09-24-2015, 11:41 AM
@hanelyp, those are interesting ideas. In game we might lump them both under "Phobos orbit," but in reality they would be distinct.
OK, moving on out... the main asteroid belt is an obvious win. Ceres and Vesta are obvious targets, but really, any largish hunk of rock will do (and there are millions of those). But there's not a lot more to say about them; in each case you'd be in a coincident orbit around the sun, making good use of the resources it provides. The main belt is wide, but its center is about 400 million km from the sun, for an irradiance of about 180 W/m^2, or 13% of what we get here. Starting to get dark out there.
![[Image: asteroid-243-Ida.jpg]](http://www.skyandtelescope.com/wp-content/uploads/asteroid-243-Ida.jpg)
Up next: Jupiter!
OK, moving on out... the main asteroid belt is an obvious win. Ceres and Vesta are obvious targets, but really, any largish hunk of rock will do (and there are millions of those). But there's not a lot more to say about them; in each case you'd be in a coincident orbit around the sun, making good use of the resources it provides. The main belt is wide, but its center is about 400 million km from the sun, for an irradiance of about 180 W/m^2, or 13% of what we get here. Starting to get dark out there.
![[Image: asteroid-243-Ida.jpg]](http://www.skyandtelescope.com/wp-content/uploads/asteroid-243-Ida.jpg)
Up next: Jupiter!
Joe Strout
Lead Developer, High Frontier