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Space Elevator Going Up
Adlopa writes "The
Guardian newspaper reports on scientists' efforts to realise the space elevator, as first described by Arthur C Clarke in his 1979 novel 'Fountains of Paradise'. Advances in materials science mean that 'a cable reaching up as far as 100,000km from the surface of the Earth' is no longer an impossibility and 70 scientists and engineers are discussing the idea at a conference in Santa Fe today."
Imagine the fact that the tip would accelerate as it fell...most of it would end up burning up in the atmosphere. Also imagine how little of the earth's land area lies along the equator. Not much. It might cause some localized devastation, but it's not a world-breaker.
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calculating orbits by hand (this was before the advent of the PC, remember), for example. Much of our scientific and engineering achievement today was first written about by Sci Fi authors, including personal computers, world wide networks, men traveling in outerspace, satellites, genetic engineering, waterbeds and much more. I personally hope we continue building what Sci Fi writers write about. Idealism and dreams lead to greatness. Pragmatism and "being realistic" lead to boredom and stagnation.
In my universe I'm perfectly normal, it's not my fault you don't live in my universe.
Fuck Iraq and let's cough up roughly 12 space elevators instead.
Hate me!
I swear to god, if my eyes roll any harder, they're going to fall out of my head.
It's not like we're talking about a high tension cable here. The cable's structure will be balanced by gravity -- the center of gravity will rest at the geosynchronous point, meaning that the bottom half will be falling toward Earth while the top half will be moving away at an equal rate. (Disclaimer: my degree is in English and I'm relying on this thing called "high school physics class"...)
Really, it depends on where the cable snapped and what the nature of the accident was...
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New continents were found, the sound barrier was broken and even space flight was developed at the cost of human life. Yet, it was worth it.
As a species we have become too concerned about safety. We are afraid to such extent that testing new discoveries (medicinal, chemical and physical) are becoming so burdened by the hysterical safeguards, governmental red tape and the associated costs that nothing ever gets done. To my mind, this development threatens the very progess of our species.
BOO! TERRO
From the article: "When we actually start launching this it's going to be kind of boring," Dr Edwards said.
After watching rockets (and shuttles) explode into spectacular fireballs, boring is just fine with me. Considering the majority of mass on any rocket is used to just get it to a level of orbit, this could be a nice way for us to start working toward the moon (and eventually beyond) again.
The really exciting will no longer be GETTING into orbit, but rather what we can do once we get there.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
But there is another problem: if it burns, will the resulting particles be hazardous for us to inhale?
Carbon nanotubes are primarily, well, carbon. Burning up would create the same stuff that charcoal makes, CO2. Potentially less toxic than second hand cigarette smoke. There may be some other chemicals in there, but the whole idea is to make the tube out of a single material, the nanotubes, to make it strong. So, yes, research is good, but toxicity is probably not the biggest issue.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
Sigh.
Who modded THAT insightfull?
"Imagine an accident. I wouldn't want it to happen to me!" Is not insightfull.
We get these inane comments with every article about transport.
Electric cars: Imagine getting electrocuted.
Supersonic planes: Imagine a supersonic collision with a building.
Space elevator: Imagine it falling on you.
Ship: Imagine it sinks.
Train: Imagine it derails.
Etc, etc, etc.
We don't need to have those modded up! They're not saying anything original.
You can't take the sky from me...
a) Carbon nanotubes are strong but very, very light. They have a high surface area per unit mass. In the lower atmosphere, the cable would float to earth like a piece of fishing twine; in the higher atmosphere it would just burn up.
b) Not really. Airborne traffic is smart enough to deal with comms towers, skyscrapers and hurricanes. This thing does not move - all you need to do is fly around it.
c) Yes it does. In order to advance space traffic, we need to get to geosynchronous and LEO MUCH cheaper, allowing us to loft the larger masses necessary for more ambitious space missions. Getting big tonnages out of Earth's gravity well cheaper and more reliably than is currently possible would be a BIG win for space travel.
But how will they protect it from, well, planes at altitudes below 100,000 feet?
3 words: Restricted air space.
You can't take the sky from me...
So how exactly do you come up with a budget for a project that calls for an unknown (but massive) amount of nonexistanium, delivered to orbit no less?
The same way that NASA came up with the budget for the space program in the early 50's and 60's. They had to create a huge number of things that did not exist in order to put a man on the moon. From things as mundane as food and drink and holders that could be used while weightless to as science fictiony as computers small enough to fit in an Apollo space craft. Somehow they managed to not only do all of that, but to budget for it as well. Not only that, all of that R&D was very good for the economy, returning, depending on who you believe, as much as $7 to the economy for every dollar spent.
In my universe I'm perfectly normal, it's not my fault you don't live in my universe.
One man's lightening bolt is another man's elevator power source.
The estimate of 7 billions $ seems very, very, underestimated.
And I suppose all known NASA locations are not consider as potential site to build this escalator, most of them are much more to near regions where tropical storms are likely to happen. Because, what would happen to a nice 1 meter large, paper thin, 100 000 km long light weight ribbon under a tropical storm? For sure, it will be hard to align the laser beam on the vehicles.
Achille Talon
Hop!
You'd be basically creating the largest "short" ever.
Not unless you made it out of superconducters! Even the best conductor we know is going to have a significant amount of resistance along the kinds of lengths we're talking about.
And depending on the exact carbon nanotube technology they settle on, the elevator won't be all that conductive to start with... it could very well end up being less conductive than the air around it...
I am disrespectful to dirt! Can you see that I am serious?!
Oh lord not this again. Yes, we must not do anything that may be a target for terrorists. Dont drive your car because there might be a car bomb. Dont fly becuase the plane might be hijacked. Tell you what, why dont you hide under your bed while the rest of us continue on with life and the building of civilization.
I'm a programmer, I don't have to spell correctly; I just have to spell consistently
"the floating base platform would be placed hundreds of miles from aircraft routes and shipping lanes and would be in a region of the sea where storms, lightning and high waves are rare." I understand that they are concerned about access, but in reality it's a waste of time and money. Any sufficiently useful transport technology has historically generated growth and traffic around itself. Instead of having to deal with restricted and obscure access routes, these elevators should be dropped into the major trade centers of the world. Ports bring boats, airplanes, highways and trains all into one place. The next logical step is to include access to space. If the space elevator is built in the middle of the pacific ocean, the next great challenge will be to supply a floating airport and direct shipping routes...