What about the mysterious question (1). Tangential question, if it is widespread knowledge it is buggy, how do you manage maintaining constant mineral supplies through your colonies without this order.
Several ways;
1) Use auto-mines on uninhabitable planets in that system with large deposits of resources, then mass-driver those resources to the colony you wish to grow.
2) Like 1, except you encourage CMC growth then purchase their outputs and MD those resources to your colony (CMCs have inbuilt mass drivers, so that saves you more resources). IIRC the number is around
10 to 20 100 million population on a colony in system. If you just drop infrastructure and Financial Centers on the colony, CMCs will pop up in time.
3) Create a Mass-Driver web/tree. This one is the hardest (and most redundant) method. You have many, many smaller mining planets, each sending their outputs to various depot planets (that usually also have mining facilities), which then they can fire/ship resources to other planets as needed/constantly. And then those planets at the end of the line can also shoot/ship off some resources on a needed basis.
3 - Fuel Production research. Do you consume more sorium when you produce more fuel?
Yes. That research just boosts the rate at which each facility can refine, not improving the Sorium/Fuel efficiency ratio.