Phosphorus - The Hard Currency
- Universal Scarcity: Essential for all life (ATP metabolism); rare in solar system
- Biomass Limiter: Directly controls maximum population/settlement size
- Conservation Problem: Food-producing regions lose phosphorus to consuming cities via waste
- TASTE® Monopoly: Controls food packaging, fertilizer, and waste management across factions
TASTE® Corporation Operations
- Inner System: Operates giant solar farms (moon/Earth orbit) feeding space cities
- Business Model: Runs recycling/waste treatment, sells phosphorus back to farmers
- Monopoly Power: Only hard currency in post-scarcity world; controls plumbing/fixtures via lease
- Cross-Faction: Operates in Krasnovian space (reformed their ministries), OPFOR (preferred provider)
Faction-Specific Phosphorus Management
- Krasnovians: TASTE® essentially runs Agriculture/Sanitation ministries after government reform
- OPFOR: Individual settlements manage resources; Psyche planetoid controls limited phosphorus as sovereign state
- Circle Trigonists: TASTE® operates as monopoly utility in sparsely populated areas
Other Key Commodities
Heavy Water & Fusion Fuels
- Heavy Water: Extracted deuterium from major water sources; expensive to produce
- Lithium Deuteride (LiD): Primary fusion fuel; powdery solid, easy storage
- Sources: Luna gets from Earth/Jovian moons; OPFOR from asteroids/Ceres subsurface seas
- Informal Currency: LiD pellets used as trade commodity
Asteroid Steel
- Premium Material: Iron/nickel from asteroid cores with unique billion-year crystal structure
- Properties: Extremely strong, corrosion-resistant, temperature-stable
- Primary Source: Psyche planetoid (nickel-steel industry)