BFR's potential

8/20/26:

Interesting to review this in light of what actually happened. SpaceX didn't call it the BFR, but renamed it the Starship/Heavy. The cost of development of the rocket itself came in at about the number mentioned below (if memory serves of one estimate I saw).

A moonbase will likely be constructed, as a return to the moon is now a NASA priority. Elon Musk wants to develop the Moon too.

I would favor a new ship be constructed that would launch from the moon to an EML collection point. It would be huge and capable of transporting thousands of colonists in relative comfort and safety. It would likely be a torus that could be rotated, and would have ample shielding from the deadly cosmic rays in interplanetary space.

The lunar base could supply some of the materials for the ship. The rest could come from the Earth. The "Battleship Galactica" would launch from an EML spot, which would require a minimum of Delta V to get into a Martian Capture orbit. From there, the crew could disembark via the Starship on multiple visits to the Martian surface. It could refuel there as many times as needed in order to bring all the colonists to the surface of Mars.

One hundred thousand colonists could traverse the distance from the EML location to Mars on each Holman cycle of about two years. Thus it would take about 20 years to get a million colonists on Mars.

10/30/18: The original post:

There was an article on NextBigFuture,  mentioned courtesy of Free Republic, which was about the BFR's development cost.  It is estimated to be anywhere from $2 billion to $10 billion.
Given the great potential of this rocket, it would be of the utmost national importance for the government to grant enough business to SpaceX so that they can have the necessary funds to develop the rocket.

You could do this with a moonbase project. It was estimated by NASA to be a project that was doable under the current NASA funding scheme.  The actual numbers ran out to about half of the Apollo project.

If a moonbase was turned into a commitment, such as with Apollo, it could be done in ten years at a price that should be even less than the NASA number.  Of course, SpaceX would have to win a competitive bidding war.  But it should be done as a national priority.

The government is not likely to do this however, as funding tends to get spread out over a number of states.  This doesn't work well with one company getting the lion's share of the business.

What purpose would a moonbase serve?  It could process lunar regolith into fuel.  The fuel could be used for deep space missions.

The most likely fuel from the moon would be oxygen.  Oxygen is not a fuel, but is a reaction mass.  For all intents and purposes, it is the same thing.

For the raptor engine, which uses methane, oxygen would be close to 80% of the reaction mass.  In such a scenario, it would be profitable for the BFR to land on the moonbase, load the oxygen, and transport it to a refueling depot at the L1 Lagrange point.

The advantage of using these points is that it takes less energy to get to the Lagrange point than to the moon itself.  Morever, the big rocket could be mostly fueled up for a trip outbound to Mars and other destinations.  One big rocket can service the Lagrange point, and provide extra for more ambitious missions.

Almost all of a rocket's launch mass is fuel and oxygen, so if you can get it elsewhere as opposed to the Earth, you can vastly improve access to the Moon and points beyond.

Best part of the show was this part

8/20/26:

It is odd that this kind of post is in this blog. What was I thinking???

Nostalgia... memories of things past... Well, in life, there are no "mulligans". You pass through just one time. Whatever you want to do, you better do while you have the chance.

12/11/25: The original post is below:

A bit of nostalgia about the 70's nostalgia period that produced this show--"Sha na na".

The Fly in the Ointment argument against anti-matter propulsion

8/18/26:

Civilization should be much further along than what it is. It's a shame.

12/24/24: The original post is below:

There's always a "but", isn't there

The stuff you need for this kind of rocket doesn't exist yet. It has to be invented. The fly in the ointment is the chicken and the egg too. If there's no bucks, there's no Buck Rogers.

The problem is that the Luddites have managed to convince us that economic growth is bad. It's called "Limits to Growth". It grew into the so-called environmentalism that has choked off economic growth in the West, and encouraged it to take place in the East.

In other words, the communists did it. We let the commies talk us into sabotaging our own economies. They'll lie about politics being downstream from culture, but amongst themselves they tout the reverse, which is described by Gramscii. Gramscii held that if the commies grabbed all of the high ground of the culture, they can seize the power. And so they have.

The cure is to take it back. But the fly in that particular ointment is that you can vote your way into communism, but you'll have to shoot your way out.

The issue hasn't been decided too much in favor of the commies yet. But they are really close. We have but a few years to turn this around.

Off-grid post 2.19.19 ; cinematic woes

8/15/26: The more things change, the more they stay the same. In French, according to google translate, it is: Plus les choses changent, plus elles restent les mêmes

But things do change. No more trailer. Plans may change because of circumstances. But I haven't given up on my off-grid project. It is still on the back burner. I think about it, but action is not in the cards at this time.

If the Focus Fusion device works, I may be coming into some money. It's always about the Benjamins. Even for me. I try not to, but there's no getting around it.

2.19.19, the original post is below:
A study of the videos reveals that my cinematic skills leave something to be desired.  I
resolve to do better in the future.

However, I do have a lot of video to look at now, which is of some comfort.

The attention recently has been in terms of maneuvering the trailer into a suitable spot.

The general area is decided, but details, details, details...

In addition to that, I am giving thought about a construction procedure for the foundation
pods.

For some reason, I am already running out of words.  But I wanted to put something up
anyway, so here it is.

"Cold Fusion" Facts Page

8/13/26:

Obviously, I haven't kept up on the news in this topic. Since nothing really big happened in the news, I suspect that not much is going on.

The website linked to is still good, by the way. I haven't reviewed the info. Perhaps it has been updated in the last decade. It's a little hard to tell. A bit of speculation: It may well be the case that the reactions do not produce enough energy to make electricity. If it does produce heat, and is economical to run, then perhaps the problem is in extracting what value that there may be in it. The production of heat for climate control may be a possible application. Quick update: Some of the old sites are still up. It isn't dead. Rossi is still out there.

5/28/11: The original post follows below:

Frequently Asked Questions About Low Energy Nuclear Reactions(part of the field of condensed matter nuclear science historically known as "cold fusion")

Pretty good summary of what is known.  However, it hasn't been updated since 2009.

I support this project, please join me today!

8/12/26:

This has been 14 years. I don't recall if I made any kind of donation or anything.

The molten salt project was still alive, so far as I know. Perhaps when I have more time, I can check in with Gordon McDowell and see what he's up to these days.

Quick update:

Here's his video channel on YouTube

2/25/12: The original post was a video embed that no longer displays:

Using gravitational lens to image exoplanets. What a concept!

Raising the level of civilization may be a pipe dream

8/9/26:

Some say the internet is forever. But these old links go dead a lot. It's a good practice to check the old posts on a regular basis and see if they're still good. This one has a link that is still working, but the article link isn't there, or it wasn't good to begin with.

As for the title of this post, the level of civilization will rise, but not evenly. There is always the possibility of collapse, though.

The original post was on 2/15/12:

After getting back into the world for the last few weeks, I realize the difficulty of the concept of raising the level of civilization. Progress doesn't come easy, and it is also not guaranteed to continue with the gains that have been made.

People are not that civilized. I see it every day.

Are people really just smart apes after all?

Civilization has outraced biology. Human beings may not be ready for the high tech living we now enjoy, nor for any further advances.

This is not in any way considering the Luddites as correct. I would prefer continued progress, but progress may not be easy against the headwinds that also exist.

Docudharma ...blogging the future

8/8/26:

As Yogi Berra once said: "Predictions are hard, especially about the future."

The hydrogen economy didn't materialize. It looks like the world is going to go for the batteries. But how to charge the batteries? It still takes hydro-carbons to power the world.

So-called "renewables" won't cut it. If that was going to work, it would've by now.

Nuclear power yields the most power, but that is being blocked for various reasons. Perhaps molten-salt reactors? Perhaps aneutronic fusion? It's still a waiting game after all these years.

11/6/11: The original post:

Marrying Stranded Wind and Freight Rail Electrification

The darker the blue, the windier it is- that's better for power generation

excerpts:

• It should, I hope, be clear that much of the best resource is in areas that do not have the highest electricity consumption.
• That right of way is used to establish long distance High Voltage DC trunk lines to bring sustainable energy from the places that have it to places the need it [ comment:  What if you can do away with high voltage trunk lines?  What I'm saying is, why does this have to be necessary?  Couldn't you make your fuel "in situ" and use it on the spot?  That is, synthesize fuel from wind power.  You can synthesize methanol and then use the methanol in a fuel cell, or use the methanol to make diesel.  How to build the synthesis plants?  You could possibly use airships to bring in the construction equipment and supplies to build the plants.  After finishing construction, the airships could bring raw materials for the synthesis of the fuel.  The fuel can be also be transported to fuel depots in a like manner.]

The next step is to see if airships can operate in high altitudes. That might be a problem, as most of these windy areas are in high altitudes.  This may be achievable if the effort needed was deemed to be worthy.

Update:

Strolling through memory lane.  Here's a post almost a year old which describes how methanol can be synthesized in a nuclear reactor.  Substitute wind power for nuclear power and you can synthesize methanol that way.  It is all a part of the master plan to switch to the hydrogen economy.

The Morning Summary, April 25, 2011

8/6/26:

Folks may want to know some stats. This blog was cross-posted from the original blog, and so this post was on the original blog. It should still be there, but this update won't be. Different blog now.

I'll give some general stats for this blog starting now.

All time views, per Google's Blogger Platform: 361464

April 25, 2011 : The original post:

The statistics:

Time approx 4:30 am

Sitemeter; Mon. am. 4618; v. Sun. am 4599; 19 up 1 from Sun

Blogger: Sun. 83, up 24 from Sat. (59); overnight is 12 so far, compared with 21 this time yesterday.

Nothing to report on bids, nor sales, still zero on revenues, no clicks on Amazon.  Nobody appears to be clicking on the Products page nor on the Marketing pages.

New record for this blog on Blogger pageviews.

YouTube page: 848 v 847 channel views previously, 493 v. 492 upload views previously. Channel views improve by 1, upload views improve by 1.

It is gratifying to hit new records. On the other hand, the lack of marketing success is frustrating.

Update:

I think I am going to be lite with the blogging today. That's my agenda today. Just to think.


Update:

One thing I thought about was the Space Show yesterday. If you were to get large quantities of turpentine and nitric acid in orbit at a reasonable cost, that could be a plus. On the other hand, these hypergolics may be hard to find and to synthesize in space. It would be necessary to get this up there somehow. Once up there, they can be more useful than trying to store cryogenics. The big dumb rocket could send up buttloads of the stuff. Also, the Space Cannon concept may be able to send it up at a reasonable price.

Also, after I finished the above post, I started reading up on fusion. I may need to spend some time in these forums.

Update:

It is interesting to go back and look at previous posts like this.  It is all an education, just like yesterday.  I didn't know about Interorbital until I listened to the Space Show.  It is still a matter of getting educated on what's out there.

If I may interject a thought into these discussions.  Everybody is going at this in their own way.  But what if no single way exists?  That's a question that should be considered.  Take fusion, for example.  The fact that fusion can take place now is not in dispute.  The problem is getting it to do what we want.  But if we want to do something like generating electricity, it may not be possible by a direct approach.  Let's say if you wanted to use fusion for propulsion and then use that propulsion to emplace solar stations that would send energy back to the Earth.  But I don't think anyone is thinking that way.  Instead, they want to get it to produce net electrical power.  Maybe that isn't even necessary.  That's my point.