[scotty234 (OP)]

1

[Simmer]

Are we talking deep space here or somewhere near a star?  

Also, how fast would it be going - would you be travelling between systems or just floating somewhere?

[ukmicky]

There are only three options solar power, nuclear fission,or nuclear fusion.
Couldnt use Solar power because it isn't very efficient and you would need a large collection area to produce a decent  output.
You cant use nuclear fusion as it still beyond our science so all your left with is nuclear fission which is what our nuclear power stations use on earth.

[neilep]

You forgot Mouse Power !!...all those cute little mices going round and round !!...and methane power...all those cute little bums going toot toot !!.....but if anything is made to deal with the power with the ultimate of efficiency then adequate power will always be enough !!...errhhmm !!..what I mean is...you may not need a billion solar panels if one solar panel is efficient enough to do the same job of a billion panels....one could also utilise some form of effecient amplification to multiply the output.......failing that....my local store has a special offer on AAA batteries !!

Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!

[gsmollin]

Nuclear fission is not too friendly to biological communities because of the charged particle, gamma, and neutron radiation. Most space nuclear reactors give a radiation dose of about 100,000 RADs/year at a 30 meter distance. You don't want to be near that. This would require the reactor to be on the end of c. a 10 km boom or tether to lower the dose to 1 RAD/year, for instance.

Solar power is the most practical power system for this application.

"F = ma, E = mc^2, and you can't push a string."

[Simmer]

In that case I would probably go with solar power.  As ukmicky said, you need a large surface area but that's not a problem in space, there's plenty of room, continuous sunlight and no need for big structural supports.

Nulcear fission is only a temporary solution, sooner or later you will run out of fuel without a planet to restock from.  Fission might be alright (if you could make it work) but hydrogen density is pretty low in space so you probably wouldn't collect enough unless you were zipping along at near light speed!

[neilep]

....as a firm believer in empirical study i will now build living quarters with a mirror and rechargeable battery inside my head where i've been told there is plenty of ' space '

Men are the same as women.... just inside out !!

[Simmer]

You would also need continuous sunlight, so make sure you keep your ears wax-free! []

[gsmollin]

You guys are nasty!

For a long term "bio-sphere" it's solar all the way.

"F = ma, E = mc^2, and you can't push a string."

[David Sparkman]

Well I like the SiFi suggestion that a space ship traveling between the stars would have a deflector shield that would funnel space matter into the starship's fuel tanks. Then with "solar power" (read Hydrogen fusion) you might not run out of gas before you reach the next star. Now traveling between galaxies might be a different matter, and you might want to bring your own star along...[]

David

[memasa]

They could also exploit solar winds. I presume that would save a lot of fuel.

[Simmer]

Maybe your space habitat would have to be very big, large enough to sustain a whole ecology.  Human waste CO2 would feed plants, other excreta would be used to enrich the soil and corpses would have to be eaten, although this would mean carrying a lot of ketchup.

[Dr. Praetoria]

I love scifi and hope we do use such space travel devices but I still wonder "just what is wrong with Earth?".  We have everything thing we need right here.  Why not be stewards, here on Earth, by using conservation practises, population control and alternate energy souces?  Could the advance of robots make such human space travel inessential perhaps, even to the degree of outerspace colonization, resource assembly and manufacturing by robotic methods?
Doc

[David Sparkman]

A small percentage of Mankind loves a frontier. If we do as you say, looking at history, then the race will become very much like Italy was 400 AD: populated by the rich slave owners, only our slaves will be machine based. They were easily overthown by the barbarians. Man without a challenge is not much to look at.

David

[Simmer]

Yes, I think we should carry on with manned space missions and even the space habitats Ruzz5000 started off this thread with.

I know it's not usually the most economic way to do the science but I can't help feeling that without humans being there to see it and appereciate it the whole thing is a bit pointless.

[VAlibrarian]

The reality is that the human race does not yet have the technology to become independent of the Planet Earth biosphere. I for one do not even see it as a cost efficient effort. If we were to utilize a large hunk of the economic output of the human race to create a small colony in space or on the surface of another planet, it would diminish our capacity to fund the effort to bring the human race into a sustainable situation. Tell me again how that makes sense? In numbers, you send 100 people to Mars and spend a trillion dollars. As a result you fail to develop an energy scheme that will prevent economic collapse when oil runs out, and a population control scheme that will prevents many millions of horrible deaths from starvation, and an ecological scheme that will prevent the extinctions of thousands of non-human species. All this so we can plant a flag somewhere and establish a way of life for a handful of people that will be much more limited than that of us on Planet Earth.
Talk about adventure all you want, but it is silly and the numbers do not add up. If you assume that such an effort is essential because the human race is crazy and will soon destroy itself on Earth, well, I for one would look upon it as a test that we fail. We were given paradise- if we destroy it then survival is not what we deserve.

chris wiegard