SSI Activity

> Hi Vince,
>
> Well, you've "outed" me a little earlier than I had intended as I'm
> still in the process of forming some of these ideas with what I'm
> reading about in the industry but I'll share what I've got so far and
> see what you and the rest of the list think.
>
> 1) From "Mining the Sky", John Lewis delves into the basics of what we
> would need to establish a sustainable Lunar factory-settlement at the
> elemental level. If we still believe the O'Neillian vision that there
> would need to be at least a minimal presence on the Moon for resources
> to build, among other things, an Island One, then a simulation of a
> Lunar settlement may prove valuable.

This could be interesting. What kind of simulation do you have in mind?
Are you talking about simulating the materials needed to construct it,
the extraction of oxygen and other lunar resources, a simulation of
what would be necessary to support life on the Moon, some combination
of these, or something else entirely?

I'm not sure what's been done in terms of this. How well have Moon
bases been researched?

>
> 2) More and more near-Earth asteroids are being discovered as our
> observation techniques improve. An online database of the known
> characteristics of NEAs could prove valuable for resource gathering if
> such a tool does not exist already.

Hm. That could be kind of neat. Here's the closest thing I found:
http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/risk/

It's all about risk assessment, though, and has nothing about what
makes up the different NEOs in question.

>
> 3) Another group I am on dealing with space elevators is looking for
> assistance in developing 3-D models of the SE concept for outreach and
> advocacy purposes.

This seems like it's getting a lot of attention lately, so it may be
well covered already. Have you seen this?
http://www.patrawlings.com/animation.cfm
At the bottom of the page is a space elevator animation done by Pat
Rawlings et al. Not sure how relevant it is to what your group is
talking about, though. Is this the type of thing you had in mind, or
would you be talking about something more instructive than showy?

Cheers,
Vince