This site is gorgeous, lots of graphics. They are looking for backers to help build mining machines. I hope this is a useful source for ideas.
http://deepspaceindustries.com/  

http://www.planetaryresources.com/2015/11/planetary-resources-applauds-u-s-congress-in-recognizing-asteroid-resource-property-rights/

Quote:Redmond, Wash. – November 10, 2015 — Planetary Resources, Inc., the asteroid mining company, praises the members of Congress who promoted historic legislation (H.R. 2262) that recognizes the right of U.S. citizens to own asteroid resources they obtain as property and encourages the commercial exploration and recovery of resources from asteroids, free from harmful interference.

This summer, a study was done showing how to accelerate reaching Mars — and really, doing anything else in space, including eventual colonization — by developing the Moon, far more cheaply and sustainably than previous proposals.  This is done by relying heavily on modern commercial services.

This summary at Next Big Future is a good introduction.  The full study is available here.



This is really important.  It's the most sensible proposal to develop space that I've seen in, well, ever (and I've been watching this stuff for three decades).  It is not just a mission, or even a series of missions; it is a proposal to build real infrastructure.  Every step makes subsequent work in space easier and cheaper.

And, as it happens, it could also get us back on the Moon while the next President is still in office.  All without increasing NASA's human spaceflight budget.


I'm told by those in the know that this is receiving a lot of attention on Capital Hill.  A recent standing-room-only briefing was attended by over 100 congressional staffers.

We need to spend the next year making as much noise as possible about this, so that it becomes part of the public conversation.  It should be an easy plan for the next President to endorse, but they won't even notice it unless people are demanding it.

This plan, or something like it, could shake off public (and congressional) apathy, and get us reaching for the stars again!

That's right, "Project Tree."  We're not calling it a tech tree because many of the nodes in it do not represent new technologies, but rather projects that must be done in order to open up capability.

For example, right now in the year 2015 we have the technology to put a station at L1, or even on the Moon... we just haven't done it yet.  That would be a project.

So anyway, we have created a new mod format for adding projects to the game, and we use this internally for all the standard mods.  It's a simple text file containing stuff like this:

Has anyone read their space settlement section? It's massive and detailed. I am not sure how much we can use, but it is nice to have it all in one place.

We've been working on defining the tech tree (along with the development tasks for version 0.20).  I thought you might enjoy seeing what we've come up with so far.



The forum software is squashing that a bit... right-click and do "View Image" to see it properly (or just click here).

As always, feedback is welcome!

Cheers,
- Joe

We are gearing up now to add a technology tree for version 0.20.  We're super excited about this, and wanted to give everyone else a chance to get your input in now, at the very early stages.

We'll be taking elements from the Integrated Space Plan (which my older son, Kevin, has a poster of on his wall), as well as ideas from experts in the industry, like Jeff Greason's very sensible plan for cislunar infrastructure.

But those plans usually only go about as far as Mars.  We want to cover the whole solar system!  So, what do you think?  What are the big achievements or developments that you would see as most useful to settling the solar system?

We are currently doing a lot of research and deep thinking about game design and High Frontier.  At the same time, I'm currently at New Worlds 2015, hearing from a lot of incredibly smart people about how to open up the frontier for real.

For example, Jeff Greason (CTO of XCOR Aerospace) presented a very sensible plan for how to get where we want to go, much cheaper than the traditional NASA way of doing things, and in a much more sustainable manner too.  Basically it goes like this:

1. Develop a lunar orbit shuttle that can go back and forth between the Moon's surface, and lunar orbit or L1 (a balance point between the Earth and the Moon).
2. Land a small plant to extract water from the polar ice, and split this into hydrogen and oxygen (i.e. rocket fuel!).  Use this to fuel the lunar orbit shuttle.  It can now go back and forth between the Moon and L1 as much as you like, at essentially no cost.
3. Build a space station and fuel depot at L1.  Fill it up with fuel using the lunar shuttle.
4. Build a shuttle that goes back and forth between LEO and L1.  Have that refuel from L1.  Now you can bring stuff back and forth between LEO and L1 or the lunar surface at essentially no cost.
5. Want to go somewhere else (say, Mars)?  Use L1 as your staging area, fill up on lunar rocket fuel, and off you go.
   

1. L1 Station (cost: 5 XP)
2. Lunar Shuttle (5 XP)
3. LEO-L1 Shuttle (5 XP)
4. Phobos Station (15 XP)
5. Mars-Phobos Shuttle (15 XP)
   

Hello!

I've downloaded and been trying the demo version today. After some initial struggling getting used to the design editor, I finally came up with a design that appeared to be workable (a cylinder 500m diameter, 500m length, endcaps -16, spin giving about 0.6g, mirror below colony; docking ports, comm antenna, nuclear power station, radiator and solar panel onthe top part of a tube with a bearing in teh middle.

looks OK, so I press build, and select L5. I'm asked to name my colony, but there's something about a budget, and it reckons I have negatiove 3,000 billion and change. It ALWAYS says this no matter the size or simplicity/complexity.

What am I doing wrong, please? :-}

Hello!

My name is Esme. I can remember peering up at the stars and wondering what they were when I was about five - devouring every book on science in the library when I was given a library card at ten, and seeing Neil Armstrong step onto the moon when I was eleven. I really thought that by the time I was forty, I might well be knocking lumps off rocks on Mars if I studied and worked hard. Sadly, it wasn't to be, and I'm nearing 60 now. I remember reading Gerard O'Neils paperback on space colonies with excitement, and Bono's book advocating aerospike-engined SSTO's as a means to get us into space cheaply (I still have both books). I've kept an eye on the simulation genre of games, and started playing Kerbal Space Program around version 0.23 and stumbled across High Frontier as a result of a comment on the KSP forums yesterday. I'm looking forward to having some interesting chats on the practicalities of getting us Out There!.