Colonization of Space

There is an increasing concern – at least an increasing discussion – about the fact that earth has finite dimensions and finite resources while its population – at this cusp of the 21^st century – is threatening to exhaust both available space and resources within a foreseeable future. 

More than a few scientists and arm-chair wizard wannabees have suggested it’s time to seriously consider colonizing other planets – like Mars.  More refined minds are suggesting the development of de novo, free-floating “Space Settlements”, as described in the following clip from NASA: http://settlement.arc.nasa.gov/Basics/wwwwh.html:  

“Space settlements will be a place for ordinary people.  

A space settlement is a home in orbit.

·         Rather than live on the outside of a planet, settlers will live on the inside of gigantic spacecraft. Typical space settlement designs are roughly one half to a few kilometers across. A few designs are much larger.

·         Settlements must be air tight to hold a breathable atmosphere, and must rotate to provide psuedo-gravity. Thus, people stand on the inside of the hull.

·         Enormous amounts of matter, probably lunar soil at first, must cover the settlements to protect inhabitants from radiation. On Earth our atmosphere does this job, but space settlements need about five tons of matter covering every square meter of a colony's hull to protect space settlers from cosmic rays and solar flares.

·         Each settlement must be an independent biosphere. All oxygen, water, wastes, and other materials must be recycled endlessly.”

This is a theorist’s/purist’s view, completely unencumbered by real world challenges.   

First of all, de novo can’t happen in a complete vacuum – other than by some incomprehensible “Big Bang” occurrence.  Thus, creation of such new settlements would require the extraction of enormous megatons of resources from current earth – where resources are already nearly tapped out.  Space settlements would, thus, be limited by the resources available from “mining” the earth.  While the sun can provide solar energy and can generate vegetation, at least the initial raw material would have to come from sources all too familiar.  Perhaps mining the moon, Mars, asteroids, and other celestial sources could provide eventual replacement and expansion possibilities.  But construction of a “flying flotilla system” for heavy duty transport of raw materials around and about the universe is imponderable with currently conjecturable reasonability.   

Second, if we have even half a thought that we can create such a tightly controlled life-support system in space, why can’t we do it on earth? 

·         Because we don’t have the WILL? 

·         Because we don’t have the DISCIPLINE?

·         Because we don’t have the RESOURCES? 

·         Because it’s already too late?   

Third, we can’t hope to establish something sustainable in space that we haven’t made sustainable here on earth.  To think that we would leave all the “unworkable” and “unsolvable” challenges here on terra firma is naïve at best.  Let’s set up a model system HERE and see how it works.  How would it work politically and economically, and how closely would it be tied to current earth-based systems?   (Some would say that democracy is the best we have to offer but it’s no longer working as it “should” … so what’s next and what’s better?) 

Fourth, we grossly underestimate the interdependencies we have on earth-based sources and systems that cannot readily be transported into space.  Try replicating the Pacific Ocean or polar ice caps which act as diverse climate control reservoirs, not to mention the former as a major life-support system.  Or consider earth’s “atmosphere” … which is a lot more complex than a bunch of “hot air”.  Among other things, it protects us against meteor showers and small asteroids.  Try replicating THAT!  And replicating gravity (actually reverse gravitation) by creating centrifugal (rather than centripetal) force in a rotating enclosure would have an unknown and potentially deleterious effect on natural biologic propensity.   

Speaking of the Pacific Ocean, why don’t we consider “colonizing” the two-thirds of the planet earth covered by water that are currently “uninhabitable”?  It would seem a lot less challenging to float large watercraft than to create inordinately large space craft.  NOTE: Vast portions of earth’s oceans are currently “deserts” – because plankton and corral do not easily grow over deep trenches and cannot support “edible” fish.  How about creating “floating corral reefs” or floating “continental shelves” to support the microscopic and macroscopic infrastructure for expanded life-support systems? 

If we’re going to use space, why not use it to dump toxic waste?  We could dump all our toxic chemical and radioactive waste on the moon and then mine it back as needed for recycling for future use, or set up reprocessing centers THERE.    

To think that we can create a completely independent replica of earth – not to mention a “better” earth – in empty space … on any fully functional scale … is an exhilarating thought.  But it’s based more on the fantastic notion of running away from our problems – most of which we’ve caused ourselves – rather than on fully understanding and making the most of what we’ve already got – which is pretty fantastical already … if we’d only put the same amount of time, energy and money into doing it sustainably right.  Quartermaster