An ion thruster I suppose would do the trick. Of course it would run out of Xenon after awhile, but ion engines have the highest fuel to force ratios short of a solar sail. Actually come to think of it I am not sure it is much of a problem. If you were in a geosynchronous orbit, surely the solar pressure would push you away half the time, but push you back the other half, right?
Agree with the poster. I figure solar cells in space will not trump solar cells on the ground until we dramatically lower the cost of delivery to orbit. At the moment we SpaceX is quoting 4300 USD/Kg to orbit on a Falcon 9 (1.1 - still waiting on maiden flight Sept5), and maybe down to 1200 UDS/Kg for the not yet built or demonstrated Falcon Heavy. And that is to LEO, Solar Cells probably need GTO which is about twice as expensive. I can't imagine a space based array can be competitive at those prices. Now if someone built a rail-gun based launcher, then maybe it could make sense. And as AC mentioned, we are in the midst of a ground based solar cell revolution right now. Very cool...
Actually that last sentence doesn't parse. Are you saying that if ATK gets cut they wil somehow cause the selection process to be jettisoned? That sounds wrong...
I think the Space Shuttle was just a big flop that only escaped being cancelled because the US Government has such deep pockets. In the end, in fact way before the end, it was a jobs program more than anything else. It set the space program back something like 20-30 years. I don't understand why people can't just admit it was a horrible mistake. Actually, of course I do understand, so many valuable lifetimes of work were sunk into it.We have to pretend.... But we should have just been building cheaper rockets (which the two other programs on the table proposed) - or funding a Ramjet, or Roton, or almost anything else. The only really useful thing the Shuttle did was repair Hubble.
Imagine where we would be now if NASA had done something like COTS 20 years ago after Challenger blew up instead of building another Shuttle.
I think NASA showed that they hadn't a clue what they should do with their terribly expensively developed "National Assets". They are all now rusting hulks. And they are developing another one with no clue as to what it is for (jobs for retiring engineers maybe). At least the commercial guys are likely to rack their brains out as to how they can get more money out of "their" assets. And face it - if a war broke out and SpaceX had useful assets, who do you think would control them overnight?
What is your logic here? You think it costs signifcantly less to turn Dream Chaser around than a Dragon Capsule? It looks an awful lot like a Space Shuttle to me for that. The two who seem to be doing a lot for bringing the price down would be Blue Origin (who are banking on a seemingly unlikely SSTO), and SpaceX with their Resuable Powered Decent stages (which also seem pretty far away at this point). It takes a 130 million Atlas V to put a Dream Chaser into orbit last time I looked, where as the Dragon only needs a 60 million dollar Falcon 9. Although Dream Chaser *could* probably fit on a Falcon 9 and in either case you are looking at additional costs on top of the basic launcher.
Hard to beleive SpaceX would not be one of them at this point. In fact I think it is fair to say that Musk would drive the man rating of Dragon forward regardless of whether or not they get it, and that could potentially make the CCP program completely idiotic - i.e. if they went for something else and it cratered budget-wise, as space programs traditionally do. Still, I am not convinced that a good deal of SpaceX's success is somehow begininers luck that could fade as the org grows and they take on too many goals (Man-rating Dragon, Falcon Heavy, Grasshopper, Bigelow, 10 Falcon launches a year, etc). Can they possibly do *all* of that?
Really? What about the center core propellent cross-feed? That sounds like a major piece that cannot have been launch tested yet. AFAIK there is no other rocket that has ever had it either so there must be some element of risk. All that mass transfer could go wrong in any number of ways I suppose.
Solar is getting cheaper by about 10 percent a year, and has been for decades. And there is no reason to think it will be any different in the future. This cannot be said of any other form of energy. And it has reached grid parity already in many places where incremental costs of additional capacity are high (like India). Btw, I find your ignorance AND your rudeness appalling.
Kenya should probably go solar since it scales better at the small end, requires less transmission infrastructure. It is interesting that it doesn't seem to have much more sunlight than many American cities, at least according to casual web search:
Agree completely. I think Assange is at the very least guilty of gross breach of many people's privacy. I hope everyone who had documents exposted to the world that they considered private communications between them and the parties that they communicate them too sue the guy. I would be so pissed if he had done this to me personally. And I imagine practically everone on slashdot would think the same if it happened to them. It is just that most people forget that governments have actual people working in them.
Wierd reply. Its like you didn't read the e-mails, especially your own. There are several main things you write that don't fit.
I didn't complain about not having fun - he did. I happen to enjoy my life immensely, both the parts that involve my kids, and the rest of it, but I think that is somewhat off topic.
Raising kids is actually lots of fun, and mine are rewarding and not very annoying (although admittedly many are). I guess we rasied them right (although genes obviously play a large role too).
You write about personal responsibiliy and sound economic policy, I think that sound demographics is an essential part of that. Seems like a no-brainer really.
And sound economic policy and personal responibility is being seriously undermined by people persuing their "different desires" without investment in the human capital that created them in the first place.
That we need more kids is not a popular opinion these days, but I think it stands to scrutiny. The world we live in is unbounded.
And by the way I am not the least bit religious. Even athiests can be interested in humanities continued well-being.
Slashdot Mirror
An ion thruster I suppose would do the trick. Of course it would run out of Xenon after awhile, but ion engines have the highest fuel to force ratios short of a solar sail.
Actually come to think of it I am not sure it is much of a problem. If you were in a geosynchronous orbit, surely the solar pressure would push you away half the time, but push you back the other half, right?
Agree with the poster. I figure solar cells in space will not trump solar cells on the ground until we dramatically lower the cost of delivery to orbit. At the moment we SpaceX is quoting 4300 USD/Kg to orbit on a Falcon 9 (1.1 - still waiting on maiden flight Sept5), and maybe down to 1200 UDS/Kg for the not yet built or demonstrated Falcon Heavy. And that is to LEO, Solar Cells probably need GTO which is about twice as expensive. I can't imagine a space based array can be competitive at those prices.
Now if someone built a rail-gun based launcher, then maybe it could make sense.
And as AC mentioned, we are in the midst of a ground based solar cell revolution right now. Very cool...
He does know how to swear like Gates (at least like he used to). And he does have a newish vision.
Kind of light on Enterprise though. MSFT needs someone who can do both. It is a tall order.
Its being done at a lot of places including here:
http://www.opb.org/news/article/osu-researchers-make-electricity-sewage/
Will probably take decades to make it to common usage though. How often do they rebuild Sewage Treatment Plants?
I don't care how they dress. I thought the "Mohawk guy" on the Curiosity landing was pretty cool. So do most others I believe.
They should defund the Senate Launch System instead and fund more of these science programs. (Like a few more Mars Rovers).
because I am an idiot and a slow learner.
Nice. Seems a bit like rationalzation, yet the logic is undisputably there. Glad you had a good ride.
Hope you don't want to have kids.
Actually that last sentence doesn't parse. Are you saying that if ATK gets cut they wil somehow cause the selection process to be jettisoned? That sounds wrong...
It sounds like you know what you are talking about, ... so you are depressing me.
Although I am pretty sure SpaceX will build a human rated Dragon regardless of what the CCD program decides.
I think the Space Shuttle was just a big flop that only escaped being cancelled because the US Government has such deep pockets. In the end, in fact way before the end, it was a jobs program more than anything else. It set the space program back something like 20-30 years.
I don't understand why people can't just admit it was a horrible mistake. Actually, of course I do understand, so many valuable lifetimes of work were sunk into it.We have to pretend.... But we should have just been building cheaper rockets (which the two other programs on the table proposed) - or funding a Ramjet, or Roton, or almost anything else. The only really useful thing the Shuttle did was repair Hubble.
Imagine where we would be now if NASA had done something like COTS 20 years ago after Challenger blew up instead of building another Shuttle.
I think NASA showed that they hadn't a clue what they should do with their terribly expensively developed "National Assets". They are all now rusting hulks. And they are developing another one with no clue as to what it is for (jobs for retiring engineers maybe).
At least the commercial guys are likely to rack their brains out as to how they can get more money out of "their" assets.
And face it - if a war broke out and SpaceX had useful assets, who do you think would control them overnight?
Are you sure they have a chance? The article clearly states that they are to be selected form the *current 4*...
What is your logic here? You think it costs signifcantly less to turn Dream Chaser around than a Dragon Capsule? It looks an awful lot like a Space Shuttle to me for that.
The two who seem to be doing a lot for bringing the price down would be Blue Origin (who are banking on a seemingly unlikely SSTO), and SpaceX with their Resuable Powered Decent stages (which also seem pretty far away at this point). It takes a 130 million Atlas V to put a Dream Chaser into orbit last time I looked, where as the Dragon only needs a 60 million dollar Falcon 9. Although Dream Chaser *could* probably fit on a Falcon 9 and in either case you are looking at additional costs on top of the basic launcher.
Hard to beleive SpaceX would not be one of them at this point. In fact I think it is fair to say that Musk would drive the man rating of Dragon forward regardless of whether or not they get it, and that could potentially make the CCP program completely idiotic - i.e. if they went for something else and it cratered budget-wise, as space programs traditionally do.
Still, I am not convinced that a good deal of SpaceX's success is somehow begininers luck that could fade as the org grows and they take on too many goals (Man-rating Dragon, Falcon Heavy, Grasshopper, Bigelow, 10 Falcon launches a year, etc). Can they possibly do *all* of that?
You think ATK can out manuver Boeing? Boeing is 10 times bigger.
Really? What about the center core propellent cross-feed? That sounds like a major piece that cannot have been launch tested yet. AFAIK there is no other rocket that has ever had it either so there must be some element of risk. All that mass transfer could go wrong in any number of ways I suppose.
Thanks. I almost puked when I read the word "orbit".
Solar is getting cheaper by about 10 percent a year, and has been for decades. And there is no reason to think it will be any different in the future. This cannot be said of any other form of energy.
And it has reached grid parity already in many places where incremental costs of additional capacity are high (like India).
Btw, I find your ignorance AND your rudeness appalling.
Kenya should probably go solar since it scales better at the small end, requires less transmission infrastructure. It is interesting that it doesn't seem to have much more sunlight than many American cities, at least according to casual web search:
http://www.climatetemp.info/kenya/
http://www.currentresults.com/Weather/US/average-annual-sunshine-by-city.php
The true reward of writing code is seeing it executed. Just hand it over. If you want more money get another job. Dice is full of them.
That sound ruder than I meant it. Basically you are just overthinking it.
Agree completely. I think Assange is at the very least guilty of gross breach of many people's privacy.
I hope everyone who had documents exposted to the world that they considered private communications between them and the parties that they communicate them too sue the guy.
I would be so pissed if he had done this to me personally. And I imagine practically everone on slashdot would think the same if it happened to them. It is just that most people forget that governments have actual people working in them.
Wierd reply. Its like you didn't read the e-mails, especially your own. There are several main things you write that don't fit.
I didn't complain about not having fun - he did. I happen to enjoy my life immensely, both the parts that involve my kids, and the rest of it, but I think that is somewhat off topic.
Raising kids is actually lots of fun, and mine are rewarding and not very annoying (although admittedly many are). I guess we rasied them right (although genes obviously play a large role too).
You write about personal responsibiliy and sound economic policy, I think that sound demographics is an essential part of that. Seems like a no-brainer really.
And sound economic policy and personal responibility is being seriously undermined by people persuing their "different desires" without investment in the human capital that created them in the first place.
That we need more kids is not a popular opinion these days, but I think it stands to scrutiny. The world we live in is unbounded.
And by the way I am not the least bit religious. Even athiests can be interested in humanities continued well-being.
Or a social contract.