Renewables

[Drashner1]

Note that every new colony in an extrasolar system faces a similar bottleneck - there is ample energy in almost every solar system, but to access it you have to expend a lot of energy to build the infrastructure.

Well, yes and no. While it's true that all the energy infrastructure must be built and that requires energy, it's also likely that:

a) if you have the wherewithal to build a starship in the first place, you have quite a bit of energy available onboard to power the initial construction.

b) Your construction systems can themselves be both automated and solar powered. Given that in OA such systems are also probably self-replicating and totally automated, the 'bottleneck' becomes one of locating optimal starting points, deploying the construction units, and then waiting for them to do their thing. If you've already got the wherewithal to sit in a ship for the years or decades it took to get there, sitting for a few more months or years isn't likely that much of an issue.

For that matter, with the kind of tech involved, it might make more sense to send the robots ahead and have them start building before the ship arrives. That way, your initial colony infrastructure is all built when you get there. No bottlenecks required.

Todd