Quote:
Originally Posted by sir_pudding
I don't see why a skilled synthetic chemist couldn't make double base smokeless propellant with a TL8 lab.
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It occurs to me that if you are going to make smokeless powder we've overlooked a critical feedstock - cellulose. It's not remotely easy to synthesize, which we neglect here on Earth because God already did all the ridiculously hard chemical engineering necessary to put together a commercially viable total synthesis from water and carbon dioxide using self reproducing nanoassemblers, but alien ecologies don't necessarily have a source of it.