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You can actually get quite high with the right balloons. Keep in mind that as long as the balloon is capable of expanding such that internal pressure is balanced with external pressure without venting, it will have the same lift. With highly expandable materials (such as underinflated weather balloons) significant altitude can be achieved.

  I don't know if they can actually succeed (even if their concept is sound I don't think they have the resources to see it through), but the people at JP Aerospace have a plan for creating a balloon supported near-space station and a balloon-to-orbit vehicle using a very high specific impulse ion drive to reach orbital velocity once above enough of the atmosphere for drag to matter very little. (you don't need super high-thrust chemical rockets if your vessel is supported in other ways)

The big problem I see with balloon to orbit systems is peak helium. Helium is a pretty rare find (it's a trace gas in natural gas extraction afaik) and though the US has significant helium reserves, We will likely reach a point where helium cannot be easily found and this point is likely to occur long before we run out of fossil fuels. So very much helium is required for these big balloon projects that is ultimately wasted. Helium has other uses than just lifting latex. Deep divers for instance use it in small quantities as diluent gas. Its usefulness in that application is due to its low atomic mass: it is easier to breath at the higher densities. Hydrogen might be a substitute there as well, but divers would then have to worry about keeping the partial pressures of their hydrox mix below the flash point. It would be very inconvenient to take a breath, swim down a little and then have your lungs explode. Similar arguments can be made for liquid helium cooling. all of the low-volume helium application are put at risk by high-volume industrial use of helium.

Seriously. Why are we still building giant fireworks? Couldn't a mass-driver work with new heat-resistant materials? Or those JP Aerospace guys with the blimps-to-orbit plan?
Even the Space Elevator doesn't have this problem. Surely there are better things to do with the money to lower cost-to-orbit than building giant bottle-rockets. As long as we remain under the paradigm of taking our fuel with us, it seems to me the cost and complexity goes through the roof. My two cents only.

NASA Budget Shows Shuttle Phase-Out

Whatever happened to launching from lighter-than-air platforms? With conventional rockets, so much weight goes into fuel to move the fuel you'll burn later to move the fuel that comes even later. Surely someone's doing something with a straightforward idea like this?

That's pretty much what JP Aerospace is doing, "airship to orbit." RLV News has some additional info and news items on them.

doesn't mean they don't exist (still in the prototype phase, but still an intriguing idea).

I give you... JP Aerospace, Airship to orbit. The basic goal is to achieve orbit using an airship and ion thrusters. Not being a scientist, I have no idea if their goals are practical. In the meantime, they're just doing some fun experiments.

JP Aerospace has been doing this for years.

http://www.jpaerospace.com/

Check out the blimp-to-orbit project here. Not to say that I wouldn't rather see $400M of funding put into that project, but we're at the point now where it makes sense to try multiple ways to get into space to find out what's most cost-effective, and JP Aerospace has a $70M USAF contract to build ultra-high altitude blimps at this point.

I wonder, do you think they get high enough to warrant an extended journey on one?

I would love to get up that high - its close enough to space for me :)

An airship would be able to carry a larger suite of passengers for a thrilling few hours.

They're planning to use such airships to launch ships into space, by slowly achieving orbital speed!

Work is underway at JP Aerospace on the Ascender, a hybrid aircraft for flight at the upper most part of the atmosphere, as well as the Vee Airship. These type vehicles are of interest to the U.S. Air Force Space Battle Laboratory in Colorado Springs, Colorado. They are focused on perfecting a near-space maneuvering vehicle, Powell said. === end quote

Yep, that's JP Aerospace. Havn't heard much from them lately.

with respect to waste streams... what about sewage?

With respect to arable land, who says it has to be arable? The following quote discusses the sewage into algae biomass oil research Mike Briggs is doing:

You can look at them for yourself at the University of New Hampshire site here [unh.edu] This is largely based on research successfully completed at DOE in 1998 and shelved because cheap oil looked like forever back then. You can find the DOE reports from the UNH link. Biomass algae is a more efficient biodiesel source than food grains, etc. because a single-cell organism doesn't require wasting energy and nutrients on making the rest of the plant (stalks, roots, etc.) and grows in hours, not months. The difference between food grain biomass and algae biomass is the difference between 1-3 barrel / acre / year and 91-360 barrels / acre / year. (see the UNH site for detail) Biodiesel you can burn in a car / truck / plane.

Using algae biomass as a practical energy solution requires removing a couple of process bottlenecks, one being growing the algae while capturing methane generated in its growth cheaply (the DOE solusion used open raceway ponds), and getting the oil out of the algae cheaply. You won't see much about possible solutions for a while because in order to get research funding, anybody with what he thinks are the right answers is discussing them on an NDA basis with potential investors or team members. (based on comments I've seen from researchers... and because I'm looking for money myself in this area)

With respect to solar, neither of you brought up an obvious point. What happens when the sun goes down? ,p.A homeowner on the grid can choose either battery backup (since you've priced this, you know this means REAL BIG batteries) or grid backup, buy power when the rates are low.

The choices are more limited with respect to supplying utility grade power:

• very large-scale storage
• a worldwide electrical grid
• a solar power satellite network

I favor the solar power satellite solution, since JP Aerospace appears to be on the edge of success with their blimp-to-orbit space transportation solution, which promises orders-of-magnitude reductions in the price-per-kilogram for boosting payloads into orbit to less than what NASA says on their solar power satellite project site is required to make a SPS project feasible.

With respect to solar cells themselves, I am not at all certain about whether or not the real problem in getting the cost down in this application is best done through new types of solar cells or through more economical packaging of existing devices. Wafer-scale cells with arrays of cells photolithographed onto them, automated laser testing to mask out defective cells just might reduce costs quite a bit. Or not, this is not my field and I'm not really equipped to run the numbers. But I suspect an effective 100% yield on very high production volumes certainly wouldn't hurt.

The other possibility that occurs to me for reducing the cost of a solar power satellite array is to replace NASA's rigid structure setup with solar cell array modules strung on cables combined with microwave transmitters to make very large phased-array antenna systems to ship the power back without having to carry it back to a central power nexus and separate antenna system. The central control nexus would gather the physical location of the cell arrays and instruct the array transmitters as phase-control information. Not saying this is THE answer, just suggesting that thinking outside NASA's box might be in order here.

The URLs for the NASA project, etc. are on the page in my sig.

Real cheap solar cells plus cheap transportation to orbit probably means a very cost-effective solar power satellite system is possible which can make power available 24/7/365 without concerns about storage.

A network of orbital power satellites or putting a big solar cell farm in the L5 position is probably cheaper than the $16,000,000,000 the International Energy Agency says we need to spend to continue our fossil fuel habit.

Economic considerations are far more important. Any idea what replacing the US oil distribution infrastructure with a hydrogen distribution infrastructure would cost? The researchers obviously don't.

My WAG would be hundreds of billions of dollars, with luck. Putting giant hydrogen tanks at every gas station? New hydrogen pump islands well away from current gas/oil pumps? Training personnel? How about replacing every single plane, bus, auto, truck, locomotive, and generator on the face of the earth? Just what are we buying with it that we can't get cheaper with biodiesel? (estimate for building energy farms big enough to grow enough biodiesel for the US - $169 billion)

Meeting the volume restrictions in cars or trucks, for instance, requires using hydrogen stored at densities higher than its liquid density

Just what kind of superpressure vessels or exotic chemistries or other technologies are going to be required to fix this problem? Will vehicles based on this cost as little as twice what current vehicles do in volume production?

Solving the problem (cheap space transportation) that is required to make space power satellites cost-effective is comparatively trivial compared to the problem of building hydrogen storage for vehicles comparable in performance to current diesel products.

Frankly, I doubt that "the hydrogen economy" would be cost-effective even at a zero-cost/Kwh and IMHO, it's not worth wasting resources we're going to need to replace fossil fuel in trying.

It's time to say clearly and publically that the "hydrogen economy" is driven by hype and is nothing more or less than a technonerd wankfest, not a viable replacement for fossil fuel.

Not to say that the research should be stopped, we might learn some useful things from it, like how to build safe superpressure vessels for flammable gases.

But no responsible scientist or environmentalist should be discussing replacing fossil fuel or stopping global warning with "THE HYDROGEN ECONOMY!!!". Such talk at best, serves us to distract us from more viable energy alternatives. Anyone who discusses hydrogen energy as a fossil fuel replacement or as a global warning solution is talking through his asshole, whether he knows it or not, you can dismiss him as clueless at best.

Examples:

• biomass biodiesel (carbon-neutral), perhaps from sewage - biodiesel provides far more energy per volume than hydrogen can short of the hypothetical technologies discussed in the paper.
• The only real technological problem with space power satellites is cheap transportation of solar cells to orbit. Perhaps http://www.jpaerospace.com/ has the answer.

We've been researching alternative energy for generations, we need to bring the most promising technologies up to the pilot plant level NOW, pick winners, and GO while we still have a more-or-less viable planet to work from.

Check the link in my sig for more discussion and links to the source info I'm using to support the above.

It's possible to lift a significant payload and launch vehicle over a 100,000 feet using a powered airship technology.

I'm not sure if you already know about them, but JP Aerospace is working on airships which go to orbit.

Why can't these be turned into solar cell plants making wafer-scale solar cell arrays (arrays to avoid the problem of defective chips, simply disable cells with defects).

However, I think it time to deviate from the tradition that calls for solar cell arrays to cover our building roofs.

Remember JP Aerospace and its project to build blimps capable of shipping freight to orbit for $1/ton-LEO?

Most of us should, it was covered on slashdot.

Solar cell arrays in space are a proven technology, as is microwave power transport and the main pieces of the JP Aerospace project.

These projects seem to me to be a natural fit.

Space-going blimps can't get closer to any planet without at least a thin atmosphere than a parking orbit.

Cheap bidirectional traffic to the Moon is the key to industrialization and colonization of the Moon. Which is the only way we're likely to be able to get jobs or live there.

Safety considerations aren't as hard to deal with where the population dessity that can be affected by chunks of an Elevator and its payload landing on their heads is vanishingly close to zero. Earlier generations of nanotube technology will produce the less strong cables required to build these initial efforts.

This is worth doing, and using the launch techology mentioned above to deliver it to lunar parking orbit, perhaps a lot less expensive than previous cost estimates based on heavy-lift booster rocket launches from Earth.

Building ultra-high altitude blimps is within the means of technology we know how to do and materials we know how to make, and building blimps to go to high altitude carrying cargo isn't all that big an extension of this.

Like the Space Elevator, I see nuclear powered rockets for use within Earth's atmosphere as just another blind alley. Outsise Earth's atmosphere, they might be a good idea.

This reminds me of JP Aerospace's plans and ideas for high altitude platforms to launch airships into orbit. Looks pretty nifty.

How would regulations intended to, say, ensure that a passenger can physically withstand X number of Gs at launch be applied where the max launch acceleration is 1G?

I can easily imagine new set of space environmental laws being used to interfere with the development of non-rocket space technology in the USA.

The Internet isn't rocket science, copyright isn't rocket science, but corporations in pursuit of their own interests against the public have worked with Congress to do their best to fuck up both areas. So what happens when the regulations cover an area that is rocket science?

And here are some links for them:
Main Page
PDF Summary of their LEO plan

And here are some links for them:
Main Page
PDF Summary of their LEO plan

JP Aerospace has a good track record with dozens of launches to 100,000 feet, so the technology's there.

Given that current gear requires a lot of power and massy equipment to deliver gigabits of data, having one (or more) airships per city is a good idea, although I'm fonder of manned stations such as JP Aerospace proposed (their Dark Sky Stations).
See the Slashdot discussion here

JP Aerospace has a good track record with dozens of launches to 100,000 feet, so the technology's there.

Given that current gear requires a lot of power and massy equipment to deliver gigabits of data, having one (or more) airships per city is a good idea, although I'm fonder of manned stations such as JP Aerospace proposed (their Dark Sky Stations).
See the Slashdot discussion here

The folks at JP Aerospace are using baloons for assist--in fact they are taking this even further and claim they can take a lighter than air craft to orbit using ion drives or something similar.

jpaerospace has a feasable looking plan for cheap access to orbit. They are using airships to do most of the work. They claim their timeline is ~7 years for getting one of their ships in orbit.

it may only be a few years before a private party is able to launch people into actual orbit.

Someone is already working on it.

Airships are incredibly cool things, as Indiana Jones proved.

Some people do seem to have great ambitions for lighter-than-air technology, though: these maniacs want to fly them to orbit...

I can't answer your question definitively, because searchs for the "Highest Altitude Plane" on Google tends to return the X-15, which would (in my view) be a booster rocket, not a plane to piggy-back on.
Helios seems designed to max out at about 100,000 ft.(Helios Site - 3rd paragraph)
The highest balloon flight was 113,740 ft. (assuming this site is up-to-date - 3rd paragraph).
JP Project's .pdf file marketting release on the subject says 140,000 feet, but I think they've only made it to 100,00 so far, so I don't know if that's a realistic expectation.

The price of jet fuel vs. the price of helium is a good issue to raise. I'd have to do some research to compare them. It would take me a while to figure out reasonable estimates for each (which is an example why I want to read someone elses analysis rather than do the work myself ;-).
It also seems that a balloon launch with a parachute backup is a safer system than a jet airplane. Less working parts to malfunction, and easily understood principles.

They're making some really neat progress with the jet vane concept, but until they get site and vehicle clearance they won't be coming close to catching up with the Scaled Team.

That's ok though, each team: Scaled, Armadillo, XCor, DaVinci, etc. is approaching things differently, so who knows we might end up with a heterogenous and competitive rocket industry.

Heck, there's even JP Aerospace with their airship/ballon platform to orbit method!

Please note that they have not actually reached space yet. Until they do, this is just PR and speculation. And I wouldn't be too sure that this is the first amateur vehicle to reach space, either. JP Aerospace has sent up balloons to 100,000 feet, which is the height that this group is trying to reach. Just because it's not a rocket doesn't mean it's not a space vehicle.

You also may want to check out some of the other really cool stuff they've been doing. They're currently working on a climp that would reach LEO over the course of a few days using ion propulsion. Details are a little sketchy on the aerodynamics and propulsion method, but it would be an extremely cheap and elegant solution to space access if they succeeded.

JP Aerospace who did Saturday's launch in Texas also did the inaugural flight at Oklahoma's spaceport (a former Air Force base at the town of Burns Flat) in March with two high-altitude balloons. One carried meteorology instruments for Oklahoma Univ to 100,000 ft. The second released at 95,000 ft about 550 paper airplanes made by Oklahoma school kids.

I'm a JPA member. I was there as part of the crew in Oklahoma. I drove both payloads back to the launch site in my truck. Unfortunately, I couldn't get the time off work to do the Texas flight or I'd be there now too.

www.jpaerospace.com

Sorry that was I in such a rush this morning. Trust me, if you'ld had to wade through the zoo down by the WTC site (visiting police strutting about, tourists blocking the sidewalks, media types damn near hitting folks with eighty bazillion pound cameras) to, get this, coordinate a move, you'ld want to get in and out ASAP too.
Anyway, the direct Pongsat link is here, most of my other science teacher resources are here (check out SciPlus in particular; they're amazing). The homeschooling discussion is archived here, and the obligatory LEGO link is here.
Good luck,
Rustin

Its good to see progress from some of the small launch vehicle companies, especially after the failure of Rotary Rocket.

The actual success here, though, is perhaps not as revolutionary as it first appears. The DC-X had a similarly reusable and relightable rocket even though it was in a more conventional vertical 'rocket ship' design.

Getting cheaper access to space is the key to broader space tourism and proper space industires. Other companies trying this include Pioneer Rocketplane, Armadillo Aerospace, JP Areospace and TGV Rockets to name but a few. There's even a UK outfit, Bristol Spaceplanes,
and the European Space Agency is beginning to think in this direction too, according to CNN.
All the companies are small and desperately in need of money if anyone wants to invest. Its probably less risky than Worldcom!

Another useful resource is the Space Access Society. Indeed they've argued that the whole X-33 mess was in fact Lockheed-Martin protecting their lucrative disposable launcher market by messing up the project. Sadly, NASA seems to have been complicit in this.

you mean like these guys who fly from (roughly) the same spot?

Half true. The shuttle is a huge political stone around NASA's neck, but there is still a strong desire in most of the agency to get launch costs down and reliability up.

The simple reality of the situation is that rocketry is hard. Here's a partial list of commercial enterprises trying to get in on it:

• Orbital Sciences
• Kistler Aerospace
• Andrews Space and Technology
• Rotary Rocket Co. (dead)
• EER (Conestoga) (dead)
• JP Aerospace
• Kelly Space and Technology

And of course the big boys like Boeing, Lock-Mart, and all the various non-Amurrican folks like Russia, China, Japan, and the EU.

Any of these enterprises would be, er, on top of the world if they could develop a low cost launch vehicle. It's much easier to grumble about how expensive access to space is than it is to actually do something about it. Whether NASA is going about it in a sensible way is a separate question, but it's not like all they're just sitting on their duffs waiting for the right incentive.

http://www.jpaerospace.com/advanced.html

JP Aerospace "America's OTHER Space Program" is doing this very thing. They used balloons to carry a launch platform and rocket to 26,000 ft where they launched the rocket. Now they're currently working up to being able to launch from 100,000 ft.

JP are and interesting crowd - basicly a small-scale amateur space program

JP are and interesting crowd - basicly a small-scale amateur space program

The best one I've seen is JP Aerospace. Their progress may be slow, but it's steady .. and they're certainly targeting some pretty high altitudes! Hopefully we'll see some information on their May 5/6th launch soon.

If you want to see the independant aerospace program that really rocks, then check out JP Aerospace. They are testing a helium balloon based platform and a microsat launcher. My bets are on them.

Also interesting, appears that even John Carmack has donated to the cause :)

(Good luck JP!)

In addition to the private ventures mentioned, here are some others:

CFFC
JP Aerospace
Microcosm
Pioneer Rocketplane

Amateur and quasi-amateur aircraft played a vital role in the early development of flight. Barnstormers carried the first paying passengers.

Look at organizations such as JP Aerospace, who is using balloons to get the rockets above most of the atmosphere before launch (rockoon), and then using techniques of advanced high-power rocketry to take it from there. By the way, you can donate to the cause on their web site as well. For $8000, you can have your own flight!

Small businesses are also working on microsat launchers, include High Altitude Research Corporation who use sea launched rockoons with hybrid rocket motors (solid rockets with gas oxidizers).

It is my belief that low space access costs (for microsat payloads anyway) will come from mass production of cheap, small balloon-launched boosters.

Amateur and quasi-amateur aircraft played a vital role in the early development of flight. Barnstormers carried the first paying passengers.

Look at organizations such as JP Aerospace, who is using balloons to get the rockets above most of the atmosphere before launch (rockoon), and then using techniques of advanced high-power rocketry to take it from there. By the way, you can donate to the cause on their web site as well. For $8000, you can have your own flight!

Small businesses are also working on microsat launchers, include High Altitude Research Corporation who use sea launched rockoons with hybrid rocket motors (solid rockets with gas oxidizers).

It is my belief that low space access costs (for microsat payloads anyway) will come from mass production of cheap, small balloon-launched boosters.

If you have a legitimate use for it, you can get a waiver for one (and only one) of the limits. Amateur rocket experimenters have used this to waive the altitude restriction so the receiver starts reporting data again when it goes subsonic while the rocket is coasting near its apogee (highest altitude.) Then they can prove how high it went.

The current amateur rocketry altitude record is 72,000 feet, set in May 1999 by JP Aerospace, a non-profit amateur rocket group from Sacramento, CA. It was measured by GPS. The launch was also taped and aired by CNN.

Not true. Until this past May, it was believed by professional rocket scientists that a rocket has too much acceleration to re-acquire GPS satellites while in flight. At least that's what they were saying in public.

It was amateur rocket experimenters (from JP Aerospace of Sacramento, California) who proved that GPS in-flight re-acquisition could be done, during a high-altitude test launch at the Black Rock Desert in northern Nevada on May 23, 1999. They were attempting to get the first amateur rocket to an altitude considered space, 50 miles or 264,000 feet. Though that wasn't achieved, they did make these accomplishments:

• the first-ever FAA Space Launch Permit for an amateur rocket
• a new amateur rocketry altitude record
• proved that GPS can be used for navigation by a rocket

I was there to help with the launch and recovery operation. I'm not officially a member of the JPA organization but was there representing another amateur rocketry organization. We usually encourage each other to push the envelope.

See also CNN's coverage of the JPA launch, though they didn't mention the GPS accomplishment because it's probably too obscure a fact for their audience.

Expect delays. Unless NASA cuts off the funding, don't lose hope that they'll get X-33 off the ground eventually and learn something from it. But also don't forget there are other reusable launcher developments in the industry...

• Rotary Rocket Company
• Kelly Space & Technology
• Kistler Aerospace
• Pioneer Rocketplane

• CATS (Cheap Access to Space) Prize
• Experimental Rocket Propulsion Society (Silicon Valley)
• JP Aerospace (Sacramento)