Harvest Station
The Harvest Station Space Habitat owned by the Astrian Colonial Authority
| Sector |  7 -3 |
|---|---|
| Home System | Novalia System (7 -4) |
| Product |  Organics |
| (controlled by the Astrian Colonial Authority) [ D, T ] |
The Harvest Station is a large space station orbiting a white giant star, named Floriana, at a distance of approximately four AU. The spectrum of light emitted by Floriana is ideal for growing certain types of algae, which grow much faster because of it. The Harvest Station was built here to make full use of this rare spectrum of light.
Engineering
The biggest engineering challenge for the Harvest Station was the temperature differences and heat that naturally result from the way the station operates. It always has the same side facing Floriana, this causes heat to build up within the structure. Especially the sapphire glass greenhouse sections build up enormous heat. Considering the vacuum of space, this heat is extremely difficult to dissipate for a structure the size of the Harvest Station.
After extensive testing of prototypes a choice was made to incorporate several options into the station. First and foremost is the Radiative Power and Cooling system, which doubles as a power source. Water is pressurised and run through the outer hull on the sun side of the station and the greenhouses, absorbing heat from them and evaporating. The steam is then run through a series of generators, which generate power, before it is run through the dark side of the outer hull where the heat is radiated into space and the steam is condensed back into water. While this is a very standard way of cooling objects in space, the Harvest Stations size requires it to actively transfer the heat from one side to the other. Normally the hulls of starships and space stations have enough passive heat transfer capacity to do this without the need for specialized systems.
While the RPC-system takes care of most of the heat, it doesn't dissipate enough of it for the station to function properly. In order to remove the rest of the excess heat a second system is used. The algae grown by the station require a constant supply of nutrients and water. Rather then ship these nutrients in there pure form, the nutrients are bonded to other molecules and the water is delivered in solid form. The heat is used in an endothermic reaction to separate the nutrients from the bonding molecules and to melt the solid water.
In an emergency where heat builds up beyond the cooling capacity of these systems, such as unexpected activity or solar flares from Floriana or a malfunction in the cooling system, the station has a way to rapidly cool down itself. The station has multiple large water storage tanks, that can be run through the outer hull before being vented into space. The heat is transferred to the water, which is then dumped. While this system has enormous cooling capacity, many times the combined cooling capacity of the other systems, it is also extremely wasteful as water is lost to space. When all tanks are full the station can maintain maximum operating temperatures, about 50 degrees Celsius, for about two hours when outer hull temperature reaches 800 degrees Celsius. However if after 40 minutes temperatures haven't started to drop again, the Harvest Station is evacuated.
Production
The Harvest Station produces large quantities of a specially engineered algae that thrives in the spectrum of light emitted by Floriana and zero-gravity. These algae are used as an organic base product. These single celled algae can easily have their nucleus removed, leaving a blank cell structure that can adapt to any role for any organic species. The lack of antigens on the cell membrane also makes it useful in medical treatment as a stem-cell substitute. These blank cells are used widely by Astrians, from synthetic meat to infection resistant cybernetic attachment between natural organic parts of a person and prosthetic parts.
