Scientists Researching 32 Million Story Space Elevator

[matcom]

*singing* Love in an elevator.....

<snip>

LOS ALAMOS, N.M. (AP) -- Some scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory want to build an elevator reaching 62,000 miles into the sky to launch payloads into space more cheaply than the shuttle can.

"The first country that owns the space elevator will own space," said lab scientist Bryan Laubscher. "I believe that, and I think Los Alamos should be involved in making that happen."

Some researchers are working on their own time on technical details.

Five to 10 scientists at any given time are analyzing the economics, technical specifications of how the elevator would work and possible health risks to those using it. Laubscher says they hope the U.S. Department of Energy could someday use the information as a start for investing in a space elevator.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2003/10/14/scientists_researching_32_million_story_space_elevator/

[Braden]

1. muzak stairway to heaven plays softly

[Ratty]

2. These kinds of stories crack me up

It brings back memories of reading Popluar Mechanics as a kid. They always make it sound like these kinds of things are "just around the corner."

"We can build the elevator TODAY. All we need is that super strong carbon nanofilament, a thousand times stronger than any known substance. But that's it. Except for that we're ready to start building!"

"We can build an L5 colony today! Simply tow an asteroid into low earth orbit, dig a hole through its center, heat the thing with mirrors to melt the inside, then puff it up like a big balloon! It's just so easy! We could start building one today if only the bureaucrats had more vision!"

"Nanomachines that can enter your bloodstream and fix diseases and reverse againg! Just around the corner. Next week at the latest!"

Space Elevators? Not in this century.

[Maple]

4. We could do it

but it takes political will.

And having not returned to the moon in 30 plus years......

[Ratty]

10. Ha ha. There's another one

I can't help but crack a smile when I hear people talk about not returning to the moon in 30 years, like it's a bad thing. As if we should be ashamed.

I'm probably the biggest science fiction fan around here, but even I have to ask myself why in the world we need to be in space in the first place. And why exactly should we be on the moon? What should we be doing in space that would justify the unimaginable expense of a space elevator?

[underpants]

12. Observation point for when the machines attack

Duh!

And they will attack, toasters too.

[Maple]

15. You SHOULD be ashamed

It would solve the oil problem causing so much war in the world right now. One shuttle full of helium 3 would keep the US alone going for the next thousand years.

And many of the new advances in medicine, pollution monitoring and control, and communications come directly from space exploration.

Not to mention that any people that don't seek new knowledge, stagnate and die.

[Ratty]

17. I didn't know that!

There's helium 3 on the moon? That's news to me. Boy, that would make going back to the moon worthwhile.

[Maple]

19. Space news

apparently doesn't get much of an airing.

[underpants]

20. How will that affect the moon and tides?

:shrug:

[Maple]

21. It won't

.

[Ratty]

30. I was being sarcastic

If there's significant amount of He3 there (and so far there's only speculation), it would cost WAY WAY more to find and process it, and ship it to Earth, than any other alternatives we already have available. Even with a magical space elevator. Why not just concentrate on getting plain old hydrogen fusion working?

[Maple]

31. I know

since we've already been there.

You never put all your eggs in one basket...hydrogen fusion is one option out of many as is He3....but there are lots of other reasons to go beyond fuel.

[CBDunkerson]

23. Expense?

The whole reason the space elevator is starting to get a serious look is that it would cost alot LESS to 'be doing things in space' if we had it.

As to what we could possibly be doing in space that is worthwhile... uh... have you heard of 'television'? The 'telephone'? GPS? Ozone depletion tracking? The International Space Station? That 'internet' thing?


At present ridiculous amounts of money are required to get tiny packages into space and bringing things BACK is even more impossible. With a space elevator you could move TONS of materials up and down for much lower cost.

Not to mention the tourism aspect. Put some rooms up there and I guarantee it would immediately become THE place to honeymoon. :]

[underpants]

26. FLy me to the moon, let me swing amongst the stars

Let me see what spring is like on Jupiter and Mars

In other words darling kiss me
In other words I love you

BRING IT HOME FRANK!

[tridim]

32. Now I'm jonezin' for Cowboy Bebop

Thanks underpants!

[underpants]

5. Except for that.............

Very funny.

So apparently we are in a space elevator race now? I can see the Russians go yeah sure I'll race you to the 20,000,000th floor and then back. American elevatornauts are all gugn-ho and accept. The Russians let they go and stay where they are, horrific screams of pain are heard from the American tube.........

[Maple]

9. Apparently you're unaware

of all the launching other countries are doing, and that you are...ahem....losing the race.

[underpants]

11. While thye are up there can they take an RPG and spare us Star Wars

Just a thought.

[sexybomber]

13. Yeah, like China.

Apparently they're going to do a space shot this week, maybe this afternoon (NY local time), if the New York Times is right...

They say they want to put a man on the Moon and a colony on Mars. Hmmm.

[On the Road]

14. Arthur C Clarke, from his Hideout in Sri Lanka, Said:

"The space elevator will be built ten years after everyone stops laughing."

A lot of scientists have stopped laughing recently. There was a big conference in New Mexico, I believe, a couple of months ago. The carbon nanotube technology exists, and is strong enough, but the designs don't have a sufficient margin of error.

Strangely enough, they're thinking of docking it at sea rather than on land.

[Ratty]

25. Aye, but there's the rub

That's like saying since we can manufacture diamonds by the ton why don't we just make all the glass on our deep sea submersibles out of diamond? Why can't we make bulletproof glass out of diamond. There's a HUGE difference between a few microscopic whiskers of carbon filament and anything even resembling a wire of cable. When they can make one as long as a human hair I'll be impressed.

I'm not antiscience, just practical. And economical. I think we should go to Mars, and soon. But I don't think we should even consider colonization--of anything--until we take care of a few problems here first.

[CBDunkerson]

27. Be impressed.

They have several meters of the stuff.

[Maple]

28. Well we can

make diamonds, and make anything OUT of diamonds actually.

But if you want to wait...be prepared to speak Chinese when you get to the Customs office on Mars.

[tridim]

29. I thought Clarke wanted to use diamond fillament

He talked about in one of his oddessy books, 2061 I believe. It sounded a bit crazy to me at the time, but lately I've been reading alot about perfect diamonds being created in the lab (Take that Pat Robertson!). Diamond fillament might not be that far off.

I wonder how a nanotube or diamond fillament will stand up to a piece of space junk travelling at high speed?

[CBDunkerson]

16. Um.... no.

Actually, we HAVE the 'super strong carbon nanofilament'. We just don't have ENOUGH of it.

Based on everything I've seen the technology for the space elevator is available today. The resources to actually implement it are not. Though that seems to be starting to change as people realize the potential.

The ability to send materials up and down without a rocket and re-entry vehicle would vastly reduce the costs of all current space ventures. Satelites, space stations, research, et cetera. All alot cheaper when done via electricity rather than rocket fuel. Also safer and more flexible.

[underpants]

3. Boy how would you like to be the Otis repairman who gets that call?

Yeha Bob we got a problem

Bob here what is it?
Yeah Bob we got a problem on the SPACE ELEVATOR

What floor?

26,584,186

Okay let me get my thermos

[denverbill]

6. And some lazy fucker will use it to go up one floor.

Jebus people, use the goddamned stairs!

[underpants]

8. AT 5 o'clock too

:grr:

[THUNDER HANDS]

7. not for me

I'll take the stairs, thank you very much.

:)

[Bossy Monkey]

18. Jehovah is going to be SO pissed! n/t

[Bozola]

22. For the cost of the money wasted in Afghanistan and Iraq to date

This is the best possible way to get to orbit guys, and it's in our reach.

http://www.isr.us/SEHome.asp


We could have been well on the way to building one of these.

GOD DAMN BUSH and his F*CKING CRONIES!

We desperately need to get mining and heavy industry off the fucking earth. At the rate BushieBoy is stealing our treasury, we'll never be able to afford to get back into space.

GOD DAMN BUSH and his F*CKING CRONIES!

[Maple]

24. Thanx for

the url!

[Zero Gravitas]

33. I't ll never work

People forget that a space elevator is not a very tall tower nor it is like a rock tied to piece of string and whirled around in the air (i.e its not under tension). The elevator would be essentialy and orbiting satellite.

IF you tried to climb it you would be part of that orbiting system, and once you are part of it, the center of gravity has changed and all of a sudden it is in the wrong orbit, ie the new center of mass of the system (the elevator plus you hanging on at the bottom) has now moved down a bit and is moving too slowly to stay in that new orbit, so any attempt to move mass up the elevator would cause the elevator to fall out of its orbit. So to counteract this effect the elevator would have to reboost the center of mass while a payload is being sent up, using basically the same amount of fuel that would be need to boost that same payload to geo-stationary orbit on a conventional rocket.

Another way to look at the problem is to consider the problem of conservation of angular momentum. At the Earth's equator (where a space elevator would have to be anchored) an object completes a circle of roughly 40,000 km every day (1667 km/h) at geostationary orbit it completes a circle of 265056 km/h in a day (11,044km/h). The energy for this angular acceleration has to come from somewhere, merely climbing the elevator won't do it, and it is this missing energy that would cause an elevator to de-orbit as soon as anything tried to climb it.