Colonies in Space

The day man developed means of traveling; he has been exploring the world around him. A curious animal by nature, this quest of his, has been utterly ceaseless. Today when he has learnt to overcome his inadequacy of being bound to earth, the idea is not inconceivable that he may want to settle somewhere other than the earth. This idea is not a speculation, but hard-core reality with many space centers working on this topic.

A would-be human colony in space must meet all the needs of the occupants and must look like a simulation of their home, the earth.

The most advantageous part is that even if the colony has to resemble earth, the materials for construction materials need not be transported from the earth (which also requires a lot of money) rather the materials can be obtained by blasting asteroids.

For energy, there is always the solar energy, which can be harnessed using huge solar power stations in space.

People need a reasonable amount of oxygen, food, water etc to survive. In order to achieve this, a sufficient amount of space can be made into enclosures, which provide humans the necessary life support in order to survive.

Space Colonies

A lethal radiation environment is created in space by Cosmic rays and solar flares. To protect life, settlements must be surrounded by sufficient mass to absorb most incoming radiation. This can be achieved with materials left over from processing lunar soil and asteroids into oxygen, metals, and other useful materials.  

Settlement in space has following advantages:

•  If a habitat is based in space, it can be designed wheel shaped and can be continuously rotated in order to provide proper centrifugal force, which acts as artificial gravity thus giving the effect of being on earth.

•  Also a settlement in space is better because sunlight is available 24 hours a day thus giving more energy and enabling crops to grow better.