Mars?

[tantric]

Re: tech base. No, really, we don't. How do you replace broken parts? How could you even make a new space suit? The process of mining, refining, distilling, etc just to make a circuit board is ENORMOUSLY complex. This is besides our total inability to make a self-sustaining closed ecosystem. We do not have the knowledge to lock people up in a sealed area with energy and equipment have them recycle their water, air and food. Biosphere 2 was an utter failure. As a trained ecologist, I know that's because they went for too much complexity.

NASA is trying to figure out how to freeze dry cakes to send with the voyagers, when they need to be figuring out how to turn piss into algae bars. So...let's figure it out, here. In Antarctica. Everything has to be in place before the first colonists arrive, just as we'd pre-land their equipment on Mars. Select a location with geothermal power (Mt. Erebus) and send about 500 people. They get one shipment of equipment a year, and they have to request anything a year in advance, but otherwise have no physical contact with the rest of the world. They do have IT contact - make it reality TV to fund it, if you have to, but mostly they have the knowledge of Earth to draw from.