Earth Energy Resources and the Drake Equation
When humans are in trouble they call out for help.
Humans respond and cooperate to survive.
When all of humanity is threatened by a global crisis, such as global warming, and the resources of the Earth are depleting help becomes secondary to personal survival.
Help needs to be sought from any source to ensure survival of our species and its technological evolution.
In 5,000,000,000 years our sun will expand to a Red Giant and consume the Earth. All we know will be gone. We will need alternative home worlds by this time.
This suggestion usually prompts the comments.
‘But that’s so far into the future we don’t have to worry about it’
and
‘Let our descendants deal with it’
In the few years that humans have been examining the Universe they have found it to be increasingly complex however one simple thing they do know about
is that it is vast and searching it will take a long time.
In realizing this humans asked the next quaestion.
‘How long will it take to search it’
Hear is an analysis that indicates why we have to begin searching now for a new home for humans, or more than one home for new resources
and making contacts outside our planet to get help to survive and evolve.
1. Resources
Our star, the sun is halfway through its energy resource.
It is halfway through its life.
So is our planet, the Earth.
This would be true even if humans had not existed.
Humans have however existed and have depleted the resources and environment of the Earth to the point where they are half used up.
Our global civilization is totally interdependent on trade, on mutual agreement, on mutual assistance to grow, exchange and use resources to survive.
This ability is ending between 2013 and 2050 and alternative methods of resourcing the energy and materials needed by humanity need to be found.
2. Evolution.
Three issues are currently dominating the path of our evolution.
First the fossil fuels humans use as fuels produce greenhouse gases that are altering the climate of the planet and making it inhospitable to life.
Secondly humans have to stop using fossil fuels in order to reduce the effects of climate change.
Thirdly by reducing and then stopping their use of fossil fuels humans will face a fuel shortage that will threaten their technological progression
and then their ability to survive the changes to the climate.
These changes will take place between 2013 and 2050.
3. Movement
Humans have just begun to look for new environments, resources and energy off their home planet. This has taken 4,500,000,000 years of evolution for our civilization. We only have the same amount of time left before our star ends its life and our home planet dies with it.
If resources were found on our moon our current technology would allow humans to travel from the Earth to the moon in 3 days over 384,400 km. Allowing for 3 days out and 3 days back this can be achieved at a speed of 5339 km/hr.
If resources were identified on Mars our current technology would allow humans to travel there in 6 months, 183 Earth days, covering 54,700,000 km, 183 days out and 183 days back this can be achieved at a speed of 12,454 km/hr
Therefore our current technology speed averages out at 12454 + 5339 / 2 = 8897 km/hr.
This level of technology does not provide the amount of energy we need to mine resources and provide for the population of the Earth.
4. How far away are the resources we need ?
The Moon and Mars appear to be lacking in resources, even liquid water. This is the local indicator that even with the basic resources to sustain life humans will need to travel further our to get vital resources.
The total known matter content percentage of the Universe in 4.9%
This is the volume of resource we will have to mine to get our energy before the resources of the Earth run out.
In relation to the Universe volume it is immediately apparent that matter is scarce, so scarce that we would need to search 1 cubic light year to obtain 1E+48 cubic meters equivalent to 1.0 × 1039 cubic kilometres of matter.
9,460,500,000,000 km x 9,460,500,000,000 km x 9,460,500,000,000 km
8,467,247,800,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 km3
to get
100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 km3 of matter
This staggering amount of matter would yield
0.0000000000000000000000000000068 grams / kWh / m2 / s2
Which is regrettably is very small for the energy inputted to collect it.
In our current technology level to travel trough this amount of the Universe would take us
951,696,950,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years, one way
19,033,939,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 years round trip.
Since we only have 5,000,000,000 years of our star and planets life remaining.
This is 3,806,787,800,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times the amount of time we actually have left.
So given the vast distances, the lack of resources, the technological ability of our current society, the timescales involved in obtaining the resources, the need for the resources.
We need to start improving our technology, identifying where the resources are and begin travelling and extracting them.
5. Are there any other civilizations to help us and how far away are they ?
The Drake Equation can assist in clarifying this part of the problem.
The Drake Equation is
N = R* • fp • ne • fl • fi • fc • L
The terms in this are.
N The number of civilizations in The Milky Way Galaxy whose electromagnetic emissions are detectable.
R* The rate of formation of stars suitable for the development of intelligent life.
fp The fraction of those stars with planetary systems.
ne The fraction of average number of planets, per solar system, with an environment suitable for life.
ne The fraction of average number of planets, per solar system, with an environment suitable for life.
fl The fraction of suitable planets on which life actually appears.
fi The fraction of life bearing planets on which intelligent life emerges.
fc The fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space.
L The length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space.
This equation has been completed from data from
The initial Drake Equation study
The current number of extra-solar planets discovered up to 2013
The possible time to send out signals to contact other civilizations.
The number of galaxies 100,000,000,000 in the universe.
The number of stars per galaxy 100,000,000,000.
The size of Milky Way Galaxy 120,000 light years in diameter.
The number of stars in the Milky Way Galaxy 100,000,000,000.
This data set creates three results
1. N = R* • fp • ne • fl • fi • fc • L
N = 20 x 0.1 x 0.4 x 0.4 x 0.9 x 0.5 x 1 x 100
N = 36 planets, L = 100 years
36 planets in the 120,000 light years diameter of the Milky Way Galaxy
36 planets in 11,311,200,000 sq light years of the Milky Way Galaxy
1 planet in every 314,200,000 sq light years of the Milky Way Galaxy
1 planet in 10,000 light years radius of Sol in the Milky Way Galaxy
Travel time from Earth at Earth current technology would be 1,213,853,830 years
2. N = R* • fp • ne • fl • fi • fc • L
N = 20 x 0.000001 x 0.35 x 0.33 x 0.11 x 0.11 x 1 x 5,000,000,000
N = 140 planets, L = 5,000,000,000 years
140 in 120,000 light years in diameter of the Milky Way Galaxy
140 in 11,311,200,000 sq light years of the Milky Way Galaxy
1 in every 80,794,286 sq light years of the Milky Way Galaxy
1 in 5070 light years radius of Sol in the Milky Way Galaxy
Travel time from Earth at earth current technology would be 615,423,892 years
3. N = R* • fp • ne • fl • fi • fc • L
N = 20 x 0.000001 x 0.35 x 0.33 x 0.11 x 0.11 x 1 x 71,553,790,562
N = 1000 planets, L = 71,553,790,562 years
1000 planets in 120,000 light years in diameter of the Milky Way Galaxy
1000 planets in 11,311,200,000 sq light years of the Milky Way Galaxy
1 planet in every 11,311,200 sq light years of the Milky Way Galaxy
1 planet in 1897 light years radius of Sol in the Milky Way Galaxy
Travel time from Earth at earth current technology would be = 230,268,072 years
Examples
A typical habitable near exo-planet is Tau Ceti e It has a mass of 5 Earth masses, an Earth radius of 1.9, a surface temperature of 68 deg C, an orbital period of 168 days, is approx. 5,800,000,000 years old and is 11.9 light years away, 112,580,288,000,000 km.
At our current av. speed of technological travel this planet is 1,444,490 years away.
The furthest exo-planet is 28,000 light years away, 264,894,795,000,000,000 km.
At our current av. speed of technological travel this planet is 3,398,800,927 years away.
Analysis of the Drake Equation results
The analysis of these results makes direct contact impossible by our current level of technology.
Contact by radio, electromagnetic wave, communication over 10,000 years would be possible.
If the other civilizations make radio contact then they can be assumed to be at our technological level or just above.
If the other civilizations make direct contact then they will be at an energy level ratio to our own of 230,268,072 to 1,213,853,830 years ahead of us to our 1.
This puts the other civilizations at a Kardeshev Type 3 Civilization Level and above
Source: http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Kardashev_scale.html
A civilization with access to the power comparable to the luminosity of the entire Milky Way Galaxy, about 4 x 10 to the 37 power Watts.
They would be the perfect type of civilization to get help from.
They could move humanity to a technology level that can allow them to expand beyond their home world.
However we have not identified a signal and so currently no such civilizations exist.
The other civilizations may have the same energy depletion problems as those of Earth.
The other civilizations may be below a radio communications level and so are out of contact.
The planets identified may only have a pre-human life level and so and so are out of contact.
Therefore at our current technological level expecting help from other civilizations is beyond a technical and logistic feasibility.
We, the current only occupants of our galaxy, have to deal with our own problems on Earth.
We will not get resources or energy by exploring the Universe to extract the meagre amounts of matter and energy, we will only use up what we have quicker.
We have to conquer environment, energy and resource depletion to survive and evolve.
We need to start improving our technology, identifying where the resources are and begin travelling and extracting them now because we are halfway through the life of our star and our home planet.
There is insufficient time to travel to the nearest resources, extract matter and return to Earth.
There are some interesting potential low energy options to ensure human survival, obtain resources and even make communication with another civilization.
These are
1. Colonize by DNA implant into the target planetary system. This minimizes the energy, resources used and reduces the size of ships needed to a bullet size. This also allows a ship to take an unlimited amount of time to get to its destination. This also allows for a human future to exist.
The human DNA could be collected on Earth and shipped to the ISS or its equivalent for launch to the target planetary system.
Millions of such ships could be launched in this 'Seeding Option'
2. Colonize by direct radio communication and build a halfway meeting point with any other civilization.
3. Colonize by direct radio communication and alter the target planets environment to facilitate the growth of a human species
A form of radiotherapy on the planets atmosphere and biosphere to create a DNA sequence implant.
4. Colonize by proxy through our communications system influencing other civilizations.
This is already underway with the recording discs sent into space with the voyager probes.
5. Try and develop a space faring system within the solar system by the colonization of nearby planets.
This is already proposed for the Mars mission.
Ian K Whittaker.
Website:
https://sites.google.com/site/architecturearticles
Email contact: iankwhittaker@gmail.com
28/10/2013
14/10/2020
2094 words over 5 pages