Chapter 17: Nutrients
With the number of Clones steadily increasing and his industrial foundation growing stronger, Li Qingsong’s steel output from his primitive, small-scale equipment had reached about 5,000 tons per year.
Over the past two-plus years, Li Qingsong had conserved steel as much as possible, and he had now stockpiled an amount equivalent to his current annual output.
Now, Li Qingsong unhesitatingly brought out all the steel he had painstakingly saved.
Over a dozen metalworking machines roared to life, processing the surplus steel through various techniques into pipes, long bars, connectors, bearings, fastening screws, nuts, and so on.
About a kilometer away from the main base, Li Qingsong had already selected the site for the first large, formal steel plant he would build since the base’s inception.
Li Qingsong had completely leveled the uneven ground here and reinforced it with a special cement suitable for the environment on Ceres.
However, this so-called "special cement" was really just a mixture of ground-up steel slag, impurities from the Tolin and Oxygen Ore used in the generators, and a bit of adhesive for bonding.
This stuff had limited strength and load-bearing capacity. If used to construct buildings on Earth, it would probably collapse before reaching three stories. On Ceres, however, it was perfectly serviceable—at least for meeting current demands.
All sorts of components were transported to this leveled ground, where the Clones busily assembled, fastened, and welded them together. Thus, the first fully enclosed factory building appeared on Ceres.
It stood ten meters high and had an area of about 1,000 square meters.
In the future, all work at the steel plant that required an atmospheric environment would be completed within this building.
It was also equipped with machinery like slings and electric cranes to easily store and move raw materials.
At this stage, manufacturing equipment like slings and cranes posed no difficulty for Li Qingsong. The most crucial component for these things was just an electric motor, and since he could build generators, building motors was no problem.
The only issues were poor performance and a tendency to break down easily. But for now, as long as they were usable, it was enough. Li Qingsong didn’t expect them to work at full capacity for years in harsh environments without a single issue, like their counterparts on Earth.
While the main factory building was being erected, the other workshops for the formal steel plant were also under construction simultaneously.
Out of 1,100 Clones, a full 350 were assigned to the construction of this steel plant.
To facilitate the construction, Li Qingsong even set up a temporary kitchen directly at the site.
Every day, ingredients from the various cultivation, livestock, and aquaculture bases were transported here with the RUMBLE of tractors and cooked into meals on the spot. The Clones could eat their fill right there without needing to return to the main base.
A day-and-night shift system was also implemented. The Clones worked in two shifts; as one group went to rest, another arrived to take their place. Construction never ceased, no matter the time of day.
At every shift change, a group of over a hundred Clones would jog over from the main base dormitories in their Space Suits, eat a meal, and then begin preparations for their work.
After the handover was complete, the Clones who had finished their long day would leave the site. They would eat first, then jog back to the main base dormitories in their Space Suits, get a quick sleep, and then jog back again the next day.
Thus, a periodic ebb and flow of people appeared in this canyon on Ceres. In time, even the hard water ice and rock on the surface began to show signs of being worn down.
Under these conditions, a total of seven specialized workshops for the steel plant were built one after another: the ore processing workshop, blast furnace workshop, hot metal pretreatment workshop, refining workshop, casting workshop, rolling workshop, and post-processing workshop.
This was something the previous steel plants never had.
The previous steel plants didn’t divide the process into so many steps. Iron ore was brought in, thrown directly into the blast furnace, and then the molten iron was poured into molds to set. That was it.
This was precisely the reason for the low output, low efficiency, and crude quality of the products from the old blast furnaces.
The more specialized and streamlined the process, the higher the output and efficiency, and the more stable the product quality becomes.
Moreover, Li Qingsong made unprecedented use of automated equipment between the different workshops wherever possible.
For example, various tracked conveyors, conveyor belts, and automatic feeders—any rudimentary automated equipment that could be realized with purely mechanical structures without needing microchips—Li Qingsong installed whatever he could to save manpower and boost efficiency.
Hundreds of Clones toiled like this for more than a full year.
In the end, not only was the initial 5,000-ton surplus of steel completely used up, but so were the roughly 5,000 new tons of steel produced during that year-plus. Not a single scrap was left.
During this entire period, apart from the steel plant, Li Qingsong undertook no other projects.
It wasn’t that he didn’t want to; even if he had, there was no steel available.
But all the sacrifices were worth it.
Now, this steel plant—spanning a total area of over 10,000 square meters, with its processes made as complete and automated as possible—was finally finished.
It was dedicated to producing cryogenic steel, the most heavily used material on Ceres, which could be considered the foundation of all construction.
Looking at the steel plant before him, filled with towering machinery interconnected by pipes, conveyor belts, and cables, Li Qingsong’s heart swelled with satisfaction.
It could produce 270 tons a day, amounting to 100,000 tons of steel a year.
He could almost see an endless stream of steel pouring out of this factory, being cast and processed into countless components that would nourish his entire base, allowing his colony on Ceres to grow strong and flourish.
’With this steel plant, I can finally get started on all the other projects... dedicated chemical plants, cultivation bases, metalworking factories, Space Suit factories, textile mills, and even Clone breeding centers...’
However, for now, although the steel plant was built, it couldn’t yet operate at full capacity. It could only run at low power, for the time being, just enough to take over the production capacity of the previous, cruder plants.
It still needed some supporting facilities before it could truly unleash its full power.
Under Li Qingsong’s direction, a massive team of 800 Clones—including over 400 newly cultivated ones from the past year—was assembled. Driving various machines and carrying all sorts of tools, they marched out of the main base in high spirits.
Now, Li Qingsong was going to build a railway to connect Iron Mine No. 1 with Steel Plant No. 1!