Earth-Moon Network = Maturing Space Industries

Here's my input to your question. The first component should be a
small LEO platform that can house assembly workers and technicians.
This station is wholly serviced from earth and has a design life of
a few years. The workers are there to assemble a LEO skyhook. This
skyhook will allow us to slingshot payloads to the moon twice per
year based on orbital mechanics. Concurrent to the LEO skyhook
assembly, we commence a mid earth orbit transfer station, which now
allows us to modify the payload orbits and increases our launch
frequency to more than twice a day, and also a lunavator system. I
won't repeat in detail what I've already extensively described in
post #2354. Give that a read and if you have any questions about it
I can answer them for you, point you to source material and lay out
my research models for you.

While all of this is going on, we launch a mission to the moon using
rockets. The payoads consist of robotic packages. These automated,
or teleoperated, machines would perform the moonbase foundation
laying tasks that are defined by the mission planners. I would favor
tasks such as ground leveling, cast-basalt tiling of our base area
(moon-dust is going to be a killer on all of our equipment - best to
pave as much of the base area as possible), brick making for future
transfer to the tether system's ballast requirements, tunnel
digging, burrowing into hillsides for equipment shelter during lunar
night (trying to avoid massive thermal shocks to the equipment -
anything that breaks down is broken for a long time!) and
benificiation of lunar materials for our future refining needs.
Further tasks, if our automated technology is up to the them, could
include automated solar cell manufacturing and small scale metal
refining, (perhaps a small refinery could make rebar for future
lunacrete construction projects.)

Now, as I described in my post #2354, when the "trasnportation
system" is in place we can start sending payloads to the lunar
surface. This task will account for thousands to hundreds of
thousands of tons of equipment. The result of sending this equipment
is that the moon base sends back ballast, which allows to to send
ever larger payloads. Eventually, we have sent the equipment for a
full mining and refining industrial process to the moon, and using
lunacrete, have built up a permanent base facility for humans.

Now that we are making iron, steel, aluminum, we use the lunavator
to send into lunar orbit the materials to build a SPS to be placed
at L1. This SPS will face the lunar near side and provide power to
the base regardless of the lunar day-night cycle.

By building the three-tether system, we have a very inexpensive
means, compared to rockets, of continually transporting material and
personnel from LEO, to either the moon, or to L5, or for that
matter, we could even assist launches to mars insertion orbit.

While we are constructing this transportation system, and the moon
facility, we also launch an automated volitile mining facility to a
NEA (I'm assuming that we've already sent probes out to identify
likely NEA and identify their geology, or asterology?) So, while
we're building up in our neck of the woods, we're also mining
hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, etc - everything that is in short supply
on the moon. When the orbit is favorable we launch just the payload
back to LEO, leaving the equipment to continue mining. There's no
way I can take seriously any proposal to move the entire asteroid
back to LEO.

Using resources refined and processed on the moon, we develop
the "high mass" industrial components (metal refining, glass
manufacturing, aluminum smelters, etc) that will be used in our
industrial facility at L2 and place them into lunar orbit using the
lunavator. Also, at L2 is a temporary shelter for the workers who
are assembling the first facilities.

We will launch from earth the high value, low mass components that
can't affordably be constructed on the moon. Now keep in mind that
the industrial facilities on the moon will be limited in design and
capacity. Over a period of years they'll be able to provide the
infrastructure for the first SPS to go into orbit at L1, the second
SPS to service the orbital industrial facility, the low tech-high
mass components for a network of lunar mass drivers, and the
material for the first seed of the orbital industrial facility. I
envision this orbital facility to have a larger initial capacity
than the lunar facilities. Once completed, the orbital facility will
process the lunar material to add additional refining, processing
and finishing facilities and to begin construction on the
infrastructure for orbital housing. The high tech components from
earth will be delivered to lunar orbit via the tether system and
integrated into the worker housing. This station should be able to
house a few thousand workers who will attend to the construction of
future SPS, to adding components to the LEO station (maybe adding a
hotel component, research facilities - gymnasium - all of the high
mass components that shouldn't be launched from earth), and
ultimately, the big habitat. I think that bootstrapping this process
off of lunar resources makes more sense than launching from earth a
complete station and refinery to process the lunar material.

Further, using lunar resources, we develop the structure of a mass
catcher, use the lunavator to transport the components to lunar
orbit, assemble the mass catcher and then trasnport it to L2. See
my posts #2175 and #2180 for more details. At L2, we assemble the
habitat, and when completed we transport it to l5, or whichever
orbit we settle on.

At the completion of this process, you have an industrial
infrastructure in place that can bootstrap into even more
sophisticated processes, attractive housing for hundreds of
thousands of citizens, a means to collect all the energy the
habitat's industry and citizens could ever require, a complete
biosphere, an agricultural industry, and a community capable of
adding ever more sophisticated industries to its palette.

Well, I hope this post answered your question.

--- In spacesettlers@y..., Jack Reynolds wrote:
> Despite many responses to this post, very few if any of you
actually
> answered the question(s). While this is quite disappointing, it is
not at
> all surprising.
>
> I did not ask what we need to mine asteroids. I asked what is
needed for
> space industry to develop, generally speaking. I agree that
asteroids are a
> resource worth exploiting, but I already knew that.
>
> I hope those of you who responded without answering the question
(s) posed
> will reconsider and repost an appropriate response. Think
holistically. Let
> me put it to you like this:
>
> Would a space station in orbit around the Earth (let's say LEO)
make an
> asteroid mining project more feasible? More practical? Less
expensive, for
> example? I strongly believe that an appropriate industrial
infrastructure
> in space would go a long way to facilitating such projects. But
potential
> industries in space are not limited to asteroid mining. What shape
should
> this infrastructure take to support full-scale, space-based
industries?
> What, in your opinions, should the physical elements of this
infrastructure
> be? Are the four elements I enumerated below sufficient? Should
they be in
> a different (chronological) order? Is there a better or different
location
> for a station not listed below? Etc.
>
> Your input is much appreciated.
>
> Jack
>
> At 07:45 PM 8/24/02 -0500, you wrote:
> >I have a question:
> >
> >If you were to define the (physical) elements that needed to be
in place
> >before full-blown space industries could be developed, what would
those
> >elements be?
> >
> >Marshall Savage, in The Millennial Project, describes these
elements as the
> >Earth-Moon Network. Between Bifrost (launch system) and Asgard
(space
> >colony) are four steps:
> >
> >1. A space station in LEO (named Valhalla).
> >2. A space station positioned above the Moon at L2 (named
Camelot).
> >3. A lunar station on the Moon (named Landsberg).
> >4. A station on one of the near-earth asteroids.
> >
> >To be accurate, according to Marshall's plan, construction on
Asgard would
> >actually begin after the lunar base (#3 above) and before the
station on
> >near-earth asteroid (#4 above). Asgard would be built from
materials mined
> >by the lunar base and eventually the asteroid station.
> >
> >The idea is to provide the necessary "transportation,
communications, and
> >mining infrastructure needed to construct and support" very large
space
> >colonies. Valhalla and Camelot are used to "develop the systems
needed to
> >live successfully in space for the rest of time." Landsberg and
the
> >asteroid mining station (Marshall suggests Eros) provide
construction
> >materials and the necessary volatiles.
> >
> >Would these four elements provide the necessary physical
infrastructure to
> >fuel the development of space industries? Are "space colonies"
necessary
> >for space industries to grow? Does automation and robotics
eliminate the
> >need for large human populations in the development of space
industries and
> >therefore eliminate the need for large colonies that would
presumably
> >support the population? Do we need two stations (in LEO and L2)
or can one
> >in, say, GEO, accomplish the same thing? With the discovery of
frozen ice