September 1, 2000

from TheTerraformingInformationPages Website

 

 

 

In the September-October 2000 issue of the bimonthly Journal of the British Interplanetary Society (London, UK), Dr. Viorel Badescu and R.B. Cathcart detail the technical feasibility of deliberately moving our Solar System.

 

In their paper, "Stellar Engines for Kardachev’s Type II Civilizations", they treat our familiar Sun as a rocket motor nowadays wastefully spewing its mass in every direction, and show that it can be controlled by emplacement of several enormous reflective screens in space, causing a selected vectored thrust after their installation.

Actually, two types of workable stellar engine are proposed:

  1. an engine which involves piloting our intact Solar System, with Spaceship Earth and the other planets dragged along by the Sun’s gravity

  2. movement of a Dyson Sphere, which is an aggregation of space habitats/cities orbiting the Sun that is made from the remains of crumbled Solar System planets

Dr. Badescu, 47, is an internationally recognized solar energy researcher presently working at the Candida Oancea Institute of Solar Energy (COISE, founded 1997) in Bucharest, Romania.

 

Primarily responsible for the computer simulations, the lead author built on the work first attempted by Leonid M. Shkadov. Shkadov, 73, reported on the possibility of controlling our Solar System’s motion at the 10-17 October 1987 38th Congress of the International Astronomical Federation in Brighton, UK, as paper 1AA-87-613.

 

Currently, he is Deputy Director, International Business Department, at the Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute (TaAGI, founded 1918) located at Zhukovsky, Moscow Region, Russia.

Mr. Cathcart, 57, is a self-employed geographer situated in Glendale, California, USA, heading Geographos (founded 1969), who’s published reports mostly deal with Macro-engineering, especially the consequences for our Earth-biosphere of an induced reduction of the Mediterranean Sea and reclamation of the Sahara [http://2100.org/, click on "Ocean Cities"].

In sum, interstellar travel is possible, either by staying aboard Spaceship Earth (and terraformed planets like Mars and Venus) OR following construction of a Dyson Sphere here.

 

Also, should future unfavorable local changes in the Milky Way Galaxy provoke a desire to move our Solar System, whatever its physical form, this can be done quite effectively utilizing two new types of stellar engine!