Traveller: The New EraTraveller_TNE Yahoo Groups Archive, 2005–2020

Thread: [Traveller_TNE] Re: Life Support and Food

4 posts.

roger clark ·

Turning waste and sewage back into edibles takes a LOT of space, so I think that both the Basic and Extended Life Support equipment on ships includes a space for "waste", this space probably also can be said to include a stacked cloths washer and drier.  Laundry and cooking I think should be classed as a service instead of life support so a steward/cook might cover this better.  As for waste removal I offer two methods; first shortly before entering atmosphere the captain can hit a botton and "bombs away" and the waste would burn up on entry into the atmosphere,or method two; berthinig fees of Cr2000 for six days, this seems kind of steep for dock side power and internet service and a parking spot so I belive it should also include waste removal, if the port is to cheep well bombs away. 
One thing life support should include is food, water can be recycled, waste can be removed, low berth gases can be repoaced but NO one is going to want to eat "recycled food".  FFS2 goes into more detail about life support and gives space per person for everything from algae vats up to food farms (how real world the numbers are I don't know, but its good enough for science fiction), I use five catagorys for food itself 1) Emergency Rations,Think MREs (Meals Rejected by Everyone) Vol: 1.5 ltrs, Mass: 1.5 kg Price: Cr 10, (2) Poor, think think airline meals Vol: 1 ltr, Mass: 0.5 kg, Price: Cr 3.5, Normal Food, think canned or processed food, somthing with taste in mind Vol: 2 ltrs, Mass: 1.5 kg, Price: Cr 5, Good Food, Think normal food,but well cooked and tasty Vol: 2 ltrs, Mass 1.5 kg, Price: Cr10, Outstanding Food, this may not be white house standards but think seconds Vol: 2.5 kg, Mass: 2 kg, Price: Cr 30 ( for this calibure of food you need a full time cook).
 


Daryl Frewing <> wrote:
Uh oh.  I had been under the impression that Life Support also included a recycling system whereby waste was treated, processed, and turned into edibles again.  This is actually going to make an impact in one of my campaigns.
 
Does anyone know what the formulas are for providing food (and food disposal systems) to the crew of a starship?  (Cost, mass, volume, etc per DT per crew member)
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From:
To:! B>
Sent: Wednesday, December 19, 2007 8:37 PM
Subject: Re: [Traveller_TNE] Adventure Seed

On 19 Dec 2007 at 9:45, wrote:

> Are food and laundry and the like *not* covered by the cost for life
> support?

Well, he didn't list life support... and given typical accounting
practices (I took a year of accounting :-) life support would
probably get split into cost of running the air and water treatment
systems. Cost of maintaining them would likely include swapping
filters.

But the actual food (and disposal of sewage/garbage/excess water)
would go to a different cost center.

And yes, on that last, ships will end up with more water than they
started with since most food gets turned into water & CO2.

--
Leonard Erickson (aka shadow)
shadow at shadowgard dot com

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Daryl Frewing ·

I'm affraid I don't have FF&S2, but I just looked it up in FF&S and was quite releived to see that Extended Life Support did, in fact, include food (and waste management).
 
"Extended life support adds waste disposal/recycling and food..."
(Section 11, page 77)
 
The catch, from my perspective, is that it is available at TL6+ which would mean that this is not some sort of "auto food production technology", but rather it would more likely be simply a mini fridge and microwave oven (or the technological equivalent) included in the common areas.  This brings us back to the origonal point of "What's the cost for stocking food on your ship" and whether or not that cost is assumed anywhere in the default calculations.
 
It seems apparent to me that the cost of the extended life support doesn't actually include the food itself, but rather the facilities to properly store and process food.  I also just looked this up in the main TNE rules under starship expenses and it states:
 
"Life Support: Each occupied stateroom on a starhip involves an overhead cost of Cr2000 per trip (two weeks) made...may be used with a double-occupancy system (two persons per stateroom), but this requires twice the normal cost."
(Page 222, TNE main rules, Starship expenses section)
 
So, regardless of realism, it does look like food could reasonably be considered to be covered by the existing rule set.
 
Does this make sense?  Am I missing anything?
 
To bring it back to the Nimitz class carrier, the total crew for this vessle is 5,680 people.  Because the cost of life support is based on the number of people, this would mean (in TNE terms) that the cost of food, laundry, waste management, etc. would be MCr11.36 per two week period, or MCr318.08 per year assuming constant opperation (probably true only in war time).
 
Wow.
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From:
To:
Sent: Friday, December 21, 2007 1:49 PM
Subject: [Traveller_TNE] Re: Life Support and Food

Turning waste and sewage back into edibles takes a LOT of space, so I think that both the Basic and Extended Life Support equipment on ships includes a space for "waste", this space probably also can be said to include a stacked cloths washer and drier.  Laundry and cooking I think should be classed as a service instead of life support so a steward/cook might cover this better.  As for waste removal I offer two methods; first shortly before entering atmosphere the captain can hit a botton and "bombs away" and the waste would burn up on entry into the atmosphere,or method two; berthinig fees of Cr2000 for six days, this seems kind of steep for dock side power and internet service and a parking spot so I belive it should also include waste removal, if the port is to cheep well bombs away. 
One thing life support should include is food, water can be recycled, waste can be removed, low berth gases can be repoaced but NO one is going to want to eat "recycled food".  FFS2 goes into more detail about life support and gives space per person for everything from algae vats up to food farms (how real world the numbers are I don't know, but its good enough for science fiction), I use five catagorys for food itself 1) Emergency Rations,Think MREs (Meals Rejected by Everyone) Vol: 1.5 ltrs, Mass: 1.5 kg Price: Cr 10, (2) Poor, think think airline meals Vol: 1 ltr, Mass: 0.5 kg, Price: Cr 3.5, Normal Food, think canned or processed food, somthing with taste in mind Vol: 2 ltrs, Mass: 1.5 kg, Price: Cr 5, Good Food, Think normal food,but well cooked and tasty Vol: 2 ltrs, Mass 1.5 kg, Price: Cr10, Outstanding Food, this may not be white house standards but think seconds Vol: 2.5 kg, Mass: 2 kg, Price: Cr 30 ( for this calibure of food you need a full time cook).
 


Daryl Frewing <> wrote:
Uh oh.  I had been under the impression that Life Support also included a recycling system whereby waste was treated, processed, and turned into edibles again.  This is actually going to make an impact in one of my campaigns.
 
Does anyone know what the formulas are for providing food (and food disposal systems) to the crew of a starship?  (Cost, mass, volume, etc per DT per crew member)
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From:
To:
Sent: Wednesday, December 19, 2007 8:37 PM
Subject: Re: [Traveller_TNE] Adventure Seed

On 19 Dec 2007 at 9:45, wrote:

> Are food and laundry and the like *not* covered by the cost for life
> support?

Well, he didn't list life support... and given typical accounting
practices (I took a year of accounting :-) life support would
probably get split into cost of running the air and water treatment
systems. Cost of maintaining them would likely include swapping
filters.

But the actual food (and disposal of sewage/garbage/excess water)
would go to a different cost center.

And yes, on that last, ships will end up with more water than they
started with since most food gets turned into water & CO2.

--
Leonard Erickson (aka shadow)
shadow at shadowgard dot com

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.5.503 / Virus Database: 269.17.5/1190 - Release Date: 12/19/2007 7:37 PM

Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your homepage.

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
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allen carpenter ·

The cost of running a carrier is indeed huge, in peacetime the cost runs to almost $3 million a day, and in wartime, MUCH higher. Just my humble bit of knowledge from serving!


 
On Dec 22, 2007 11:34 AM, Daryl Frewing <> wrote:

I'm affraid I don't have FF&S2, but I just looked it up in FF&S and was quite releived to see that Extended Life Support did, in fact, include food (and waste management).
 
"Extended life support adds waste disposal/recycling and food..."
(Section 11, page 77)
 
The catch, from my perspective, is that it is available at TL6+ which would mean that this is not some sort of "auto food production technology", but rather it would more likely be simply a mini fridge and microwave oven (or the technological equivalent) included in the common areas.  This brings us back to the origonal point of "What's the cost for stocking food on your ship" and whether or not that cost is assumed anywhere in the default calculations.
 
It seems apparent to me that the cost of the extended life support doesn't actually include the food itself, but rather the facilities to properly store and process food.  I also just looked this up in the main TNE rules under starship expenses and it states:
 
"Life Support: Each occupied stateroom on a starhip involves an overhead cost of Cr2000 per trip (two weeks) made...may be used with a double-occupancy system (two persons per stateroom), but this requires twice the normal cost."
(Page 222, TNE main rules, Starship expenses section)
 
So, regardless of realism, it does look like food could reasonably be considered to be covered by the existing rule set.
 
Does this make sense?  Am I missing anything?
 
To bring it back to the Nimitz class carrier, the total crew for this vessle is 5,680 people.  Because the cost of life support is based on the number of people, this would mean (in TNE terms) that the cost of food, laundry, waste management, etc. would be MCr11.36 per two week period, or MCr318.08 per year assuming constant opperation (probably true only in war time).
 
Wow.
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From:
To:
Sent: Friday, December 21, 2007 1:49 PM
Subject: [Traveller_TNE] Re: Life Support and Food

Turning waste and sewage back into edibles takes a LOT of space, so I think that both the Basic and Extended Life Support equipment on ships includes a space for "waste", this space probably also can be said to include a stacked cloths washer and drier.  Laundry and cooking I think should be classed as a service instead of life support so a steward/cook might cover this better.  As for waste removal I offer two methods; first shortly before entering atmosphere the captain can hit a botton and "bombs away" and the waste would burn up on entry into the atmosphere,or method two; berthinig fees of Cr2000 for six days, this seems kind of steep for dock side power and internet service and a parking spot so I belive it should also include waste removal, if the port is to cheep well bombs away. 
One thing life support should include is food, water can be recycled, waste can be removed, low berth gases can be repoaced but NO one is going to want to eat "recycled food".  FFS2 goes into more detail about life support and gives space per person for everything from algae vats up to food farms (how real world the numbers are I don't know, but its good enough for science fiction), I use five catagorys for food itself 1) Emergency Rations,Think MREs (Meals Rejected by Everyone) Vol: 1.5 ltrs, Mass: 1.5 kg Price: Cr 10, (2) Poor, think think airline meals Vol: 1 ltr, Mass: 0.5 kg, Price: Cr 3.5, Normal Food, think canned or processed food, somthing with taste in mind Vol: 2 ltrs, Mass: 1.5 kg, Price: Cr 5, Good Food, Think normal food,but well cooked and tasty Vol: 2 ltrs, Mass 1.5 kg, Price: Cr10, Outstanding Food, this may not be white house standards but think seconds Vol: 2.5 kg, Mass: 2 kg, Price: Cr 30 ( for this calibure of food you need a full time cook).
 


Daryl Frewing <> wrote:
Uh oh.  I had been under the impression that Life Support also included a recycling system whereby waste was treated, processed, and turned into edibles again.  This is actually going to make an impact in one of my campaigns.
 
Does anyone know what the formulas are for providing food (and food disposal systems) to the crew of a starship?  (Cost, mass, volume, etc per DT per crew member)
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From:
To:
Sent: Wednesday, December 19, 2007 8:37 PM
Subject: Re: [Traveller_TNE] Adventure Seed

On 19 Dec 2007 at 9:45, wrote:

> Are food and laundry and the like *not* covered by the cost for life
> support?

Well, he didn't list life support... and given typical accounting
practices (I took a year of accounting :-) life support would
probably get split into cost of running the air and water treatment
systems. Cost of maintaining them would likely include swapping
filters.

But the actual food (and disposal of sewage/garbage/excess water)
would go to a different cost center.

And yes, on that last, ships will end up with more water than they
started with since most food gets turned into water & CO2.

--
Leonard Erickson (aka shadow)
shadow at shadowgard dot com

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.5.503 / Virus Database: 269.17.5/1190 - Release Date: 12/19/2007 7:37 PM

Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your homepage.

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.5.516 / Virus Database: 269.17.5/1191 - Release Date: 12/20/2007 2:14 PM




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"Here at Artillery Command we have at our disposal one hundred megawatt laser beams, mach 20 titanium rods and guided thermonuclear bombs. Some people say we think that we're God. We're not God. We just borrowed his SMITE button for our fire control system"

Nick Bradbeer ·

>To bring it back to the Nimitz class carrier, the total crew for this
>vessle is 5,680 people. Because the cost of life support is based on
>the number of people, this would mean (in TNE terms) that the cost of
>food, laundry, waste management, etc. would be MCr11.36 per two week
>period, or MCr318.08 per year assuming constant opperation (probably
>true only in war time).

It's worth putting the Nimitz into the Trav context for comparison. She
displaces roughly 100,000 tonnes, and aircraft carriers have a density
of approximately 0.2 (maybe a little more since she's nuclear and
partially armoured, but we're just looking for ballpark here.) That
gives an internal volume of about 500,000m3, equivalent to a Trav
displacement of about 35,000 dTons. So a CVN is about the same volume as
a Gionetti class light cruiser.

It's obviously important to bear in mind that the CVN is a carrier, so
will have a much higher complement than a warship of equivalant size.

Nick