The celebration of the ignition day came to an end, but the excitement burning in people's hearts did not cool down at all. Instead, it was pushed to a new peak.
Space elevator!
This was a magnificent project that only existed in people's imagination. No one ever thought that one day in the future, it would really come into their lives.
And now it seemed that this day would come soon.
Regardless of what the other audience sitting in front of the TV watching this grand event thought, at least for those sitting in the venue, almost no one doubted that Lu Zhou was joking with them.
After all, just three days ago, they had witnessed such a miracle with their own eyes while sitting here. The shock brought to them by the aurora that enveloped the night sky of the entire city group would probably never be forgotten in this lifetime.
What's more, even the second-generation controllable fusion technology couldn't stop him from moving forward. What was a space elevator to him?
They were willing to believe in his ability and vision.
Even now, it looked like a big cake …
The bustling crowd poured out of the Heart of Asia venue, and they were diverted to the direct light rail station and parking lot under the guidance of the staff and security guards.
Although they couldn't hear what everyone in the crowd was talking about excitedly, the expressions on their faces had written all they wanted to say.
Standing in front of the floor-to-ceiling window in the Heart of Asia lounge, looking at the surging crowd downstairs, the corners of Li Guangya's mouth raised slightly.
Hearing the footsteps coming from behind him, he put his hands behind his back and looked at the reflection projected on the floor-to-ceiling window.
"Do you see the expressions on people's faces?"
Lu Zhou walked to his side. He glanced at the square outside the floor-to-ceiling window and replied in a casual tone.
"I see it, what's wrong?"
"Nothing, just a little emotional." Li Guangya narrowed his eyes and continued in high spirits, "In the council report five years ago, I made a report on the strategic significance of the space elevator, but the attitude of most council members was ridiculing. Although I'm not doing this to prove anything, I have to admit that this feeling is quite pleasant. "
Lu Zhou glanced at him and asked.
"I actually don't understand one thing."
"What is it?"
"Why are you so obsessed with the space elevator?"
"On one hand, it might be because of my feelings." Li Guangya smiled and paused for a second. He then said in a serious tone, "On the other hand, it's because I once read a thesis … or research report."
"Report?"
"Yes, it's about the exploitation and utilization value of the resources outside the asteroid belt."
Using concise language, Li Guangya described the contents of the research report to Lu Zhou.
As everyone knew, since the industrial system on the Mars colony matured, the frontier of human civilization had expanded from Mars orbit to the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
The asteroid belt provided a large number of low-cost and easy-to-use high-purity ores that supported the huge heavy industrial system on Mars, providing a steady stream of daily necessities and consumer goods for society on Earth.
However, ever since the territory of human civilization expanded to the asteroid belt, this natural expansion seemed to have stopped.
In the beginning, many sociological scholars and experts gave the view that their society had fallen into the trap of excessive prosperity after developing to an unprecedented stage of prosperity. Because there was no survival crisis, the society as a whole lost the drive to advance.
However, the research report gave a different view.
It interpreted this special social phenomenon from an unprecedented perspective.
Based on the fact that efficiency and economic value were the fundamental driving forces of all social activities, the research report established a simple mathematical model and came up with a concept called "effective economic zone".
That was, within the scope of this effective economic zone, human social activities had positive economic effects. However, once this range was exceeded, the economic effect would decrease with various factors such as distance and voyage time.
The size of the effective economic zone was usually determined by many factors such as technical strength, industrial scale, and distribution area. At present, the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter was the boundary of this "effective economic zone".
Mining resources from the world outside the asteroid belt, sending them to Mars for processing, and then transporting the processed finished products back to Earth, the supply chain beyond the scope of the effective economic zone would appear unprofitable due to cost issues. Therefore, almost no company would include the world outside the asteroid belt in their own plan after cost estimates.
Since the author of this research report was a well-known economics professor at the Pan-Asian Academy of Sciences, it was still very influential in the field. Although Li Guangya was not born in finance, he believed that the future of Pan-Asian Cooperation was far away in space, so he had always paid attention to research in this area.
After reading the research report, the idea of building a space elevator sprouted in his mind.
At present, the overly prosperous Pan-Asian Cooperation had begun to show signs of involution. Not only were the people content with the status quo, but the entire society had lost the motivation to make progress.
As an ambitious young man, he couldn't sit back and watch this great alliance be overtaken by other emerging alliances. They still had the great goal of establishing a community of shared future for mankind to be achieved.
The Pan-Asian Cooperation needed a super project that could drive the regional economy, expand the scope of the effective economic zone, and allow its citizens to regain their former pride.
The space elevator was undoubtedly such an excellent choice.
Even though he was not the chairman of the Pan-Asian Cooperation at that time, it did not prevent him from including the "Jianmu Plan" in his own governing program in advance.
Once he had made up his mind to do something, he would definitely do it!
"Speaking of which, I have to thank you for this." Li Guangya glanced at Lu Zhou and said with a smile, "If you hadn't woken up at the right time, I bet those people would have labeled me a lunatic."
Lu Zhou replied in an indifferent tone.
"You're welcome. It's just a few words. It's much easier than the big trouble on Ceres … By the way, do you need my help with the follow-up design work?"
He didn't expect Lu Zhou, who was afraid of trouble, to take the initiative to help.
Li Guangya was slightly taken aback. He then spoke with a smile.
"Of course, it's great that you are willing to help! If you don't have time, I won't force you. Just as we agreed, we'll be very grateful if you can provide us with some help in times of need. "
Lu Zhou glanced at him unexpectedly.
"It seems that you have been preparing for a long time."
"Of course." Li Guangya smiled confidently and said leisurely, "When I was still the deputy chairman of the board, I was already preparing for this day."
That was five or six years ago.
At that time, the research of the space elevator was not taken seriously. After all, the key material problem had not been solved, and it was pointless to talk about it. Therefore, neither the academic community nor the industry regarded this thing as a project that could be realized in a short period of time.
If it weren't for him approving more than one billion credits for the design of the space elevator, and then using administrative power to integrate the technical backbones of top research institutions such as the Pan-Asian Academy of Sciences Orbital Engineering Institute and the Aerospace Facilities Design Institute to establish the initial research and development team of the space elevator project, he would probably still be worried about not having enough money.
Now that the problem of materials was finally solved, Li Guangya was full of confidence in realizing his ambition.
Although he was curious about where this guy got his confidence that everything would go so smoothly, Lu Zhou didn't say much. He simply nodded.
"Since you have prepared in advance, then I am relieved."
The system did not stipulate his participation in this project. As long as this stairway to space was built on Earth, his promotion mission would be considered completed.
If possible, of course, he still hoped that they could rely on their own strength to complete this magnificent super project, rather than relying on him for everything.
Although he had been active for endless time, this did not mean that his time was worthless.
But in fact, if he thought about it carefully, their chances of winning were still quite high.
After all, he had already helped them solve the most critical material problem.
The rest shouldn't be a big problem, right?
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