The Human City, which covers a total area of approximately 2.1 million square meters, is divided into three phases. After the completion of the three phases, there will be a total of 2,000 houses. Based on the average two people living in a house, it can accommodate about 4,000 people.
Comprehensive bases No. 1, 2, and 3 can also accommodate thousands of people. It can even be said that the number of residences is no longer a limit at all. Because the construction of human cities has clearly shown that human civilization at this moment has
The ability to quickly build a residence anytime, anywhere.
Then, the biggest bottleneck currently restricting the development of civilization is population.
I don’t know how many times, officials in charge of industry have come to Zhao Changxing to complain and strongly request that more industrial people be allocated to industrial zones. The heads of various government departments will also come to Zhao Changxing every now and then and strongly request that more manpower be added to their departments. And
The reasons were so good that Zhao Changxing could not refute them, because those things were real.
The XX production line that could have been put into operation cannot be started because of the lack of people. The XX products that could have been produced cannot be produced because of the lack of people. The factories and equipment that could have been built cannot be built because of the lack of people. These things are very important to the development of civilization.
The obstacles are real.
Even the agricultural department responsible for the planting base and livestock base, and the education department responsible for the Spark spacecraft are strongly requesting to allocate more people.
The graduation season, which occurs every six months, is the day that all government departments take most seriously. Because every time at this time, 100 adult graduates will leave the Spark spacecraft and can be replenished in the human base. But Zhao Changxing is always concerned about this
This matter is handled very strictly. As for the allocation of these 100 people, it never depends on how miserable the department heads cry, but only on whether a certain department can persist.
Are you saying that there are too few people, too much work, and you can’t persevere? I’m sorry, but it doesn’t count if you say you can’t persevere. It counts if I say it. If I say you can persevere, you can persevere. I think you still have a lot of work to do this year.
There is great potential to be tapped. I will not add the 100 people to your department for this graduation season.
You really can’t hold on anymore? Oh, let’s see, it’s true that you can’t hold on anymore… Then add one more person to your department. One person is enough and you can hold on.
Since the establishment of human government, the distribution of adults has been such a process.
But this is only a last resort. The population growth rate is too low and there is really no way.
Now, Zhao Changxing finally wants to concentrate on solving this problem. The main reason why he decided to solve it now is that the level of industrial capability represented by the successful construction of Human City gave Zhao Changxing the confidence.
I don't know how many people cried with joy when they heard that Zhao Changxing finally decided to solve this matter. At this meeting, all the participants came to participate with the fullest enthusiasm.
"The main obstacle is the limited capacity of the Spark spacecraft. This limits our population growth rate, which can only be 100 people every six months at most."
No matter how many children people can give birth to naturally, under the iron law that "minors can only stay in the Fire spacecraft in a gravity environment equivalent to that of the Earth", this upper limit cannot be broken in any case. Because there are too many people.
, the Spark spacecraft cannot be released.
"Then, we have two plans. One is to expand the capacity of the Spark spacecraft, and the other is to build a second nurturing base in space."
This nurturing base for minors must be built in space. Because only in the space environment, the base can create a gravity environment equivalent to the earth in the form of rotation. At the same time, because it only serves as a nurturing base, it
The construction difficulty will also be reduced linearly.
It doesn't even need a propulsion engine. Because of the special environment of Sedna, once an object launched into space has an orbiting speed, its speed will basically not decay, and it can keep orbiting and never fall down.
.
"A nurturing base with a population equivalent to that of the Spark spaceship would have to be at least 500 meters long and have a total mass of several million tons if calculated based on five circles. This is far beyond our current projects.
ability."
No matter how low the gravity of Sedna is, transporting millions of tons of materials into space is an impossible task at this stage. What's more, this has not taken into account specific construction issues, such as
Can existing technology achieve the construction of such a huge space base?
"The plan to build a second breeding base is not feasible. Then, the only plan is to expand the capacity of the Spark spacecraft. Extend its main axis and build more circles on the extended axis."
Zhao Changxing looked at the person in charge of the industrial department. The person in charge of the industrial department immediately stated: "As long as the problem of material transportation can be solved, there is no technical difficulty in extending the main axis and adding circles to the main axis."
The fusion reactor equipped on the Spark spacecraft still has a large margin, and people do not need to consider energy issues. The extension shaft is connected to the main shaft, and there is no need to consider the issue of rotation. Just extend the main shaft and build some with radiation protection, heat preservation, and anti-collision
The shell is not difficult.
"How much supplies are needed to expand the capacity of the Spark spacecraft?"
The director of the Industry Department quickly calculated and replied: "On average, adding a new circle requires 35,000 tons of materials. It can accommodate 700 minors."
Transporting 35,000 tons of materials into space, even on Sedna, is a big project for people at this moment. Besides, it will definitely not just add a new circle. That would be meaningless.
Zhao Changxing pondered: "Can a space elevator be built now?"
Building a space elevator on Sedna is countless times easier than building it on Earth. The reason is that Sedna is too small and has too low gravity.
If you want to build a space elevator on Earth, its length must be at least 40,000 kilometers, and the material strength requirements are abnormal. But here on Sedna, a space elevator with a length of 5,000 kilometers is enough. In terms of material strength,
, carbon nanotubes can meet the requirements.
The head of the industrial department smiled bitterly: "Now we can only create carbon nanotubes in the laboratory, and we are still far from large-scale manufacturing."
"Is the electromagnetic gun okay?"
The surface escape velocity of Sedna is about 500 meters per second. Then, through electromagnetic acceleration technology, the relevant materials can be directly accelerated to a speed of more than 500 meters per second, and then they can be directly launched into the orbit. In this way
, the purpose of transporting a large amount of materials into space can be achieved.
"Our technology, ahem, is still a little behind."
"Does it have to be transported one by one via spaceship?"
Zhao Changxing was in trouble.
This is obviously unrealistic.
At this stage, the Falcon 1 and Falcon 2 spacecraft are the only bridges between the Fire spacecraft and the human base on the surface. In order to transport enough food and clothing for the more than 3,000 minors in the Fire spacecraft, these two spacecraft have already been working every hour
We are busy every moment, and we really can’t squeeze out more transportation capacity.
Thinking of these two spaceships, Zhao Changxing thought of another problem, or hidden danger.
It has to be said that the quality of the two Falcon spaceships built with all the strength of human civilization, striving for excellence and regardless of cost, is really amazing to people at this moment. Up to now, they have been working intensively for more than a hundred years.
time, but not a single major failure.
But... with only these two Falcon spacecraft, the connection between the Fire spacecraft and the ground base is still too fragile. Once one Falcon spacecraft fails, people will immediately be dumbfounded. If both of them fail, the problem will be
Bigger.
"Let's simply solve this hidden danger." Zhao Changxing felt furious and tapped his fingers on the table, and the government officials immediately returned to silence.
"If the space elevator doesn't work and the electromagnetic gun doesn't work, then build a spaceship. If the fusion-powered ion thruster spacecraft doesn't work, then build a chemical fuel spacecraft."
The so-called chemical fuel spacecraft is just like the rockets launched by people on the earth many years ago. It generates a large amount of gas through the combustion of chemical fuels such as liquid hydrogen, liquid oxygen, methane liquid oxygen, and paraben, and ejects it from the bottom to obtain power.
That kind of.
It's still because Sedna is too small and has too low gravity. The difficulty of building a chemical-fueled spacecraft is also only a tenth of that on Earth at most.
People looked at each other.
"Isn't this a space shuttle?"
"That's right. It's just a space shuttle that can take off on its own without a rocket launch. If ten are not enough, build a hundred. If a hundred are not enough, build a thousand. Even if the ants move, they have to transport the building materials up to me.
"
Zhao Changxing has become fierce. In any case, the problem of too slow population growth must be solved.
In today's era, the population is too small so the level of industrialization cannot continue to increase rapidly. If the level of industrialization cannot be improved rapidly, it is impossible to build a larger space nurturing base and increase the population growth rate. These two things have almost become an entangled knot.
.And it seems that chemical fuel spacecraft is the only tool that can untie this knot.
The head of the industrial department was full of confidence: "Leader, don't worry, I will do preliminary research right away."
He had no reason not to be confident about this plan.
Although everyone knows that industrial capabilities are still at a low level at the moment, on Sedna, you can jump to a height of several hundred meters with just two kicks, and you can make a pistol and shoot bullets into orbit.
, there’s no reason why we can’t even build a chemical-fueled spaceship, right?
But the development of the matter once again exceeded people's expectations. Less than two months after the head of the industrial department took over the task with confidence, he once again found Zhao Changxing with a grimace.
"Leader, it turns out that our technology cannot even build a chemical-fueled spacecraft."
"Our material technology is still not up to standard and we cannot produce qualified materials. The pressure and temperature in the combustion chamber of a chemical fuel engine are too high, and any of our existing materials will deform in that environment..."
Zhao Changxing seemed to be in disbelief. He was stunned for a moment, looked at the person in charge of the industrial department, and repeated the sentence: "Can't even build a chemical fuel spacecraft?"