Xie Yuanxun: "The Electromagnetic Rocket Well has begun construction. We're expanding it from the foundation of an abandoned missile silo, which will save several months of construction time. It should be preliminarily completed at the beginning of this summer vacation."
Song He typed back, "The Russians are also developing an Electromagnetic Rocket. Is that a challenge?"
Xie Yuanxun: "It's a serious problem. The rocket market isn't large, and every additional competitor means one fewer order. The Russians are throwing the strength of their entire nation into developing an Electromagnetic Rocket. I'm afraid their technology won't be lacking. I learned about it half a month ago and couldn't sleep for two days!"
Xie Yuanxun: "If either the Russians or I succeed, it will inevitably drive the Lighthouse to attempt Electromagnetic Rocket technology as well. Once the space race reaches a fever pitch, this will be the only viable technological route."
Song He: "The only viable technological route?"
Xie Yuanxun: "Chemical rockets are extremely primitive recoil rockets. You can deduce this from the Tsiolkovsky Rocket Equation. When the area of the engine at the bottom of a rocket increases quadratically, the required fuel mass increases cubically. Think about it, and you'll understand what that means."
Song He understood instantly. Put that way, traditional rockets really did have an upper limit. They were fine for launching satellites now and then, but if they wanted to transport large quantities of interstellar materials, they could only explore other means of space transportation.
Nuclear Rocket technology was too advanced, while Electric Propulsion rockets were the only solution available right now!
No wonder the Space Elevator plan had been arranged in advance. The higher-ups had realized the limitations of traditional rockets long ago.
Xie Yuanxun: "For now, we can only take things one step at a time.