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China Space

China Plans To Build A Deep-Sea 'Space Station' In South China Sea (huffingtonpost.co.uk) 73

Posted by msmash from the deep-sea dept.
China is ramping up its space efforts, it appears. A Chinese company named KuangChi Science plans to launch balloons from Hangzhou, in eastern China. HuffingtonPost reports: China is stepping up efforts to build a deep-sea underwater 'space station' in the South China Sea. If the plans go ahead, the station would be located 3000 metres below the surface, inhabited by humans, and would be used to hunt for minerals. There are also concerns that it would be used for military purposes in territories that are hotly contested between China and other nations, including the Philippines, Vietnam and Japan. The news comes from a Science Ministry presentation that revealed China's current five-year economic plan (till 2020). Despite no further details or blueprints being made public, the presentation ranked this project as second in a list of 100 science and technology priorities according to Bloomberg.
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China Plans To Build A Deep-Sea 'Space Station' In South China Sea More

China Plans To Build A Deep-Sea 'Space Station' In South China Sea

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  • sealab 2020 (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    sealab 2020

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by sycodon ( 149926 )

      Sooner or later there will be a typhoon in the South China Sea and all of China's shiny new islands will be washed away.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ffkom ( 3519199 )
        You did notice they place a lot of concrete there to make those artificial islands durable? And that doesn't even require advanced technology.

    • I was thinking more Seaquest DSV

  • Here we go! Hope China is focusing on the right Tech Tree with the right Leader!

  • Diffe rent engineering reqs (Score:5, Insightful)

    by wierd_w ( 1375923 ) on Tuesday September 06, 2016 @04:01PM (#52837209)

    A permanent sea habitat, and a space station, have vastly different engineering requirements.

    For starters, a sea habitat has to withstand positive pressures, and ocean current flows. (At the depth specified, a strong storm swell will shake the habitat pretty good.)

    Meanwhile a space habitat needs to be lightweight for launch cost reasons, needs to protect against radiation, and withstand negative pressures well. The sanitation and sleeping arrangements need to consider microgravity.

    About the only things the two will have in common are airlocks, power generation, and air reprocessing.

    Sealab 2020, China Edition looks like it is just another lame excuse for actions in the contested south china sea.

    • Re:Diffe rent engineering reqs (Score:4, Insightful)

      by ShanghaiBill ( 739463 ) on Tuesday September 06, 2016 @04:36PM (#52837419)

      At the depth specified, a strong storm swell will shake the habitat pretty good.

      You need to read more carefully. It will be at a depth of 3000 meters, not 3000 millimeters.

      3000 meters is about 2 miles beneath the surface. No storm will be felt that deep.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ffkom ( 3519199 )

        No storm will be felt that deep.

        Certainly not felt, but one might hear some faint rumbling noises.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by Yvan256 ( 722131 )

          That's not the storm, that's Jim's stomach. He skipped breakfast so he's pretty hungry right now.

      • I misread it as 300M, (which if you ask me, is vastly more plausible than the 3000 they cite.)

    • I guess it's time to send in SeaQuest.

    • I think the power generation might be slightly different as well. Most space habitats have been solar powered, and under the sea, I just don't see solar working terribly well.

  • Lots of skepticism over this one (Score:4, Informative)

    by jandrese ( 485 ) <kensama@vt.edu> on Tuesday September 06, 2016 @04:09PM (#52837255) Homepage Journal
    On other parts of the internet there is a lot of skepticism about China's stated goals for this facility. It smells strongly of manganese nodule harvesting [wikipedia.org] and many analysts think it has a military or intelligence purpose instead. The details that have been released are so sketchy it's hard to believe that it's a legitimate scientific facility, but I guess it's not impossible.

    • Re:Lots of skepticism over this one (Score:4, Insightful)

      by NotInHere ( 3654617 ) on Tuesday September 06, 2016 @04:16PM (#52837305)

      This thing is not a legitimate scientific facility, but a legitimacy facility. Its signal is simple: we build it there, because its part of our country. We claim the natural resources of this area.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by jandrese ( 485 )
        If that's the case, I don't see how it is any different than just claiming you own that part of the ocean. What do you do when fishing boats start operating in the area. The presence of the "research facility" doesn't change anything unless it starts launching torpedoes or something.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Even if it's not a legitimate scientific facility, China is planning to do something in its own backyard.
      It is no concern to the US what China does or does not in its own waters. We would go literally apeshit if some nation told us what we could and couldn't do off the coast of California, Hawaii or Florida.
      The US is always imparting moral lessons but doing the complete opposite. I think it's fair to say China has learned the game very well indeed.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        It is no concern to the US what China does or does not in its own waters. We would go literally apeshit if some nation told us what we could and couldn't do off the coast of California, Hawaii or Florida.

        The catch is that the definition of "its own waters" is very controversial - most of the South China Sea is far closer to the coasts of Vietnam, Malaysia, and the Philippines than mainland China. What's been happening the last few years is more analogous to the US claiming the entire Gulf of Mexico right u

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Ogive17 ( 691899 )
        Find me a spot in the sea of China that is international recognized Chinese territory and is 3000 meter deep. They can build their lab there.

        What they will try to do is drop it in international waters, claim the lab is over 1000 years old and proof that the entire sea has always been Chinese territory.
    • Too bad China isn't keen on building relations. It could accomplish most of its goals more effectively if it could have profit sharing with other governments or something. As much noise as Americans make about jobs lost to China would blue collar workers shed a tear if their corporate overlords were Chinese rather than American? Come on, China get with the program. Be a beacon of light or something, because the way you're going, whatever your endgame is, it's going to be costly.
    • Various nations have considered harvesting the deep sea floor for minerals, but so far the costs outweigh the value of the material by far. Also, if this was actually meant for commercial harvesting, they would certainly not bother the difficulties to bring humans there, and to keep them alive.

    • On other parts of the internet there is a lot of skepticism about China's stated goals for this facility. It smells strongly of manganese nodule harvesting [wikipedia.org] and many analysts think it has a military or intelligence purpose instead. The details that have been released are so sketchy it's hard to believe that it's a legitimate scientific facility, but I guess it's not impossible.

      It smells strongly of several things--Intelligence use (e.g. an undersea SOSUS-type hub), military use (becoming masters of the deep sea has massive military implications, especially in an age when satellites can see ships), anti-extinction use (create a self-contained environment in the ocean and you have a facility very well-isolated from the rest of the world), continuity-of-government use, and general distraction (nationalist militaristic projects are great at distracting your population and adversaries

    • ...it's hard to believe that it's a legitimate scientific facility, but I guess it's not impossible.

      Why would there be an opposition between genuine, legitimate science, and military/commercial interests? Most science has always been in response to commercial and/or military interests, and arguably, most military action has been for what could roughly be called commercial reasons. I'd say, of course China's intentions include both commercial and military interests, same as so many America and European research projects. I also think this is really exciting in many ways; we know less about the abyss than

  • Even the article says it. Isn't "space" in space station referencing outside Earth? Not having "room"? Is the title what we would call an oxymoron?

  • Political circumstances aside, if someone actually plans to build a habitat for humans 3000m deep into the ocean that would be a pretty difficult, dangerous and expensive operation, which on the other hand is much more likely to find new exiting stuff than any of the "manned space exploration tours" to rocky deserts above. Building structures that withstand such pressure reliably is much more difficult than building structures to survive a vacuum. If anything goes slightly wrong in that depth, death is also

    • Also means different long term health effects than found in space.

      Tri-mix will let you dive that deep, but is not meant for long term use. Substitution of the nitrogen with inert gasses like helium or argon are untested for long term use.

      Unless this habitat is designed to not only NOT crush like a ball of aluminum foil, but to also have sealevel cabin pressures, the health implications are poignant.

      What, is China planning on colonizing Europe or something?

      • Europa you stupid hunk of glass. God I wish I could turn this auto correcting bullshit off!

      • Exactly, as a scuba diver I always found it fascinating that regular sea level air is lethal (oxygen toxicity), if you manage to get that deep without nitrogen narcosis kicking in first. Hence the more fancy air mixtures. But as you point out those have many problems too. You'd almost have no choice but to keep the cabin within a few atmospheres of sea level and build it to withstand enormous pressure. In space we pop, under water we get crushed. Scientifically I'd love to see them try it. But as a Murican,

      • Re:A 3000m deep habitat - a bold experiment... (Score:5, Interesting)

        by ffkom ( 3519199 ) on Tuesday September 06, 2016 @04:31PM (#52837395)
        There is no gas humans can breath and survive on at 30 MPa pressure. Hydrox was barely survived (in COMEX experiments) at 7 MPa pressure. No, a deep-ocean habitat at 3000m would certainly contain ordinary "1 bar air", and need to have very very strong casing and very very dependable sealing.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Yvan256 ( 722131 )

      Death is also more sudden and certain because I've never heard of space sharks.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ffkom ( 3519199 )
        Then you obviously missed https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] - which is not even much less credible than the usual press coverage on "blood thirsty sharks hunting men". But jokes aside, creatures are posing the very least risk to you, down there.

  • There are also concerns that it would be used for military purposes

    Yeah well it's not going to be mobile like a submarine, and we all know that the seabed isn't any less subject to earthquakes and other disturbances, so wouldn't it just be a damned shame if some totally random geological event completely destroyed their undersea base, what a terrible tragedy!

  • ...would be that it would fulfill (in China's eyes) the 'inhabited' clause of the law of the sea, thus entitling them to mineral rights.

    Or, they simply say that they're conducting 'research' and exploit local minerals/drilling anyway.

    I doubt it's a military base, it wouldn't take much at all to make who ever is inside an instant casualty in the event of conflict. A 'port' for military operations hopefully unobserved by US satellites and/or a nexus for setting up a substantial undersea surveillance network?

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by guruevi ( 827432 )

      Not sure if mining minerals that deep is in any way economic, China has way easier access to minerals with full disregard about the ecological consequences. Just like mining asteroids, the deep sea is too expensive to access for the foreseeable future.

  • Am I the only one to think this sounds like a badass way to trial various technologies for space colonization? A substantial amount of the ECLSS tech will be transferable, for starters. I get that everyone wants to be suspicious of China all the time, but they are serious about their space program, and this gives them a chance to be the first to create a continual human presence in a deep-sea habitat. Pretty cool IMO.

  • The thin layer of atmosphere may prove defense-less against threats like Gamma Ray Burts, and colonizing Mars won't save us from them. Learning to live under sea, and building cities deep underwater for reducing the likelihood of our extinction from some types of very low probability catastrophic events is just as important colonizing Mars.
  • Deep Blue Sea....
  • China knows how to efficiently sink people's earnings to the bottom of the ocean.

  • Otherwise known as a black lab. Let's see if this one can fetch.

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