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NASA Still Wants Space Elevator
Jerry Smith writes "The Guardian reports 'Each of the groups that will gather in New Mexico is competing to win a NASA prize set up to encourage entrepreneurs to start development work on the technology needed to create a space elevator.' It still might take a while though, progress is slow, so slow."
when a plane runs into the elevator? It only takes one crazy pilot.
I know a man named Otis who invented a room,
And his heart was filled with pride.
I said to Mr. Otis, "What does your room do?"
He said, "It goes from side to side."
So I said, "Mr. Otis, if you take my advice,
You'll be the richest man in place.
You gotta take that room that goes from side to side,
And make it go to outer space."
And that was good advice, good advice.
Good advice costs nothing, and it may win a prize.
NASA offered me
Four-hundred-thousand dollars, whee!
For good advice.
Have you read my journal today?
FTA: As New Scientist magazine reported last week, the best performing robot last year managed an ascent of only 12 metres up a cable before it stalled, while no material came close to meeting the standards needed for building a space elevator.
Hopefully won't be too hard beating that, my mindstorm robot can do better!
Even if we do get a "Space Elevator" working, what would the point be? We wouldn't be able to send anything massive up the cable due to weight. That means no people, few satelites. So is NASA really intending to spend _billions_ of dollars on something to simplify satelite launching? Or are they betting that the elevator could support 2.5 tons of weight?
Money is expensive, so expensive.
It still might take a while though, progress is slow, so slow.
There is of course truth in that statement, especially considering the effective infancy of CNT materials science. Many gains have been made in the past 15 years or so, but it takes time...and thus the quote from the summary. We are today seemingly obsessed with instancy; however, this is to our detriment. Patience, patience!
The same technologies used to build a space elevator from earth would be usable for building other things: space elevators for other planets, for one, since every body in the system that could use a space elevator has a shallower gravity well than Earth; inter-orbital elevators; rotating tether slingshots; ...
I just don't understand what would take a long time about developing a nanotube ribbon countless miles long, and then suspending it in space... what's so hard about that? I think I have enough leftover cables from old pc's to about get there, if only they were thinner.
stuff |
If they want a space elevator, they'll have to earn it the old fashioned way: buy enough candy bars to get a golden ticket, and by all means RESIST all temptation to snack on that scrum-diddly-umptious confectionary cornucopia when touring the factory.
Where were you when the voynix came?
I would rather rebudget the cash into education and raise our base up significiantly. Sadly this isn't simcity.
members are seeing something, your seeing an ad
"I know a man named Otis who invented a room"
Now I know I'll have that blated "Otis Theme" earworm from "Superman" in my head all day. Thanks a lot!!! Brrump, dump, da-da. Dada, dada, da dum dum. Brrump, dump, da-da. Dada, dada, da dum!"
Where were you when the voynix came?
Never fear, if it doesn't work they can take the space elevator or the space stairs...
If we are some day able to create this elevator, the distance involved means it will take several days to complete a journey from ground to earth orbit.
I have a hard enough time avoiding contact with "other people" in elevator cars -- but the real tragedy will be the music. Girl from Impenema for 72 hours straight?
Aaaraargh.
The only way I could see this working is if they piped in aerosol (-)-delta9-trans-Tetrahydrocannabinol and phillip glass...
gah s/elevator/escalator/ :-/
Jesus, why the hell not just buy one?
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
Tornado's, earthquakes, hurricanes, flooding... Mother nature probably poses a very large threat to this thing. And it isn't like you can just let it float or move it around as the need arises, it has to be firmly attached to the planet. Granted a flood doesn't threaten it much, but high winds (hurricane, tornado) could damage the strand. An earthquake could damage the foundation that keeps it there in the first place.
And yes, an aircraft could just aim for it - though I'm sure there would be a lot of restricted airspace within miles of this strand, likely under the watch of the military, so you'd need a fast aircraft to make it there before getting blasted out of the sky. If they use this to launch satellites, you can bet access will be tightly controlled.
I'm still waiting for a giant slingshot. Something the size of an aircraft carrier. Muah!
In geostationary orbit, a LED ZEPPELIN will be holding up this STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN. They will probably outsource much of the work to KASHMIR. I hope the isn't a COMMUNICATION BREAKDOWN that makes the whole thing come crashing down OVER THE HILLS AND FAR AWAY.
How ya like dat?
Don't forget GPS. And satellite TV. And high-speed intercontinental data backbones. And weather forecasts based on satellite imagery. Even 'failed' missions such as Beagle 2 resulted in significant scientific advances (in that particular case, reducing the size of a mass spectrometer from the size of two desks to something the size of a Kirk-era tricorder prop).
Well, yeah! Who wouldn't?!
Nothing hides evidence like a stew. -Gus Pratt
I doubt an atoll would be a good place for a Space elevator. One of the main points of creating something like this is ease of transport of materials into space: just hitch them on and let them be pulled up by the elevator. If you make it difficult to get materials to the elevator in the first place (having to ship them out into the middle of the Pacific), you've just made it much more expensive and much less desirable to use it.
Plus, storms and Typhoons and such things are common in the middle of the ocean. Not exactly ideal for loading materials onto the elevator.
No, Mr. Green. Communism is just a red herring.
My other ride is the Millenium Falcon, you insensitive clod!
I got nothin'
Space Elevator is just "Mambo Jambo".
"Tornado's, earthquakes, hurricanes, flooding... Mother nature probably poses a very large threat to this thing"
History shows again and again how nature points up the folly of man. You know that once Godzilla gets a bus caught between two gargantuan fangs that he just can't pick out with his silly T-Rex claws, he's going to be looking for some good dental floss.....
Where were you when the voynix came?
Just climb a rope up into space. The only trick would be to keep the anchor in orbit, less it become an Earthly anchor while you're climbing the rope.
God spoke to me.
Somewhere in Russia, a bunch of guys are wondering how the hell the U.S. beat them to the moon.
It's poetry with a beat behind it! And guns! They're like beatniks with automatic weapons.
"The same technologies used to build a space elevator from earth would be usable for building other things: space elevators for other planets"
Got enough rubber to mix in with the nanotubes? That space elevator to Mars is going to need a LOT of stretch.
Where were you when the voynix came?
I wouldn't; I'd just like some Grey Poupon.
No, Mr. Green. Communism is just a red herring.
Build a 40,000 km cable out of nano-parts that haven't quite been invented yet, and then stand the entire thing straight up.
Yeah, I'm not going to hold my breath on this one.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
"Even 'failed' missions such as Beagle 2 resulted in significant scientific advances..."
Yea, transformers FTW.
http://www.TheGamerNation.com/Forums
how do you get there to go into outer space?>
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
I doubt we will ever see a space elevator. Not only is it incredibly difficult to create. The article clearly states that this technology is nowhere near and it would probably take at least a decade to create, if not two. By the time this is actually a reality - which is unlikely going to happen within 30 years - we will probably have way more efficient space travels as even commercial space tourism has started to kick in as well.
Point is, it would probably not take long before such elevator would be completely useless due to its slow speed and low capacity.
Full Tilt
Well, I wanna gold plated toilet, but that's just not in the cards, is it?
the tension on the initial cable is going to be extremely high, and this is an application where microfractures of the nanotubes will introduce unacceptable points of failure. modern ropes and wires are constructed by a weaving process, of sorts, that take shorter strands and weave them together to make a longer piece. that weaving process creates micro failure points. so, not only does the space elevator project have to create a ribbon that is at least 100 miles long, it's very likely they're going to need to make it as one continuous strand of nanotubes 100 miles long. making a dozen strands, each 10 miles long, and connecting them is likely not going to work, as the connection points won't withstand the tension that's going to be on the ribbon. so, that's a major manufacturing problem that has to get resolved. also, there are logistic problems out the wazoo with getting all the pieces put together properly. unlike a skyscraper, or an elevator, which exist within one basic inertial reference field, the space elevator would exist in it's own reference field. if you don't believe me, take a look at the math and try to calculate the tension of a strand of nanotubes as it extends outside the gravity well of a planet. the math is based on our previous understanding of astronautics and physics, but it definately would extend our operational knowledge into new areas, thus requiring it's own learning curve. consider the amount of time, energy, and research that was spent developing our current operational knowledge of launching spacecraft, connecting spaceships with spacestations, and the like. we would be doing all of that over again, in the context of space elevators and superstructures which extend out of the gravity well. when you dock at the one end of space elevator, what happens to the tension at the other end? operationally, how do you deal with that? operationally, what do you do with a docked spaceship when a hurricane is entering the elevator earthside location? there are a zillion operational details which need to be worked out in both the construction and operation of a space elevator.
Would be required to make a space elevator economically viable? Bearing in mind that a simple tin can in space cost around 100 billion up to around 2000.
Deleted
The carbon nanotubes which this is supposed to be build upon break easily, with horizontal force against the elevator. The other point is that if you break it you have lots of tiny needles in the air. So tiny that they get into your lungs.
©God
The government just prints more money when it needs some. Simple... Ok it's not that simple, really they usually borrow it, that's why you're 8.5 trillion USD in debt.
Deleted
According to the article, the satellite involved would be in geostationary orbit. OK, but the Centre of Mass of the entire system is not. Isn't the centre of mass of the orbiting body what determines the altitude of the orbit?.
Furthermore, no matter how light the elevator system structure is, may I presume that its mass is greater than 0? Thank you, I will.
The cable will apply drag >0 to the satellite. Any deceleration at all and its no longer in geostationary orbit. Oops.
Uh, since the whole purpose of this thing is to lift stuff into space, and again taking the liberty of assuming that the mass of this stuff is >0, then each and every time we hoist something up the tube, the distribution of mass shifts again, and thus the applied drag will be affected.
I'm not a rocket scientist, but...
Does not the altitude of an orbit depend on the velocity of the orbiting body? If the altitude is the fixed variable (in order to remain geostationary), then what do you adjust when an additional force is applied to to the satellite by hoisting mass upward? This additional force will be "felt" by the satellite as if it were increased mass of the Earth. Lifting mass up pulls the satellite down.
I think that the formula is something like T^2= R^3*(4+PI^2)/(G*M) Where:
T is the orbital period,
R= the radius of the orbit as meassured from the earth's centre,
G is the gravitational constant, and
M is earth's mass
Only way out I can see is to have a body up there so massive that the entire elevator structure plus payload is insignificant. Won't be cheap getting something like 23000 mi up.
Hoping to hear the scoop on orbital mechanics from a real rocket scientist...
-Slithy
Are they too lazy to take the stairs?
Stupidity is like nuclear power, it can be used for good or evil. And you don't want to get any on you.
Mankind cannot be given easy access to space. The Commer$ial Intere$t$ that control our country, the U.S. of A., want our populace to remain stupid and in an uneducated and physically-deteriorating condition so that we remain $imple Con$umer$, feeding at the Commercial Trough. I won't even mention what the aliens want. Too much Conspiracy before breakfast curdles the blood.
This post encoded with ROT26. If you can read it, you've violated the DMCA. Handcuffs please, sergeant.
Tell Nasa to want in one hand, and I'll go ahead and start pissing in the other, and let's see which hand fills up faster with a space elevator.
Seriously, space elevator tech is possible, but there are a MYRIAD of useful things they could be researching instead that we could be using RIGHT NOW.
When we do get strong enough carbon fiber filaments (or diamondoid nanotech or whatever) to produce a space elevator, then we can start building it.
This whole situation feels a little cart and horsey to me.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
Any introductory physics student knows how to make this work. Assume a massless string...
Learn some XHTML + CSS before linking your site on here - your tables look ugly!
i agree, the idea is complete horse sh!t, but dont tell anyone, let NASA & the US Government waste billions of US Taxpayer dollars to find out for themselfs that it is complete nonsense...
I have been following this for some time... Here are a few links for ya.l Study
http://www.isr.us/Downloads/niac_pdf/contents.htm
LiftPort Group. Company wants to beat NASA.
Reference Site
Place a curse on the RIAA/MPAA
It's questionable whether there is a big enough market on Earth to warrant building a space elevator, the market size on other planets is infinitesimally smaller.
Everything is nonsense! Humans create and apply meaning to things.
Imagine if the Iraq war budget was spent on this project instead?
How many billions of dollars?
Just as soon as they build a reliable rocket propulsion system that will get humans into space without having to worry about it exploding in mid-launch or disintegrating when reentering the earth's atmosphere.
Small moves....
and a rather good image (I use it as my wallpaper)
http://www.mondolithic.com/06Gallery08.htm
Here in russia there is one intresting idea since 1977 ( so seems patent free already ) to build a transport using 'strings' see demo pictures here http://www.unitsky.ru/ . Now, using strong tethers developed for space elevator instead of steel strings in the mentioned design, one gets quite a cheap transport solution - less construction costs than for railroads with the same energy to deliver the cargo.
Kids still want presents on Christmas!
On the other hands the parents are probably doing a lot better with the budget, than NASA is.
Someone asked, what about planes hitting the space elevator? Well screw planes, what about satellites in low orbits? It would be a long shot, but if one hit it would hit hard.
Finally, what's this thing supposed to sit on? I know a lot of it isn't supposed to weigh much (even though I'm too ignorant to understand why not, only the far endpoint is actually in orbit, the rest is going the wrong speed for its altitude), but the first few miles sure would. You can't just pour a concrete footing and then put near-infinite weight on it, it'll just drill itself into the Earth's surface. We'll be lucky if the Earth doesn't crack open like an egg! Well I guess we could spread the load out, maybe build a frame all the way around and balance it with another space elevator on the flip side of the world. I mean we didn't even get the Big Dig right and we're talking about this, might as well think big since we know we're kidding ourselves (except for the part about blowing our tax money, that's real).
At least that's the conclusion of Nicola M. Pugno:
the megacable strength will be reduced by a factor at least of ~70% with respect to the theoretical nanotube strength, today (erroneously) assumed in the cable design.
For this reason I've become quite skeptical. But please, prove me wrong, boy would that be cool.
Any sufficiently advanced libertarian utopia is indistinguishable from government.
NAIAMSNAIAAE (Neither am I a material scientist, nor am I an aerospace engineer), but why do we need to start at base level? Let's start at the point where we want the elevator to end and work our way down (top-down approach). Maybe we don't need to build the cable all the way to the bottom. Some kind of platform connected to the cable floating at some point in the atmosphere easy to reach by conventional planes (backwards compatibility). Once we have more knowledge of nanomanufacturing, we could extend the cable down to the surface (iterative approach).
:-)
And yes, I am a computer scientist. Why do you ask?
"All you have to do is be fragile and grateful. So stay the underdog." Chuck Palahniuk, Choke
Don't get me wrong...
I'm pro spaceflight, I'm pro spece exploration, and I'm pro a space elevator.
But if you think NASA won't invest money in a folly, then can you please explain why the DC-X was built 1/3 size so that it could never get to orbit, and the SCRAM-jet was built as a scaled down model that could never carry anything or do useful work, just like the DC-X?
Back in the 50's and 60's, we didn't build anything that wasn't man rated: if it flew, then you could produce a copy of it and fly it for real.
I suppose we could blame some of this "let's build a cheap version" on our ability to build RPV's or even automated flight control systems, instead of needing to stick a human being in the thing as a guidance system, but when you aren't building something that can achieve the eventual mission goals, then whatever youbuild - won't.
I don't know if I believe in the "evolution instead of revolution" philosophy when it comes to doing new things - if Columbus thought that way, he'd have incrementally explored larger and larger circles to find all the islands between Spain and the East Indies, and would have died of old age before he got far enough along that he "found" Iceland.
-- Terry
Do carbon nanotubes burn when sprinkled with flaming kerosene?
Patents Drive Free Software as Hurricanes Drive Construction Industry
Boron Nitride will probably the material of choice, not carbon fullerene tubes. It's a *very* promising material - it is just a matter of developing manufacturing techniques.
I hope they aim the elevator for the moon. That way if they miss at least they will be among the stars!
I love my sig.
It won't need tax payer funding, now will it? Someone will make a lot of money building one and economic forces will drive business it's way.
Deleted
Space research historically has been an enriching and profitable venture. However, NASA is a glutton who miss-spends money with bad contracting policies that encourage waste.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
Yet another Slashdot poster who couldn't recognize humor if it bit him the butt.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
Come on guys. Not all of the said problems can't be handled. People have done the math and it works out. Right now the biggest problem is the cable. We don't have something light enough but strong enough. For those of you that dont believe me check this.
SSMI
Those have very little or nothing to do with manned space travel.
Im not a rocket scientist, my name isnt Otis and Im not feeling that smart today. However here is my two pence idea: From what I understand the major hurdle in Space Elavator design is the weight of the cable. The longer it is, the heavier it gets, and it reaches a point when the material used for the cable is not strong enough to hold its own weight. I read carbon nanotubes are a great leap forward, but not good enough yet. So if weight is the problem. Lets lay supports along the way up, just like we do electricty pylons. Of course we can not have them down to the ground, so instead, why not at regular intervals, huge circular platforms with large gas envelops filled with hydrogen, (explosive but could be replenished all the time by elotrolizing water vapour making it self sufficant). These lighter than air blimpy things could take cable weight, lighening the load, and provide a cool viewing platform. If anyone things this would work and wins the contract, my only request is use of platform two and five to put an office and an apartment on so i can live in the sky. - Tristan
They should start with a moon elevator. That could make building a base on the moon and using it as a staging area for longer trips more practical. Landing on the moon is costly, since there is no atmosphere to help with slowing down.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
Actually, you just hang the rope on a Satellite in near geocentric orbit. The tension on the rope is no different than gravity. The big problem would be finding a rope that could hang without breaking under tension. Also you'd need to constantly be sending up loads, or the tension that's acting like gravity will be lost, and you'll get some drift on where the rope comes down to earth. I still bet the rope would rip in half, unless you find something that's really light and high stress.
God spoke to me.
Hey - a sling shot might work.
Stretch a long horizontal cable out to the east with the western end tied to the earth.
Stretch another cable straight up so that you can lift the free end of the horizontal cable.
Now lift the free end (eastern end) of horizontal cable such that the free end of the cable becomes stationary when you disregard the rotation of the earth. Thus the attached end of the cable will move at a velocity of about 1000 miles per hour relative to the free end. Another way to look at this is that the free end will move at a velocity of about 1000 miles per hour to the west relative to the attached end.
As the free end stretches to the limit of the cable length we get a sling shot formed.
If the energy of the earth can be translated into forward velocity on the free end of the cable as the surface of the earth whips by at a relative velocity of 1000 miles per hour, then we might be able to get say a 20:1 ratio in velocity from a sling shot effect and this would fire anything attached to the free end into space at orbital speeds - righto?
I've not used a bull whip recently but I figure that might be a good name for such a project.
Has anyone here read Red Mars? They built the elevator from space to Mars. When the cable was detached and fell to Mars, it fell near the equatorial plane leaving a path of destruction and death. Living in North Dakato is probably fine, but Egypt and Equador might have a different take when a failure occurs.
It is man-made. There WILL be a failure.
Consider what happens when something strong enough to carry hundreds of cars into orbit is built and it has 5 days worth of supplies for a few hundred people both going up and down. How heavy will those cars need to be? How much food and air will need to be lifted with each for their stay?
Out of Earth's gravity well, now that's a long cable. F = GM1M2/r^2 if I really my orbital mechanics from college. Put in the mass of Earth and the Moon and solve for a zero force between them.
Anyway you look at it, that's a big swoosh when it falls into the ground/ocean.
Mr Pugno seems to be confusing bulk and nano technologies.
... let alone to an active MNT material whose design and properties we don't yet know. Even if the basic lattice structure is modelled after today's passive nanotubes (which is unlikely), the composite properties will be quite different.
MNT doesn't seek to make ribbon-type materials through bulk materials processing, but by constructing atomically perfect lattices out of individual atoms or out of small molecular assemblies. You can think of nanofactories as extruding an atomically-perfect ribbon by design.
However, that's not the end of the story either. Even if you nanofactured a perfect ribbon, it wouldn't stay perfect for long, but would suffer environmental damage over time and a certain amount of spontaneous self-decomposition as well.
That's why the MNT community is keeping active MNT materials in mind, ie. ones where you're not really extruding a perfect passive component but a live lattice of interlinked and self-repairing nanomachines. While there are many variations on this theme being suggested, this general approach seems to be essential for keeping the elevator cable healthy.
Needless to say, Pugno's strength reductions don't apply to such a perfect lattice material
How many elevator cars would there be? What if you were stuck in the middle?
Current plans, if I recall correctly, is to send up an orbiter to GSO with a spool of nanoribbon, and "throw" it downwards. The center of mass remains in geostationary orbit, and the orbiter becomes the counterweight.
It seems to me that the problems of building a Space Elevator would be significantly reduced if be built one from the lunar surface. With one-sixth of the gravity of the earth, would it be practical to build a space elevator to the lunar surface with currently available materials?
Might this not be a useful exercise to demonstrate the feasibility of the "Space Elevator" concept, while also giving us relatively easy access to the lunar surface?
Maybe I missed something but I don't see anywhere in the post you replied to it says anything about taxpayer funding.
FalconShould there be a Law?
In the last discussion we had. You're getting very close to troll territory my friend.
REPOST:
With all the talk lately about a space elevator, I got to thinking after recent slashdot discussion, just what advantages would a space elevator offer over a tower launch? I contacted the man responsible for a similar idea, the skyramp, (warning: hideous javascript menu may break firefox), Carlton Meyer, and had a dialogue in which he pointed me to the tower launch archive.
The ideas I see bandied about there are similar to what I had in mind, which would be essentially an 11km tall tower (think pylons rather than skyscrapers, based at sea), with evacuated airless launch tubes, using nuclear reactors to power a maglev or pulley system to accelerate vessels to escape velocity. These would then emerge above the end of the troposphere [gatech.edu], with it's associated weather and air pressure, and have little to no fuel needed to escape the earth's gravity, meaning you could do a lot more while you were up there. At normal launch accelerations you can get to LEO with very little external propulsion.
Not only would this enable multiple launches daily, it is, unlike the space elevator, readily achievable with today's technology, and financially viable as well. Given NASA had an annual budget of $16.2 billion for 2005 [space.com], and a nuclear power plant costs a cool billion to build, give or take, we could have this up and running in a few years.
Space has got vast, essentially unlimited resources. One recent story pointed out the trillion dollar iron asteroid up there. The thing has about 5 tons of steel for every man, woman and child on earth. And thats just one of god knows how many... billions more?
Once we leap the cost to escape hurdle (as I think I have managed), we can proceed to use these resources. There are several obstacles in the way of this, first of which is zero gee mining, we have no idea how to do it. We can either mine the ore out there, or bring the asteroid back into orbit and slice it up there. Or slice it up and send it back to orbit. I would be opposed to moving it back into orbit for processing, purely for the debris issue. Perhaps a lunar base would have some merit there.
So we set up a mining and processing operation either on the moon or in deep orbit, and start cutting and processing one of those bad boys. Whats the first thing we build? A bigger processing and mining operation. Space exploration, much like the internet, has to be a largely incestuous affair at first, existing solely for its own benefit.
Once we have that mastered, we can move to algae pods in orbit for food production, oxygen refining, and fuel production (biodiesel or chemical engines), all of which can be powered by the immense energy of the sun, and use the raw materials abundantly available in space. Whether you ship that stuff back to earth or use it for further colonisation, its a vital step.
The production of automated scouts is also a high priority; a vast amount of surveyor and prospector drones to sweep and map every square inch of every rock and gas in the system, out to the Oort cloud, and figure out what they are made of. I'd err on the side of quantity rather than quality, still no reason not to have either. This could be combined with deep space observatories that would make hubble look like the end of a coke bottle.
So now we have a manufacturing bridgehead, a good idea of what's interesting out there, and a cheap means to launch to orbit. Actual manned system ships would come next, to either colonise or investigate the system. The rest, as they say, is (future) history.
A lot of this would require automation, robotics, right up to the point when we build a larger manufactory from the orginal small one. Robots would als
What he can't kill, he has sex on. Trent.
what about space debris and asteroids possibly colliding right into the elevator? is there much debris that flies between the path of the earth and the moon?
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
The SE is a rock on the end of a very, very long string, being whirled around by the Earth's rotation. That's what keeps it up -- what's sometimes called centrifugal force. Pulling inward/downward on the string doesn't cause the rock to fall; if the rock is whirling fast enough, it won't even be pulled down, and when you stop pulling, the rock is still there. There's no real notion of "center of mass" of the SE as a whole. The majority of the mass is well above GEO.
The "rock" will actually be all the construction machinery that was used to build the SE, a few hundred machines that climb it and add a tiny bit of material all along its length while they're going up. They will have a total mass of about 650 tons and be at an altitude of 100,000 km. The CNT ribbon will have a mass of about 950 tons. We'll be able to send up a 20-ton climber with a 13-ton payload every four days, or a 10-ton climber with a 6.5-ton payload every day. (Gravity falls off so quickly that a given climber is down to 50% of its weight when it's 2600 km up. That's what makes it possible to send up smaller climbers more often than you'd expect.)
it's very likely they're going to need to make it as one continuous strand of nanotubes 100 miles long. making a dozen strands, each 10 miles long, and connecting them is likely not going to work
From the articles I've read, maybe a dozen this year, the strands don't have to be as long as you make them out to be. Many strands can be weaved together. I don't know if you've ever looked at a strand of tread or of your clothes, but they aren't made from one long strand, they are made from different strands woven together.
FalconShould there be a Law?
If we hadn't done the first order research and development required to put a man in space decades ago, we would not have the capability to put a satellites up there today. Do you think we'd have put the R&D in if there wasn't a space race on at the time (that centered around manned space flight no less)?
At some stage, somebody has to waste money to develop a technology past the drawing board stage, long before it becomes even remotely practical/profitable.
Erotic is when you use a feather. Exotic is when you use the whole chicken.
If you accelerate something to escape velocity, it does exactly that: escapes the gravitational attraction of the Earth and never comes back, unless it's decelerated by some unspecified means. And escape velocity at 11km height means it will be burned to ashes very quickly, remember the Columbia. With our current technology level, building a ship that can fly at escape velocity at 11km height is much more difficult than building a space elevator.
OTOH, if you want to put something in orbit around the Earth, then you should give it orbital velocity, which means it should have a very high tangential velocity around the Earth. You cannot do that with a vertical tower, unless that tower reaches the synchronous orbit altitude of 36000km, which is the whole idea of a space elevator. Remember, velocity is a vector. It has both magnitude and direction. If you want to reach orbit, it's useless to throw something straight up with a high speed, because it will fall straight down.
Well, you may say, let's make the top of the tower curved, so the ship will be accelerated tangentially. Do the math. Find out how big the curvature radius must be so that the ship isn't subjected to deadly accelerations in order to convert that vertical velocity to orbital, i.e. tangential, velocity. That math has been done even before artificial satellites reached orbit. I have an old book, "Flight in Cosmic Space", written in 1952 by Russian scientist Ari Sternfeld, where he analyzes, among other concepts, the idea you have proposed. A practical accelerator to send a ship into space would have to reach a 100km height and have a curvature radius so great that it would be several thousands kilometers in length.
Seeing as how the price to Geosynchronous orbit will be measured in cents - the price of getting cargo to an equatorial base is negligible.
Storm are not problem either - because you do NOT build the thing and attach it to an island. You build it on a floating platform, and the platform is powered. When a storm comes, you simply drive the thing in the opposite direction. The platform can move a coupel of hundred miles to avoid bad weather. This has already been thought of - and the math/engineering works just fine.
How many escape pods are there? "NONE,SIR!" You counted them? "TWICE, SIR!"
Point is, it would probably not take long before such elevator would be completely useless due to its slow speed and low capacity.
The scientific articles I've read about space elevators, about a dozen this year, have said space elevators would have a greater capacity, ie would be able to carry more weight, than the largest rockets we have now would be able to carry. Speed though would need to be worked on though I don't see it as being impossible to have a ride into space not much longer than a transatlantic or transpacific flight is now.
FalconShould there be a Law?
The climbers going up the SE will be the size of a small bus, about 10 tons, and will go up one per day. It's unlikely any will come down the SE; standard reentry procedures are much cheaper for that. The very first thing we'll do with an SE is build another, and then another; after a decade or two, there'll probably be a dozen SEs sticking out from the Equator. The first one may cost $10 billion, but the second will be 20% of that.
Would be required to make a space elevator economically viable? Bearing in mind that a simple tin can in space cost around 100 billion up to around 2000.
A big part of the cost of getting that tin can in orbit is from the cost of the chemical rocket used. A space elevator can be used to build itself. Chemical rockets would be used at first, to get a small cable or ribbon from the ground to a counter balance mass, which may be carried by the same rocket or another one, at the other end. Then a car rides up the cable while pulling another strand of cable. When it reaches the mass at the end, it joins increasing the mass. Another car does the same, then another so on until the cable and counter mass are big enough. What concerns me is where all of the stuff that is used to make the cable and countermass coming from, whether mined or manmade.
FalconShould there be a Law?
You have to do the same amount of work to get on object into orbit whether it goes up the elevator or it goes up in a free-flying machine. Your only innovation is the ground-based laser to deliver the energy needed to do the work. THAT is the basis for your argument that an elevator is superior. Not the elevator structure itself.
The reason I make this distinction is that before I'll buy that an elevator is a necessity for this future you imagine, you'll need to prove to me that you could not accomplish the same thing with a free-flying machine. You would just need a tracking system that could keep the laser beam painted on the machine. Thing is, you would need the same thing for the elevator car, because the stalk will not point straight up. So you'd need to solve most of the same problems either way.
See what I'm getting at? If the value is that you replace the fuel with a laser, why not just improve the tracking system and paint a free-flying machine into orbit?
But if you want to do Big Stuff, like large spaceships capable of carrying a crew to Mars and back, or solar power satellites, then you'll either need a Space Elevator to bulk-lift all that mass, or some way of finding pre-existing mass already in space and building all the components there.
Now you're starting to make sense. Why the hell would we lift raw mass out of our gravity well when there is so much of it available in much shallower wells? The only thing we should be exporting from Earth is our ideas and a few tools to implement them. The Moon makes much, much more sense as a base for large space projects. Even better: catch a comet or asteroid with a solar sail.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Instead of a space elevator, how about a 500 story elevator with glass windows at a theme park of some kind?
What you want is irrelivent, what you have choosen is at hand.
Letter To Iran
How many escape pods are there? "NONE,SIR!" You counted them? "TWICE, SIR!"
You are in a record store with a friend. Your friend wants to buy an album that's of some obscure genre that originated in Turkey. You ask why. She says that a friend of hers heard some of this music before, and thought it was really cool. You say this is a bad idea because she doesn't speak Turkish so she won't be able to really appreciate the music.
I don't know anyone who knows Gaelic or any other Celtic languages, nor do I but I along with others I know love Celtic music. And in part because I've heard it I'd also like to learn Gaelic, along with other languages.
FalconShould there be a Law?
http://www.lightcrafttechnologies.com/
:P
Disclaimer: I am a fan of Space Elevators. A BIG fan. Some very very serious problems have yet to be solved though.
I keep pimping the lightcraft thing because it is so logical and so beautiful: (short version)
1) 100% of launch mass reaches orbit. (Ok, 1% may ablate during the ascent)
2) Gigawatt class Lasers are 100% COOL.
3) Cents per kilo to LEO
4) Can you say "Anti Ballistic Missile Defence System that **SHOCK HORROR** actually works"
5) Entirely new industry created.
6) Laser can be reflected back from space to slag enemy locations. Surgical Strike weapon "par excellence".
7) Lasers can be defocused on orbit and used as Search And Rescue illumination at night time
8) Lasers can be defocused and used to illuminate work environments on the Luna surface at night.
9) Lasers will launch light-sail craft to relativistic velocities inside our own solar system for trans-solar robotic exploration.
10) Nothing says "Inbound Bug Eyed Alien Tamer" like 50 x Gigawatt class Lasers focused on a single point.
11) Lasers can be focused on inbound NEOs or asteroids to deflect them from striking the Earth. A change of only 2cm/s is required to prevent a collision. Light pressure rocks!
12) Interstellar laser-based messaging system, with Gigabyte/second class bandwidth.
13) Megatons of payload into LEO every year.
14) system operates 24/7 in any one of the above jobs.
Simply put, there are no technical hurdles to this system. There are already lasers in the 50 megawatt range - all we need to do is develop pulsed lasers at an order of magnitude more powerful. That should be no problem at all.
As to the defensive (In the USA read as "Offensive") capabilities of this system, well, I've had numerous emails with Liek Miyabo about this, and he refuses to discuss these options. To me, this indicates interest by the US military. Hell, if I were Bush (which, thank God, I'm not!) then I'd be all over this technology. I guess the erason there hasn't been a coupel of billion thrown at it, is that there's very little pork involved, or the research is happening in a (D) state.
How many escape pods are there? "NONE,SIR!" You counted them? "TWICE, SIR!"
An ideal place for a "Space Elevator" would be in space, on the Moon. No weather or Hezbolla to wreck it. No population to be crushed if it does come crashing down. Abundant solar power, no need to use valuable water(hydrogen and oxygen for rocket fuel) to raise or descend from the Moon's shallow gravity well. Getting to the Moon routinely becomes easier if you don't have to pack, then discard a lander each time you visit!
This is only tangentially related, but I thought /.ers would enjoy seeing this space elevator concept video, made by my friend Alan Chan. He's done special effects for LOTR and Harry Potter, so the production values on this video are much nicer than your standard NASA flick.
There is also a very good companion article on IEEE Spectrum, and a fun interview explaining how it was made (short answer: lots and lots of Lightwave).
No, I'm not getting paid to promote this or anything, I just enjoy sharing it with friends/family, and thought a few of you would like it as well. Alan Chan's a ridiculously cool guy, I mean anyone who could make a short film entitled 12 Hot Women and get people to play it at pretentious movie festivals... wow.
But then some idiots took out the buildings in new york where I was to start from.
It still might take a while though, progress is slow, so slow."
It's not slow, it's incremental.
This is an important distinction. Incremental advances allow for a stable and mature system to emerge.
Stable and mature are good things in this environment.
Display some adaptability.
A critical problem with that simulation is stated at the bottom:
So far no atmospheric effects are considered. The elevator will probably start burning up on re-entry at some point. That may cause a tether fragment to end up in a long duration orbit.
A carbon nanotube cable is not only incredably strong, it's also very light. Therefore, it's going to be heavily effected by the earth's atmosphere.
Another little problem with that simulation is that I don't see a time scale. He does state that each 'frame' is six minutes and forty seconds. There's quite a few frames in there, so we're easily talking about DAYS while stuff happens.
I don't read AC A human right
The laws of physics work just as well for any nation.
I am convinced that Man will conquer space. Whether the dominant language is American-accented English, Mandarin, Spanish or Japanese is still uncertain, but your capability remains.
You have a brilliant track record, and a wonderful people. Your achievements have inspired me to a thousand times greater use of my potential, my career, than I would have ever reached without them.
However, from across the Pacific it looks like you're in a kind of perpetual Saturday afternoon over there. Might I diffidently suggest that you, as a country, get up off your arses and start doing what you were best known for again? Your beer is terrible, your automobiles are awful, your cuisine apalling, and your politicians are worse than the French.
But your aerospace engineering is utterly superb, and the hope of the race. Don't let the rest of us down.
Do not mock my vision of impractical footwear
Even if a rope was found to have tension that could hang from a satellite, weather would throw the ropes all over the place making it impossible to work on Earth, but on another weatherless planet, it could work.
God spoke to me.
"Despite decades of putting rockets into space, the agency has never managed to make any real reductions in launch costs in that time." Thats no surprise. Between politics and seemingly locked in with 2 aerospace companies they've never attempted to economize. And now we see the Orion coming to replace the shuttle. Apollo on steroids. Yeah, thats the ticket.
A space elevator would require government funding even if it is economically viable, just because of the sheer scale of the project. It would be just like all the other huge engineering projects that have been accomplished recently: the transcontinental railroad, interstate highway system, phone system, etc. -- all of those things have generated plenty of economic returns, but were just so massive that no single entity except the government could have handled building them.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I am feeling SO disappointed with my fellow slashdotters.
I've read through every comment on this thread that is scored 2 or above, and every one of you is seeing less than half of the space elevator's potential. You are all so one-way in your thinking.
Let me try to prime the pump of your imaginations...
Visualize a one pound iron ball, sitting in your hand. How much energy would that ball release on impact if you are on an airplane at 5,000 feet and you drop it out the window? Do you think it might break a car's windshield? Do you think it might put a heck of a dent in a car's roof?
Now drop it from 23,000 miles....
So long as we move enough mass down the space elevator, we can capture enough energy using existing regenerative braking technologies to power lifting side. If we move more mass down than that, the space elevator becomes a power generator. And the beauty of this is, it isn't important what we move downward, so long as we can put some kind regenerative braking on it.
As we begin to explore space elevator technologies, we should also begin to think about how to start nudging a near Earth asteroid into a position where we can get at it easily when we are ready to start dropping things down the elevator shaft. Ion engines might be the ticket. At first it won't matter much what we drop down the shaft, but eventually we'll get more picky.
At some point we'll want to build a solar powered distillery at the end of our string, so we can deliver bottled water mined from comets or icy asteroids to the thirsty. We'd do the bottling at the surface, after running the water through 23,000 miles of water wheels and turbines. And we'd probably build a solar furnace at Strings End to reduce nickel iron asteroids to ingots that would fit special drop tubes.
Well, that's it. I'm tired of playing Heinlein. Somebody else can imagine the distribution system for the surplus power.
What's the budget of NASA vs the budget on the War on Terror?
I'd much rather see the money going into figuring out ways to get us off this rock and take advantages of the vast resources of the rest of the solar system.
is one scheme: http://www.niac.usra.edu/files/library/meetings/fe llows/mar04/897Kare.pdf
Current technology, low technical risk, capital cost in the $1B - 10B range depending on system size and the cost scaling of the lasers. (The nominal number is $2 billion for a system with 3000 tons/year capacity). Marginal launch cost at least as low as the first generation of space elevators. Growth path to any desired payload size and annual launch capability, and to marginal costs well below $100/lb.
For that matter, fully-reusable rockets can have marginal costs in the same range as the Space Elevator. The capital costs and technical risk are higher than for laser launch, but probably lower than for the Space Elevator.
Space elevators may (or may not) be the cheapest route from Earth to space once transport costs are close to the raw fuel (energy) cost, but we're a very long way from that point.
If you like celtic music, check out my band dude!
www.leperkhanz.com
rhY
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
In days of old
When knights were bold
And toilets not invented
Men laid their load
Beside the road
And walked away contented
I think he was just looking for a place to brain dump. I certainly found it an interesting read.
Time to retrieve all those Kenny Gee CDs - it's a long way to the top...:-)
Wanted: A better sig than this one. I have neither the wit nor motivation...
OK, I'll bite. Why would it "flutter" if all but the last 100 miles are beyond the atmosphere? As the NASA "feather falling on the moon" experiment demonstrates, 99.5% of the ribbon would fall accelerating at the rate of gravity.
Let's say the failure is at the geosynchronous point, which I would believe to be the worst case scenario (and perhaps a likely point, as it would be the point with the highest tension stresses on the ribbon.) If I'm right, everything nearer to earth at that point will begin to fall, accellerating at 9.8 m/s^2. Sure, the part of the ribbon that began its fall in the atmosphere would "flutter", but everything above 100 miles would experience no drag to slow it. It would enter the atmosphere at a much higher velocity.
Would a carbon fiber ribbon, designed to withstand solar and Van Allen radiation plus the cyclic temperature stresses of nights and days, simply "burn up" on reentry? Keep in mind that only the leading edge would suffer the full brunt of reentry friction, leaving the rest of this highly engineered ribbon to slip straight in. Or could part of it "bunch up" (perhaps led by the mass where the climber was) and enter as a large mass? Could that serve as a "whip handle" to pull the rest of the fiber in, causing a "red Mars"-type whip effect? Sure, it's not "sequoia sized" and wouldn't have the same mass that caused the devastation in the novel, but it'll have enough of its own mass to still pose a threat. If nothing else, the falling ribbon could potentially tangle and slice through the rest of the elevator ribbons.
I'm sure there is some science you based your statement on, but I think it's less simple than just stating "it'll flutter down because it's shaped like Saran wrap."
John
There's the idea of laser launch - instead of providing the energy to vapourize propellant with chemical reactions, you aim a laser at the spacecraft to do the job.
Secondly, there's a variety of space tether schemes that don't go all the way down to the surface; instead, they dip down to an altitude and relative velocity where they could be met by hypersonic rockets. These have the rather large advantage of not requiring super-nanotubes. here is a NASA-funded study on the idea.
And, of course, there's always Project Orion - explode nuclear bombs beneath a gargantuan steel plate to push the thing along...but somehow I don't see that one getting approved any time soon
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
Just for the record, the record for highest plane flight (108 km) is 0.25% of the length of the space elevator cable (40,000 km). Not much reason to stop at 99.9% complete (few planes go above 40 km). This also solves most of the terrorism aspect - as someone else said, if some nitwit flies a plane into it, you can always fix the last 0.1%.
Here's a no-duh sort of idea: Why not attach an inflatable ring to the payload when climbing the ribbon and fill it with helium? I mean really, is there some limitation on the contest for climber robot designs that says you can't send your robot zooming up the first quarter of the distance into space using helium to lift the payload? Your climber, for that distance, is really just tasked with keeping a firm grip on the ribbon so it doesn't float away. When the climber gets to the point where it's carrying the balloon instead of the other way around, it would deflate and stow the balloon, or send it back down, and continue on its merry way. A whole lot of lift on the cheap.
Just thinking out loud....
*** *** You're just jealous 'cause the voices talk to me... ***
Reduce, reuse, cycle
In my country, people complain about rivers flooding their houses every now and then when it rains very hard. Yet they fail to see they have built their house smack in the middle of what used to be the natural flood area (don't know the exact word) of the river. But no, really, keep complaining your basement is full of water again and again after it rains very hard and the river can't take all the water.
The point is: maybe people shouldn't build houses in certain places.
So maybe, just maybe, there is a place on earth to build that freakin' elevator without having to worry about something like hurricanes, which in my opinion wouldn't pose a very big threat to that wire. Just think about it. Firmly tie up a piece of string between two points and sneeze at it. Oh no! I think I saw it moving there for a second. No wait, it didn't.
wouldnt this be like putting 1 end of a straw into a cup, and the other into a vacum chamber, and pumping out the air (to represent space). if anything went wrong, couldnt the space elevator could just suck our atmosphear right out into space?
portfolio
Try sucking water up a long straw: at a certain height, you *cannot* suck the water up that high.
It is the measurement of air pressure in inches of water.
However, there is an atmosphere nearer the ground. If the ribbon doesn't burn up, what would the terminal velocity of the ribbon be? A few miles per hour? A dozen mph or so? When it does, what force would it exert per area? Would it be enough to break wood?
"something thats so far beyond our current capabilities its like the Wright Brothers talking about building a 747"
Actually, the Wright brothers had a much more difficult challenge. They were doing something for the first time; something that was supposedly impossible. After they had cracked the problem a 747 was simply a matter of time.
If we had decided to simply achieve within "our current capabilities" we wouldn't be that far from banging rocks together. How do you think we push past "current capabilities"?
Sheesh!
Trivially false. Just launch two rockets for twice the payload.
Sorry dude, our rocket can only carry 100lbs, we're going to have to send you up in two separate rockets ;-)
Oh god, that woman is John Romero!
Something I've wondered about this is: if you take a rotating mass, like a figure skater's spinning body, or the earth, and you increase the radius of some of that mass from the center of mass, by extending their arms, or bringing mass up to the top of a space elevator, you slow the rotation. What kind of effect would slowing the rotation of the earth have on it? (from, say, a climate or geological perspective) and how much mass would it take to have this effect? Also, would it be a cumulative effect? ie. you raise 100 tons and slow the rotation of the earth by 10^-30 m/s^2, and set the 100 tons "free" from the tether: would the rotation return to normal, or would you have irrovecably lost that momentum?
I apologize in advance for fucking up any of the terminology... I'm obviously not a physicist....
Oh god, that woman is John Romero!
Is the flute used much in Celtic music? I've got a wooden American India flute by Nighteagle I want to learn.
FalconShould there be a Law?
A useful analogy for the construction of a space elevator is the old method used to build bridges over giant chasms. The first, most difficult, and most important step is to attach the two ends somehow. One way is to fly a kite, or if the distance is short enough, throw a weight across the chasm attached to a string. Once you have the initial connection, you can slowly add more lightweight lines to it until you've got a strong enough rope to hold some weight (like a person). The process of building-up the initial connection becomes progressively easier with each iteration.
Even if the actual space elevator is not.
You have to do the same amount of work to get on object into orbit whether it goes up the elevator or it goes up in a free-flying machine.
Not true. With a rocket, you must lift the fuel, reaction mass*, and the tankage required to contain the same. Typically, that is 100x the mass of the payload, although only a small part is lifted all the way to orbit.
By contrast, with space elevator, only the payload carrier, payload, and electric motors need to be lifted. This is vastly more energy efficient than a rocket.
Space elevators face enormous structural and economic barriers if they are to become reality. But don't discount their efficiency. That's very real.
*Even if it's a laser launch system, you still need reaction mass.
Ok, I'll translate GP for Europeans:
We are talking about a space elevator here, something that's so far beyond our current capabilities its like Leonardo Da Vinci talking about building an A380. When we have the capability to actually build one of these things, a Eurotunnel or Thalys will be childs play.
Well, that's part of why I asked the questions. Since there is no drag, terminal velocity is different. I think the tail of the ribbon could conceivably reenter at speeds of Mach 5 or even higher. Sure, the leading edge would burn up, but would it consume the entire ribbon on the way in?
John
Spin around in your chair then put your arms out and then back in. What happens? Not sure about what effects but have a look at the mass of the earth compared with the counterweight.
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how much would a 16 pound shot put weigh after I putted it downward, 15.79 lbs? Fired from a high powered slingshot what calaber bullit would would make it it back in one piece, all of them?. How about a potato launched from one of those homemade backyard potato launchers(steamy mashed or completly incinerated?).
yeah, but this would be more like: Spin around in a chair, put your arms our, cut off your hands and then put your arms in....
I know the mass is small, but how much would it take to slow the rotational velocity down by, say, 1%?
Oh god, that woman is John Romero!
Well, that's it. I'm tired of playing Heinlein. Somebody else can imagine the distribution system for the surplus power.
Why not use Oompa-Loompas for the distribution system? Ooh, wait, I know! We could just replace the entire elevator with a bunch of trained flying ponies! OMG!!! I'm, like, totally sure that would be SOOO much easier!!!
Seriously, you want to make an elevator out of something we don't have; on a scale that's thousands of times harder than anything we can do. While you're playing about in the realms of the imagination, why not just imagine a flying pony, or a flying Spaghetti Monster to solve your problem for you? It's just as likely to happen; at least within our lifetimes.
In the real world, we can't use carbon nanotubes; they don't exist as a building material. They're barely a material at all; the world record for those things is currently about 4 cm, and we don't know how to join them together. We'll need a lot of the those things, too -- if they stay at nanoscale, we'll be building a tower to thin to see, let alone climb. We don't know how to make carbon nanotubes into carbon cables; and we may never be able to. It's all up in the air right now, and it will take decades to learn if it will ever be possible.
And once the chemists figure out how to manufacture a substance, the engineers need to learn to mass produce it reliably. That takes year, often decades. Then they need to mass produce it reliably and cheaply.That sometimes never happens; and if it does, it takes a long time. Then industry needs to learn how to manufacture things out of it reliably and cheaply. Again, this takes a long time, and again, the material may never be widely adopted.
Once we get the basic materials science down, and once we know what carbon nanotubes can do in practice (and not just in theory), then we can think about putting them in space, and seeing what happens to them there.
After all that work, you've just got the tiny problem left of creating the longest physical structure ever created. Oh, and you don't just have to double the world record: you don't just need to do ten times better than what we can do; no, you've got to exceed it by a factor of a several hundred thousand. Oh, and by the way -- it has to work against gravity the whole time.
And once you've got a working, viable model for how you can practially build it, there's all the logistics, and financing of it. How many years did the Chunnel take? How much did it cost? That's just for a plan so simple that it could be conceptually duplicated with a bunch of guys with shovels; not bleeding edge stuff that requires training a work crew to deal with life in the great, yawning, frozen void of space.
Maybe, one day, we'll have a space elevator. But by then, neither you nor I will be alive, and techology on Earth will be so advanced that neither of us will recognize it.
Try it hlding a tennis ball and then let go off it.
From wikipedia
The earth is 5.9742×(10 to the power of 24) kg.
Assuming 1% mass is requied to slow down the earth then the mass would be
5.9742 x( 10 to the power of 22) kg OR
5.9742 x( 10 to the power of 19) tonns
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