Re: [TML] Fueling from an icy asteroid or rock? Grimmund 12 Dec 2014 15:07 UTC
On Sat, Dec 6, 2014 at 8:51 PM, Bill Rutherford <xxxxxx@comcast.net> wrote: > My players are, in desperation, en route to an icy rock to try to obtain > fuel. The ship has fuel scoops and a refiner but it just sank in to me (but > apparently has not to them, yet...) that scoops are for skimming. Somehow I > don't imagine a fuel scoop being something like a wood chipper where you > feed stuff in one end and out comes sawdust - er, water... > > It would seem plausible that the players would set up a pre-fab shelter of > some sort, sealed to the (frozen) ground, and would essentially mine water > within it, feeding the fuel refiner via hose or the like. > > OK - how full of holes is this, and how should it *really* (in the context > of the game) be done? As it turns out, iceballs may be an excellent source of deuterium. Sample size =1 http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/dec/10/water-comet-67p-earth-rosetta?CMP=ema_565 "Measurements from Rosetta’s Rosina instrument found that water on comet 67P /Churyumov-Gerasimenko contains about three times more deuterium – a heavy form of hydrogen – than water on Earth." -- "Any sufficiently advanced parody is indistinguishable from a genuine kook." -Alan Morgan