Recent content by Khatti

That is more than fair enough. I freely admit that there is a Holy Grail aspect to this whole discussion. If when all is said and done, it comes to naught, fine. There is no guarantee that you will find a technical solution or scientific breakthrough if you're looking for it. But it's even more...

Would it be possible to drop a large tube or hose into the atmosphere from low orbit down to--say-- seventy kilometers and cycle atmosphere up into orbit where the oxygen and carbon could be separated? In theory cheap power would be more feasible in orbit than on Earth. I can see stability...

Again, point taken.

I have no love affair with oil or coal, if we can get rid of them so much the better. Conversely, even though I live out in the sticks and only need to drive a few miles south in order to see wind turbines, I don't have a great deal of faith in renewables filling our energy needs. I see wind and...

As you might have figured out, what interests me is building O'Neil structures. Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of the Earth cooling down a lot, but it isn't the only thing I'm thinking of. Carbon, being the lightest and strongest of materials to build with, is the logical material to build...

The other problem is the consensus that there is already too much CO2 in the atmosphere, and there needs to be some way to remove at least some of it. Admittedly, I go for the most romantic solution.

Point Taken.

This is why I wanted to ship the carbon upwards and use it to build O'Neil Colonies.

Environmentalists may hate this, but I have lot more faith in fifty very smart guys (or gals, or transsexuals or whatever else may be interested in this) solving global warming by trying to make money at it than I do any Environmentalist dream of arranging the societies of the world to their tastes.

What I find so intriguing about this idea is, if we could figure out a way to mine carbon from CO/2 and Methane, it would be one of the few elements that could be mined and processed in low-Earth orbit. Yeah I know, that would involve a couple of technologies that exist only one paper.

<Mentor moved thread to Science Fiction> Hello one and all. I'm fascinated by the idea of breaking down methane and carbon dioxide and using the carbon as a building material (graphene being the preferred material rendered from this process). Can anyone tell me anything on where the current...

Oh come now, certain elements are going to be necessary for spaceflight under any circumstances; Carbon come immediately to mind for building hulls. I don't know about Iron, but it occurs to me that if you need to hold your energy matrix in a magnetic field some element needs to be the base for...

I have a whole series based on this thought, thanks though.

The next question is a little more esoteric: is it likely that there are any elements out there that we haven't discovered yet? Does anyone have any thoughts on how Dark Matter might figure into the question I've asked? Again, the mining world idea applies. Feel free to speculate on this...

Okay I have two questions that I plan to post separately. The first question is simple: what elements will be needed to further space travel in the future? Does anyone care to comment on what base elements would be necessary to build the starship Enterprise? I should explain the reason why I'm...