Shugaadu system, Glimmerdrift

[Enoki]

Here's an odd system to ponder over. Per the Wiki list it has one planet, no asteroid belt, and no gas giants. There is a G0V and F5D star present.

Shugaadu (1728) itself is listed as A200899-E. That means no significant water is present.

Question: Where does the fuel for that class A starport come from?

My answer to this dilemma was to assume based on the tech level that the two stars interact and there is a plasma stream between the two that allows a shielded ship operating locally to skim it for the fuel.
The only downside to that is that with a main sequence class V star and a dwarf star that eventually the dwarf will go nova as it acretes material from the main sequence G0.

Of course, one can assume that the nova is years, decades, or even a millenia off but sooner or later BOOM!

Could make for an interesting you have a week to run away...

 

[Vladika]

Here's an odd system to ponder over. Per the Wiki list it has one planet, no asteroid belt, and no gas giants. There is a G0V and F5D star present.

Shugaadu (1728) itself is listed as A200899-E. That means no significant water is present.

Question: Where does the fuel for that class A starport come from?

My answer to this dilemma was to assume based on the tech level that the two stars interact and there is a plasma stream between the two that allows a shielded ship operating locally to skim it for the fuel.
The only downside to that is that with a main sequence class V star and a dwarf star that eventually the dwarf will go nova as it acretes material from the main sequence G0.

Of course, one can assume that the nova is years, decades, or even a millenia off but sooner or later BOOM!

Could make for an interesting you have a week to run away...

This may be a time when a misjump is desirable?:devil:

 

[rancke]

Shugaadu (1728) itself is listed as A200899-E. That means no significant water is present.

No, it means less than 5% open water. Underground water, if any, is not factored into it.

Question: Where does the fuel for that class A starport come from?

If there is no local source, it can be jumped in frome a neighboring system. This will increase the cost of fuel quite a bit, but it's doable if the starship traffic justifies it.


Hans

 

[Lycanorukke]

Grab it from Kuiper belt or Oort cloud objects?

 

[77topaz]

If there's no fuel in the system itself, it could be imported from adjacent systems (the Imperium probably does this anyway), like Hans said (I think).

 

[Frankymole]

Is there a design for a huge Imperial fuel tender/tanker, anywhere? Might make an interesting ship, hazardous cargo, security escort in wartime, and all.

Lots of small tankers might be better though. Eggs in baskets, and all that.

 

[samuelvss]

Underground water, polar ice caps, and comets are a few sources. How many satelites does the priamry have? That said, if the primary planet had only .1% of its surface covered in water, that could still be a lot of fuel. One of you math types can do the math.

Alright, alright...Size 2 has a radius of 1,600 km, so the surface area is 4 * pi * (1.6 x 10^6 m)^2= 3.2 x 10^13 square meters of surface area.

If we assume that it has an average depth of 1 meter, and .1% of the surface area was covered with water, then that would be a volume of 3.2 x 10^10 cubic meters of water, or 2.3 x 10^9 dtons of unrefined fuel.

The assumptions are very wild, but I think to jump fuel in, would mean that the fuel would cost Somebody at least Cr 1,000/ton.

Would wilderness refueling be the norm on a Hyd 0 planet? Certainly not. But having surface water that is greater than say .001%, and less than 5% is certainly a more plausible interpretation of canon than jumping it it. It is, of course, one of serveral such.

 

[aramis]

Fighting Ships of the Shattered Imperium has one, but that's a BADLY broken rulebook.

 

[BytePro]

...
Shugaadu (1728) itself is listed as A200899-E. That means no significant water is present.

Question: Where does the fuel for that class A starport come from?

Water is only one source of Hydrogen...

Given a type 2 atmo, hydrogen would probably just be separated (cracked/reformed) from the atmo. Efficiently, too, using a catalyst or biological agent - with useful byproducts.

 

[Enoki]

I think given an E tech level that skimming the outer part of the Dwarf's plasma stream would be easier. You have a low enough temperature that shielding of a ship is easily within reach (insulation and such today can manage those temperatures) and you'd have a nearly pure hydrogen stream to cull fuel from.
It makes more sense than importing the fuel for both ships on a class A starport an a population of nearly billions (8). If you assume (as I have) that Shugaadu is fairly wealthly and has a strong economy then local production is a virtual necessity. Oh, and Bytepro, the atmosphere is a 0. Size is 2. That makes it a small moon at best.
I have Shugaadu as being like say Switzerland or the UAE: The best shopping within 20 parsecs or more. You want it? They have it if you have the cash. It's Nieman Marcus on a planetary scale. They can skim the star for fuel simply because they can afford the high tech ship to cull hydrogen from the corona of a star.
You show up you pay their rates. But, they also are set up where when you do you don't care what those rates are unless you are passing through and then they cut you some slack and tell you to get the hell out because you are distrubing their guests.

The big question is when is the "big bang" going to occur...

 

[77topaz]

Water is only one source of Hydrogen...

Given a type 2 atmo, hydrogen would probably just be separated (cracked/reformed) from the atmo. Efficiently, too, using a catalyst or biological agent - with useful byproducts.

The atmosphere code is 0 (vacuum) - the size code is 2.

 

[BytePro]

Oops - yeah I see that now... just means Hydrogen will be mined <shrug> - hydrogen is everywhere.

Even ignoring solar wind deposited ions*, or cometary accreted water, the surface itself will contain hydrogen in some useable form - separable with our current TL** - and this is a high TL system (if I read the UWP right this time ).

The lack of water just means standard starship scooping and refining is impractical (bad for impoverished PCs :devil - starports could always obtain hydrogen.

Now - if the system also contained no fuel providing starport, that would be a different issue...

*notably less likely if planet is not tidally locked and thermal cycling occurs
** low tech vibratory screening and heating can release hydrogen, for example - ignoring more advanced chemical processing