (about $20 billion) for the development of a fusion power industry, including construction of commercial thermonuclear reactors, until 2050.
...

Dark Matter Mystery Deepens in Cosmic "Train Wreck"

http://chandra.harvard.edu/press/07_rel … 81607.html

Astronomers have discovered a chaotic scene unlike any witnessed before in a cosmic "train wreck" between giant galaxy clusters. NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and optical telescopes revealed a dark matter core that was mostly devoid of galaxies, which may pose problems for current theories of dark matter behavior.
...
A popular [but apparently wrong] theory of dark matter predicts that dark matter and galaxies should stay together, even during a violent collision, as observed in the case of the so-called Bullet Cluster. However, when the Chandra data of the galaxy cluster system known as Abell 520 was mapped along with the optical data from the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope and Subaru Telescope atop Mauna Kea, HI, a puzzling picture emerged. A dark matter core was found, which also contained hot gas but no bright galaxies.

"It blew us away that it looks like the galaxies are removed from the densest core of dark matter," said Dr. Hendrik Hoekstra, also of University of Victoria. "This would be the first time we've seen such a thing and could be a huge test of our knowledge of how dark matter behaves."

In addition to the dark matter core, a corresponding "light region" containing a group of galaxies with little or no dark matter was also detected. The dark matter appears to have separated from the galaxies.

"The observation of this group of galaxies that is almost devoid of dark matter flies in the face of our current understanding of the cosmos," said Dr. Arif Babul, University of Victoria. "Our standard model is that a bound group of galaxies like this should have a lot of dark matter. What does it mean that this one doesn't?"
...

[ back to the drawing board ]

This is the crux of the con: "stare at the randomness until you see the images I have suggested that you see."

Is that the thrill you get?  Making other people see something? 

But why this particular con?  There are so many.  Do you just need the practice?  Are you finding people for your sucker list?