Space colony self sufficiency
May. 27th, 2013 08:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethI have been reading about food banks. More people need more food and the food banks are running out before they feed all the people. It is bad and getting worse and it's because of the government deciding that people need bullying more than they need food and I don't understand how there's politicians sitting there saying it's nothing to do with the government when it's so closely tied to welfare reforms.
My idea of a practice space colony seems more urgent today. Especially the food self sufficiency bit. It would be hard to do, but it is important.
In Dereham there are allotments and gardens and stuff like that, and buildings mostly stop at two floors. In Norwich there are tower blocks full of flats and it is substantially harder to find dirt to put food into, let alone enough to call a garden. I think there are greenhouses at the place my brother goes that they call a training center for disabled people but it ran out of actual things to do because something went wonk with the greenhouse plan. There were bunches of places like that, getting disabled people to grow things. Mostly pretty things though, not getting disabled people to feed themselves. Space gardening would not involve needing a dirt patch, or else it wouldn't work except on terraformed planets. Space gardening for using in space should work in closed rooms.
... mostly people don't have enough room in their closed rooms to fit the people in though, there's a lot about housing shortage and overcrowding and how the definitions of 'need' used for this stupid bedroom tax include saying that children don't need their own room until they're quite old and don't need one room each unless they're different genders. Even if one kid is disabled or one is violent they don't need their own rooms. Because the government decided. But the point is, when people don't have room for the people, or their stuff, then they probably don't have room even for clever space gardening. Which is a problem on the food self sufficiency.
I've thought these things before because whenever the Guardian says something about food, quality or quantity, some daft middle class person with a large back garden goes on about how much cheaper and more healthful it is to grow your own carrots and how poor people basically aren't trying hard enough, ignoring the fact that it's very hard to grow a carrot up a tower.
Possibly space gardens could hang outside the window like flower boxes?
There might be fire safety concerns then though. And falling things safety. And you couldn't use clever tricks with water and light unless you made holes for the water and light to get to the outside. And some windows don't even open, my windows don't, unless I stake a screwdriver or an axe to them.
Food is a tricky problem.
But if some people has gardens and allotments and greenhouses and other people have the knowing of things then fitting them together to make more food seems like a good plan.
Of course then you have the problem that food happens in seasons and harvests and suchlike, and hunger happens all the time. Food storage is the next problem after food growing. And not storage as in 'kitchen' or 'pantry' or, as I usually do, 'supermarket' but as in barns and granaries and giant freezers and other places I don't know about.
I know a lot of informal barter based food economics goes on. Like my employee having a boot full of rhubarb when I wanted to have a boot full of shopping. People are growing things and swappings things.
I don't know what a self sufficient food plan would look like. If I was deciding a menu it would involve eggs but if I was inventing a garden I wouldn't particularly wish to include chickens. Some people really like chickens though. And apparently have intricate chicken swapping economies going on. I don't know if there's many chickens around here. Well, poultry in giant barns, yes, but chickens on a scale suitable for practical space colony practice, *shrugs*.
My mum has some knowing of gardens but doesn't grow lots of food. I don't garden due to the allergies. I like breathing and being basically a light pink and not lumpy.
It would be really awkward having allergies on a space colony, cause you couldn't go anywhere to get away from things.
If I was inventing space colony food it would not involve fish, because fish stare at you and smell funny and are kind of creepy. Lots of people eat fish though. And if you leave fish behind you never get to eat fish ever again. Probably you would want to bring fish just so you could have fish stocks later?
The kind of fish people have in tanks and the kind of fish people have in dinners do not seem to be the same fish. Which seems short sighted. I mean, I like pretty movement colors shiny things, but I don't get why people want them around after they've looked at them a few minutes. Tank full of food makes sense though.
Bujold wrote a space colony that had... newts, was it? And weeds for them to eat? Ethan of Athos, I could re-read it. I somehow don't see that being popular, even if it is practical. I mean, once a generation grew up eating it, then they'd think it was normal and keep on eating, but it's a tough sell at this stage.
I eat a lot of Quorn. I don't know what goes in to making quorn. I think they make it in big tanks? I don't think people grow it at home. Not on purpose anyway. Mushrooms are another thing where I don't know how they get grown apart from the thing about keep things in the dark and throw waste at them. Mushrooms are good eating though so I don't want to think about the making of process too much. If someone had a mushroom farm in their spare room I suspect the failure modes could be unhelpful to neighbours? I don't know.
I have vast empty where knowing where my food comes from could usefully be.
If people want to practice food self sufficiency, such as would be necessary for a space colony, then they need a place to grow things and someone who knows how and a plan that gives all the nutrition they need and a plan that grows... how many percent extra? You can't grow precisely the right amount because then if it goes wrong you have starving.
This morning when I woke up I thought I would start a Dreamwidth community so people could post their ideas about practical practice space colonies, and then go ask some SF writers what they know from their plannings, or possibly from their gardenings. Also maybe ask SF conventions how they organise a few hundred people for a weekend and how that experience could translate to space colonies. But now I'm thinking that's a bit fluffy compared to actual hungry people. There still needs to be a plan with communication, and something that catches the imagination, but it needs nice strong concrete details to be going on with. And probably somewhere to dig.
My planned practice space colony grows all its own food plus a bit spare, and has a central kitchen and dining room, partly because I can't cook and I like eating on a regular basis, but also so it can have a little cafe. That would be the start of the business side while the colony practice gets going. And then if there's anything else to be made and sold then it can go on display around the walls or something.
My plans need a lot of people and some real estate.
Food banks at the moment are drawing on existing religious communities, who have halls and humans. My space colony plan is intended to get a different community interested. But the SF community, while many and variously skilled, mostly hires its real estate by the weekend.
I should go looking to see what existing volunteers are doing. They probably have proper practical things going on already. ... I just don't see me being very helpful to them.
My idea of a practice space colony seems more urgent today. Especially the food self sufficiency bit. It would be hard to do, but it is important.
In Dereham there are allotments and gardens and stuff like that, and buildings mostly stop at two floors. In Norwich there are tower blocks full of flats and it is substantially harder to find dirt to put food into, let alone enough to call a garden. I think there are greenhouses at the place my brother goes that they call a training center for disabled people but it ran out of actual things to do because something went wonk with the greenhouse plan. There were bunches of places like that, getting disabled people to grow things. Mostly pretty things though, not getting disabled people to feed themselves. Space gardening would not involve needing a dirt patch, or else it wouldn't work except on terraformed planets. Space gardening for using in space should work in closed rooms.
... mostly people don't have enough room in their closed rooms to fit the people in though, there's a lot about housing shortage and overcrowding and how the definitions of 'need' used for this stupid bedroom tax include saying that children don't need their own room until they're quite old and don't need one room each unless they're different genders. Even if one kid is disabled or one is violent they don't need their own rooms. Because the government decided. But the point is, when people don't have room for the people, or their stuff, then they probably don't have room even for clever space gardening. Which is a problem on the food self sufficiency.
I've thought these things before because whenever the Guardian says something about food, quality or quantity, some daft middle class person with a large back garden goes on about how much cheaper and more healthful it is to grow your own carrots and how poor people basically aren't trying hard enough, ignoring the fact that it's very hard to grow a carrot up a tower.
Possibly space gardens could hang outside the window like flower boxes?
There might be fire safety concerns then though. And falling things safety. And you couldn't use clever tricks with water and light unless you made holes for the water and light to get to the outside. And some windows don't even open, my windows don't, unless I stake a screwdriver or an axe to them.
Food is a tricky problem.
But if some people has gardens and allotments and greenhouses and other people have the knowing of things then fitting them together to make more food seems like a good plan.
Of course then you have the problem that food happens in seasons and harvests and suchlike, and hunger happens all the time. Food storage is the next problem after food growing. And not storage as in 'kitchen' or 'pantry' or, as I usually do, 'supermarket' but as in barns and granaries and giant freezers and other places I don't know about.
I know a lot of informal barter based food economics goes on. Like my employee having a boot full of rhubarb when I wanted to have a boot full of shopping. People are growing things and swappings things.
I don't know what a self sufficient food plan would look like. If I was deciding a menu it would involve eggs but if I was inventing a garden I wouldn't particularly wish to include chickens. Some people really like chickens though. And apparently have intricate chicken swapping economies going on. I don't know if there's many chickens around here. Well, poultry in giant barns, yes, but chickens on a scale suitable for practical space colony practice, *shrugs*.
My mum has some knowing of gardens but doesn't grow lots of food. I don't garden due to the allergies. I like breathing and being basically a light pink and not lumpy.
It would be really awkward having allergies on a space colony, cause you couldn't go anywhere to get away from things.
If I was inventing space colony food it would not involve fish, because fish stare at you and smell funny and are kind of creepy. Lots of people eat fish though. And if you leave fish behind you never get to eat fish ever again. Probably you would want to bring fish just so you could have fish stocks later?
The kind of fish people have in tanks and the kind of fish people have in dinners do not seem to be the same fish. Which seems short sighted. I mean, I like pretty movement colors shiny things, but I don't get why people want them around after they've looked at them a few minutes. Tank full of food makes sense though.
Bujold wrote a space colony that had... newts, was it? And weeds for them to eat? Ethan of Athos, I could re-read it. I somehow don't see that being popular, even if it is practical. I mean, once a generation grew up eating it, then they'd think it was normal and keep on eating, but it's a tough sell at this stage.
I eat a lot of Quorn. I don't know what goes in to making quorn. I think they make it in big tanks? I don't think people grow it at home. Not on purpose anyway. Mushrooms are another thing where I don't know how they get grown apart from the thing about keep things in the dark and throw waste at them. Mushrooms are good eating though so I don't want to think about the making of process too much. If someone had a mushroom farm in their spare room I suspect the failure modes could be unhelpful to neighbours? I don't know.
I have vast empty where knowing where my food comes from could usefully be.
If people want to practice food self sufficiency, such as would be necessary for a space colony, then they need a place to grow things and someone who knows how and a plan that gives all the nutrition they need and a plan that grows... how many percent extra? You can't grow precisely the right amount because then if it goes wrong you have starving.
This morning when I woke up I thought I would start a Dreamwidth community so people could post their ideas about practical practice space colonies, and then go ask some SF writers what they know from their plannings, or possibly from their gardenings. Also maybe ask SF conventions how they organise a few hundred people for a weekend and how that experience could translate to space colonies. But now I'm thinking that's a bit fluffy compared to actual hungry people. There still needs to be a plan with communication, and something that catches the imagination, but it needs nice strong concrete details to be going on with. And probably somewhere to dig.
My planned practice space colony grows all its own food plus a bit spare, and has a central kitchen and dining room, partly because I can't cook and I like eating on a regular basis, but also so it can have a little cafe. That would be the start of the business side while the colony practice gets going. And then if there's anything else to be made and sold then it can go on display around the walls or something.
My plans need a lot of people and some real estate.
Food banks at the moment are drawing on existing religious communities, who have halls and humans. My space colony plan is intended to get a different community interested. But the SF community, while many and variously skilled, mostly hires its real estate by the weekend.
I should go looking to see what existing volunteers are doing. They probably have proper practical things going on already. ... I just don't see me being very helpful to them.
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no subject
Date: 2013-05-27 11:25 pm (UTC)Re apartment-dwellers growing some of their own food, have you looked at vertical gardens? Limited, but worth consideration. Looks to me like anything you can come up with that lessens or eliminates (if only after after startup) reliance on existing infrastructure will probably be useful for both space colony use and here on Earth for reducing the need for conduits that are vulnerable to attack and/or rising costs. Energy needs already have plenty of people working on them -- food insecurity issues have far fewer, and maybe nobody with your take on it.
~
no subject
Date: 2013-05-28 02:20 pm (UTC)This is a TED talk video (http://www.ted.com/talks/britta_riley_a_garden_in_my_apartment.html) that talks about This. It's a series of open source plans for gardening in small spaces (http://www.windowfarms.com/) that would be ideal for space faring. They can be scaled up, scaled down, and because they grow hydroponically you don't have to lift several hundred thousand tons of soil into orbit, Also, here (http://www.gyostuff.com/Grow_Media_Basics.html) is some different information about the different ways to grow high yield in tight spaces.