Ceres as a source of fuel

On Jan 9, 7:25*pm, kT wrote:
Frogwatch wrote:
On Jan 9, 10:05 am, kT wrote:
Frogwatch wrote:
On Jan 9, 9:33 am, kT wrote:
William Elliot wrote:
On Thu, 8 Jan 2009, Frogwatch wrote:
The asteroid Ceres supposedly has humongous amounts of water ice in
the form of miles of ice overlying a rocky core. *Its escape velocity
is only about 1000 mph. *Soooooo.............we send automated ice
mining equipment there powered by solar collectors. *These melt the
ice and break some into H2 and O2. *The H2 and O2 are used as
propellent in a large gas gun to send ice projectiles toward Earth and
Mars where said ice is captured and used as "fuel" for very efficient
solar thermal rockets as part of an interplanetery transport
infrastructure. *Yes, the ISP of water as fuel in this manner is worse
than using H2 but we have LOTS of ice from Ceres and it probably isnt
worth breaking up just to make H2.
If it is done right, the gas gun might even be able to leave trails of
ice for an interplanatery ship to pick up as fuel so it doesnt have to
carry all of its fuel. Eventually, Ceres will be filled with ice
tunnels and can serve as habitat for people with natural radiation
shielding.
After that, then what?
Low gravity sex, obviously.
I've long thought that marketing the thrill of zero-G sex would be the
best way to get space tourism going. *Porn worked for the internet,
maybe it'll work for space too.
You just got to laugh at the 'low earth orbit is nowhere' and the
'forever stuck in LEO' crowd, along with the 'going in circles forever'.

Ceres and Pluto are the last great unknowns in this solar system, but
I'm not very optimistic that the world will be in any great shape to
enjoy the surprises that are in store for us in 2015, when it comes.

At least we'll get a taste of it at Vesta is 2011. I am very excited.

BTW, Ceres also supposedly has lots of hydrocarbons mixed in with that
water ice. *One could use solar to slowly break the water into O2 and
H2, use the H2 for either nuclear or solar thermal rockets and then
burn the hydrocarbons in the O2 as fuel for getting payload to and
from cycler (Ceres-Earth cycler and Ceres-Mars cycler) orbital craft.

What you have to realize is that Ceres is a differentiated planet,
possibly with continents frozen in place, certainly with large impact
induced melting and refreezing, possibly persistent water volcanism.

I expect something akin more to the surface of Mars, but we really
haven't got a clue, except that the material will be well mixed.

Regardless, we need to be ready when Dawn arrives in 2015, so that we
can make the next move as soon as possible thereafter. Ceres is it.

Anyone still pushing for the moon and Mars is missing the point. If we
can do Ceres, we can do any larger body in the asteroid belt. And there
is a large amount of nickel iron and other refractory metals out there.
Nothing much is required to get it. You land an empty fuel tank on the
surface, fill it with little solar powered scoopers, and return it.

I suggest you revisit Tony Zuppero's ideas :http://www.neofuel.com

It looks like Tony has himself a new career. Smart move Tony!

Ceres is a wee bit too small, too far away and meanwhile Earth is
falling apart at the seams.

Why not go after the second captured moon of Earth (Cruithne 3753)?

~ BG

On Jan 10, 6:11*am, William Elliot wrote:
On Fri, 9 Jan 2009, Frogwatch wrote:
The asteroid Ceres supposedly has humongous amounts of water ice in
the form of miles of ice overlying a rocky core. *Its escape
velocity is only about 1000 mph.
Eventually, Ceres will be filled with ice tunnels and can serve as
habitat for people with natural radiation shielding.
After that, then what?
Low gravity sex, obviously.

I've long thought that marketing the thrill of zero-G sex would be the
best way to get space tourism going. *Porn worked for the internet,
maybe it'll work for space too.

You just got to laugh at the 'low earth orbit is nowhere' and the
'forever stuck in LEO' crowd, along with the 'going in circles forever'.

Do they provide zero-g strings?

Ceres and Pluto are the last great unknowns in this solar system
At least we'll get a taste of it at Vesta is 2011. I am very excited.

BTW, Ceres also supposedly has lots of hydrocarbons mixed in with that
water ice. *One could use solar to slowly break the water into O2 and
H2, use the H2 for either nuclear or solar thermal rockets and then burn
the hydrocarbons in the O2 as fuel for getting payload to and from
cycler (Ceres-Earth cycler and Ceres-Mars cycler) orbital craft.

In the New World Order of the capitalist' solar system, our solar system's
socialists will hide in the catacombs of Ceres which will have been filled
with trash of the previous inhabitants who found methane from the
atmosphere of Jupiter to be a more lucrative. *All will go well for them
until the socialist's discovered a way of producing hydrocarbons from
Ceres that was making them rich enough to be noticed by the New World
Order, "US owns the world" dictators. *At that time they will be given the
Gaza treatment with a lucky few escaping to Pluto or Mercury. *Gaza's
problem is that there's a large off shore gas reserve which is suppose to
belong to Israel. *East Timor had a similar problem, off shore oil
reserves which were suppose to belong to the New World Order dictators.

Riddle of the day. *Why did god put Christian oil under Islamic sand?

----

Ceres is a wee bit too small, too far away and meanwhile Earth is
falling apart at the seams. However it certainly could be used as a
near fly-by dump sight.

Why not go after the second captured moon of Earth (Cruithne 3753)?

~ BG