The October 29th issue of the most-excellent SpaceRef newsletter contains a link to a new video that NASA has posted showing the space debris field orbiting our planet.  It’s the most complete such video I’ve seen, zooming through various orbit levels and showing different viewpoints and perspectives of the debris.

Of course this video only shows the space debris that is known & tracked.  The amount of items too small to be tracked greatly exceed what you see in the video.  It’s important to keep in mind, however, that videos such as this cannot show the vast distances that actually exist between pieces of space debris.  It’s kind of like the pictures you see of the asteroid belt showing asteroids constantly bumping into each other, that’s just not realistic.  Incidentally, on the topic of the distance between asteroids, here is a paper put out by NASA on the probabilities of a collision between asteroids 100 meters or larger in diameter (estimated to be at 30 billion) – they calculate that such occurrences will only happen once every 1.2 million years!  They also give the formulas and assumptions they use so you can have fun figuring out your own asteroid collision scenarios 🙂  And, as a bonus, the paper shows a picture of two asteroids after a collision.

Anyway, back to earth’s space debris field.  According to the ISEC Report on Space Debris Mitigation (available at the ISEC Store), in Low-Earth-Orbit (LEO), the area with the highest concentration of space debris, there is only piece of space debris (10 cm or larger) ON AVERAGE per 730,000 cubic kilometers.  To put that into perspective, imagine an enclosed corridor, 4.25 km wide and 4.25 km tall, that circles the earth at the equator, a distance of about about 40,000 km.  In that entire area, you would find ONE PIECE of space debris 10cm or larger.  Of course that is an average as there are, alternatively, clouds and voids of space debris.  And the quantity of smaller space debris is, of course, larger.

What does this mean for a Space Elevator?  Well, unlike pieces of space debris that may collide with each other or with a satellite, the Space Elevator is much more vulnerable.  Given enough time, a very long time, EVERY piece of space debris will, sooner or later, impact a space elevator.  Referring again to the ISEC report on Space Debris Mitigation, calculations show that the most vulnerable part of the space elevator to space debris is that portion equivalent to LEO, approximately 200 to 2000 km above the earth.  In that zone, the ISEC report shows that satellites would impact the elevator once every five years, space debris 10 cm or larger would impact the space elevator once per 100 days and space debris smaller than 10 cm would impact the space elevator once every 10 days.  All of these are, again, average numbers.

Does that sound the death knell for the idea of a space elevator?  No, not at all.  What it does mean is that the elevator tether must be designed to cope with this hazard and that CAN be done.  The tether must be robust, able to cope with multiple small impacts and the occasional large one and it must be rigorously monitored and maintained.  I can imagine a scenario where every meter of the tether has multiple monitors viewing it, with Climbers that also examine the tether as it ascends and descends.  As the conclusion of the ISEC Space Debris Mitigation report states;

Space debris mitigation is an engineering problem with definable quantities such as density of debris and lengths/widths of targets.  With proper knowledge and good operational procedures, the threat of space debris is not a show stopper by any means.  However, mitigation approaches must be accepted and implemented robustly to ensure that engineering problems do not become a catastrophic failure event.

If you want to learn more about this, visit the ISEC Store to purchase the entire report.  You can use information from it the next time one of your friends tells you that a space elevator is not feasible because “space debris“…

In yesterday’s post, I talked about the new crowd-funding campaign to create Space Elevator – 20XX, a “dialogue driven web game“.  Reading about this new project and then writing the blog post caused me to think about life on a space elevator and the books I had read which had this as theme.  The ones I can recall are:

Horizons by Mary Rosenblum.  I blogged about this back in March of 2007 (Has it really been 7&1/2 years since then?  Geez…).  Check out my blog post for a brief review of the book, but suffice it say that I remember really enjoying it.  The concluding line in my review was “Overall, however, I quite enjoyed the book and would recommend it to anyone who wants to see how a future, Space-Elevator based civilization might develop.”

Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson.  It’s been a long time since I’ve read this – too long in fact, but as I recall, there was some description of life aboard the Mars Space Elevator, that is until it was sabotaged and the space station (Apex Anchor) went flying off into space.  I’ve never posted a book review but have made my feelings known in this blog post, detailing a new TV series which is supposed to be based on this book.

Running The Line, a collection of ‘Selected stories and images from the 2005 Clarke-Bradbury International Science Fiction Competition‘ edited by Dr. Brad Edwards and David Raitt.  I had blogged about this book in a very brief post in April of 2007 and, in that post, had leaned on a more detailed review of this book by “Dr. Coburn”.  Sadly, the link to that review no longer works.  It’s been many years since I’ve read this collection, but as I recall, many/most of the shorts dealt with a specific aspect of living on a space elevator.

There might be other books with these theme, but I can’t think of them at the moment.  So, if you want a primer on how you might want to navigate through this ‘dialogue driven web game’, these books might provide you with some clues.

The last several weeks have seen three crowd-funding campaigns for projects related to the space-elevator.  The two Kickstarter projects for creating Documentaries relating to the space elevator, Sky Line and Shoot The Moon, have been successfully funded and we should be seeing the fruits of the donations in the coming year.  In addition, we have the ongoing Indiegogo funding campaign for Open Source The Way Up which I blogged about several days ago.

And now we have a FOURTH space elevator-related crowd-funding project, this one much different than the other ones.  Space Elevator – 20XX is, in the words of the creator, David Ly;

“Stories about space elevators! A dialogue focused web game: make permanent choices and create parallel universes!

Mankind has completed their greatest monument, a 62,000 mile (100,000 km) long space elevator. How would everyday people react? Find out in this first episode.

What’s a dialogue driven web game? Imagine taking all the dialogue options from Bioware’s Mass Effect or Telltale’s The Wolf Among Us, and and adding branching story line/ parallel universes on top of that.”

I’ve never played (or even heard of) a “dialogue driven web game” before now.  It doesn’t sound like my ‘cup of tea’, but I guess I won’t really know until I try one, and hey, why not try one related to the space elevator?

So, if you’re at all interested, head on over to the Space Elevator – 20XX Kickstarter website and check it out.  There are the usual rewards for donations at various levels, and also a very detailed Accountability section which I would advise you read so you know what your donations are going to be spent on.

Four crowd-funding projects related to the space-elevator in the past several weeks – I like it…

Something else to put on my reading list…

American Author Jason Hough has penned a trilogy which seems to have not one, but two space elevators as central objects in the plot.  The Dire Earth Cycle, released in three parts in July, August & September of 2013 (yes, I know, I’m late to this, but hey, the Prequel won’t be released until November of this year!), tells us the story of:

Part 1 – The Darwin Elevator: In the mid-23rd century, Darwin, Australia, stands as the last human city on Earth. The world has succumbed to an alien plague, with most of the population transformed into mindless, savage creatures. The planet’s refugees flock to Darwin, where a space elevator—created by the architects of this apocalypse, the Builders—emits a plague-suppressing aura.
 
Skyler Luiken has a rare immunity to the plague. Backed by an international crew of fellow “immunes,” he leads missions into the dangerous wasteland beyond the aura’s edge to find the resources Darwin needs to stave off collapse. But when the Elevator starts to malfunction, Skyler is tapped—along with the brilliant scientist, Dr. Tania Sharma—to solve the mystery of the failing alien technology and save the ragged remnants of humanity.

Part 2 – The Exodus Towers: The sudden appearance of a second space elevator in Brazil only deepens the mystery about the aliens who provided it: the Builders. Scavenger crew captain Skyler Luiken and brilliant scientist Dr. Tania Sharma have formed a colony around the new Elevator’s base, utilizing mobile towers to protect humans from the Builders’ plague. But they are soon under attack from a roving band of plague-immune soldiers. Cut off from the colony, Skyler must wage a one-man war against the new threat as well as murderous subhumans and thugs from Darwin—all while trying to solve the puzzle of the Builders’ master plan . . . before it’s too late for the last vestiges of humanity.

Part 3 – The Plague Forge: The hunt is on for the mysterious keys left by the alien Builders. While Skyler’s team of immune scavengers scatters around the disease-ravaged globe in search of the artifacts, Skyler himself finds much more than he expected in the African desert, where he stumbles upon surprising Builder relics—and thousands of bloodthirsty subhumans. From the slums and fortresses of Darwin to the jungles of Brazil and beyond, Skyler and company are in for a wild ride, jam-packed with daunting challenges, run-and-gun adventure, and unexpected betrayals—all in a race against time to finally answer the great questions that have plagued humanity for decades: Who are the Builders, and what do they want with Earth?

So, an Australian AND a Brazilian Space Elevator, what’s not to like? 🙂

And, as noted above, there is a Prequel coming out in November.  The Trilogy has received many favorable reviews on Amazon and I’m looking forward to reading it.  As it is set in the twenty-third century, I don’t know how much the story will match up with what is currently considered the most feasible way to build a space elevator, but the author did state in an interview, “I needed somewhere reasonably close to the equator for the physics of a space elevator to work” so he has been paying attention.

I’ll be buying the books on Amazon, that’s my favorite shopping place.  However, they are offered for sale in many locations, detailed on the author’s website, so you have options.  And, when I do read them, I’ll post my thoughts about them here…

(Click on the Cover thumbnails to see a larger version)

A few days ago, I was able to share the happy news that the Space Elevator Documentary Sky Line had been successfully funded via Kickstarter.

Regular readers also know that there is another Space Elevator Documentary, Shoot The Moon, which is also trying to get funded via Kickstarter.

As of posting this, there are only 31 hours to go in this campaign and it is closing in on it’s funding goal of $37K.

If you’re interested in helping a Documentary targeting the Michael Laine / LiftPort effort to build a lunar space elevator, please consider donating to the effort, as I have.

Thank you!

Details are very sketchy, but the good folks who ran the previous EUSPEC (European Space Elevator Challenge) have announced a new competition for 2015.  From their webpage:

“The next European Space Elevator Challenge will take place in 2015!

We are currently in the planning phase of EUSPEC 2015. Details regarding competition dates, rule book and team registration will be announced shortly on this website and on our Facebook page. Stay tuned!”

Of course this blog will be covering any and all developments with this event.  I would end this post with my tagline “Stay tuned!”, but EUSPEC used it already 🙂

Yet another space-elevator-related crowd funding effort has gotten underway, this time on Indiegogo.  Whereas the three previous space-elevator-related crowd funding efforts have been fairly modest in their goals ($8K for the initial LiftPort effort, $20K for the Sky Line Documentary and $37K for the Shoot The Moon Documentary), this new effort is trying to raise $1,000,000 – yes, a million dollars!

It is called “The Space Elevator: Open Source The Way Up” and, beneath the airy hyperbole, the ‘space elevator tower’ it’s proposing seems to be a variant of Nelson Semino’s concept known as “The SpaceShaft”.  The idea behind it is this: when Konstantin Tsiolkovsky originally proposed his tower that reached from the earth to Geostationary orbit (GEO), he was using the Eiffel Tower as a model, an actual building.  An earth-to-GEO tower is not possible as there is no material known (or theorized) that is strong enough to handle the weight of such a structure.  Of course, this hasn’t stopped some physics-challenged people from proposing one anyway – here is an article describing the recent idea of a “…Bollywood singer and part-time inventor…” for a 160km tall elevator called the ‘Telescopic Exo Shell’.  I do plan on putting up a separate blog post showing why this is just not possible.

The SpaceShaft attempts to get around this problem by building the tower out of lighter-than-air blocks filled with (in Semino’s case) Helium or (in this Open Source project) Hydrogen.  It sounds plausible at first rub, but even a cursory look at the idea starts to reveal problem after problem.  For example, system stability.  Wind is an issue, a real one.  The Space Shaft tries to solve it with a multitude of guy wires, Open Source by “Using sensors around the tower we can detect incoming winds and power the vertical blades to cancel any force that would bend the tower. If the capability of the wind blades is overwhelmed by the wind then magnetic flux interactions at each module connection will further counter act the bending.”  The proposal goes on to say that if this is not enough, the units will separate by repelling themselves magnetically and floating away, to be reconnected when things calmed down (presumably with quad-copters as stated in the video).  Professor Emmett Brown would be proud…

Another thing Open Source doesn’t address is the lifting capacity of the hydrogen modules.    Open Source wants to power the climbers electromagnetically.  If you’re talking about any reasonable sized payload (metric tons, at least), you’re going to need enormous magnets and then some way to power them.  According to the Video, the lower quarter of the tower will be wind turbines – will that generate enough power?  And they have weight too.  All of that has to be supported, plus the Climber & Payload of course.  Lots and lots and lots of weight.  And, at essentially 1G all the way up (gravity at 50km is 98% of earth-normal).  Open Source also says that the tower/tube is ‘evacuated’  That means that there has to be some sort of door and opening/closing mechanism at the top and also means the modules themselves must be reinforced as external air pressure will try to compress them inwards.  More weight.

And then, of course, Open Source is proposing a 50km tall tower, filled with hydrogen, subject to lightning strikes and using electricity to power the magnets.  What could possibly go wrong?

I love some of the rewards specified:  If you contribute ‘just’ $500, you get ‘2 days above the atmosphere in high quality hotel comfort and restaurant all inclusive‘ – and your safety is guaranteed!  And if you contribute $100,000, you get a ‘Carbon Fiber Floating House‘ with ‘free satellite internet for life‘ – such a deal!  And you won’t have long to wait.  The Hotel is supposed to be ready in December, 2018 and the Floating House in January, 2019.  And hey, they accept BitCoin!

I could go on, but I think I’ve made my point and am being generous in saying that this is just a crazy proposal.

To be clear, I’m not knocking Nelson Semino’s SpaceShaft.  He’s done a lot of work with this and people I respect think there is some merit to his idea.  But this Open Source project is a different animal altogether; trying to raise $1,000,000 based on nothing more than a video and some kumbaya verbiage.

One last problem; the crowd-funding campaigns I’ve participated in are structured so that if the total amount of money pledged by the campaign deadline does not reach the funding goal, pledged funds are returned to the donor.  But Open Source is an Indiegogo Flexible Funding campaign – that means that the project will keep all money donated (minus Indiegogo’s 9% cut), regardless of how much is donated.  I think I’m very safe in saying that anyone foolish enough to donate to this project is going to be very disappointed…

This popped up in my Google Alerts today…

There is a gaming website called Ludum Dare.  It is:

“…a community of game developers best known for the accelerated game development event (Game Jam) of the same name. During a “Ludum Dare”, participants create games from scratch in a weekend, based on a theme suggested by the community. Ludum Dare events take place regularly, every April, August and December.

Founded in April 2002 by Geoff Howland, the Ludum Dare community has been running its brand of Game Jam for more than 12 years now (before the term Game Jam had even caught on). The website is run and maintained by Mike Kasprzak, an original participant and part of the team that has been bringing you the event since the beginning.”

Their latest offering is called “Space Elevators – An LD30 Jam Game“.  Aliens are coming to invade earth and you have to build a giant spaceship to evacuate humanity.  And, of course, you need a space elevator in order to get some of the required resources from another planet.

The game is pretty rough (for example, there doesn’t seem to be a way to play it in Easy mode – you have to click on Normal mode – otherwise you get only instructions, there are some spelling errors, etc.), but given their modus operandi, that’s perfectly understandable.  If I have time this weekend, I will play this and see what kind of success I can have.

The graphics really remind me of the old Space Invaders game; low-resolution, jerky movements, gaudy colors, etc. – it was one of my favorite games and I was sorry when the controller bit the dust.

Anyway, enjoy!

On today’s edition of Marc Boucher’s most excellent SpaceRef eNewsletter, there was a video of the International Space Station being ‘painted’ by a green laser.

This gets a 9+ on my cool-o-meter…

One of the ongoing debates about an earth-based space elevator is how will the tether climbers be powered.  Lasers were the possibility originally suggested by Dr. Brad Edwards in his and Eric Westling’s reference work and they still may be the way to go, at least for part of the journey.  But alternatives now, especially the solar power solution originally suggested (I think) by Ben Shelef may replace or augment laser power.

And, a related ‘oldie but goodie’.  This is from the 2009 Space Elevator games and shows airborne targets being laser painted by the LaserMotive and Kansas City Space Pirates teams.

Pun intended.   We’re in the last few days of the Kickstarter campaigns for two space elevator documentaries.  Status updates from the producers:

First from Sky Line:

SPACE ELEVATOR by Richard Bizley

 

 

Greetings Backers!

We want to take a moment to thank all 139 of you for helping to get us so close to the 75% mark!  As we close in on 15k raised, we’re left with LESS THAN THREE DAYS to reach our funding goal — the campaign ends Wednesday night.  So as always, PLEASE SHARE our project link and together we can finish this movie! (LINK FOR SHARING: http://kck.st/1BXblCZ)

We are still getting some great press, including this excellent article on SKY LINE by noted festival programmer and film consultant Basil Tsiokos… “In the Works: SKY LINE” –

Please note that there are just two pieces of art left for contributors to the campaign at the $500 level: SPACE HOTEL by David A. Hardy and SPACE ELEVATOR by Richard Bizley.  These gorgeous prints, which also appear in our film, were generously donated by the artists and signed especially for this effort.

LET THE COUNTDOWN BEGIN!

… and a big THANK YOU from The Sky Line Family.

And from Shoot The Moon!

The campaign is going so well! We’re over 50%, with hundreds of backers. If everyone convinced one person to back at $15, we’d be made in the shade!

Here’s some big news:

1) Benjamin and Idil are headed to Seattle this week to film some more scenes for the documentary. We wouldn’t be planning this trip if we hadn’t been filled with confidence by the outpouring of support we’ve gotten in this campaign!

2) Reddit AMA! Tomorrow, Wednesday, at 10:00 EST, 7:00 PST, we’re doing an AMA on Reddit. We’ll post the link here, but you can also follow @ShootTheMoonDoc on twitter to get updates.

3) Google Hangout 2! On Thursday at 12:00 EST, 9:00 PST, we’re doing our second on-camera hangout where you can meet us and learn more about our project. Missed the first? It’s right here!

Thanks again, and keep spreading the word. We’re doing so well, now let’s make a strong push to the finish line!

-Benjamin and the Shoot The Moon Team (Kickstarter campaign here)

Just a few days left.  Please donate to one or both of these efforts and share this with your family and friends – thank you!

Now posted on the ISEC website is ISEC’s Strategic Plan for 2014/15.  The “ISEC Year” starts and ends at the yearly space elevator conference it sponsors, the most recent being at the end of last August and held at Seattle’s Museum of Flight.

As part of the Strategic Plan, ISEC decides on a “theme” for the upcoming year, a topic of interest that ISEC will focus on for the next 12 months and also the subject of the ISEC report for this year.

For this coming year, ISEC has decided upon two themes; “Marine Node Design Considerations” and “Tether Material Status Update“.  I don’t expect an ISEC report to be produced about the Tether Material, but it’s good to periodically revisit this subject as it continues to be (pun intended), the “long pole” in the tent…

Dr. Peter Swan, the President of ISEC, has recruited Vernon Hall to head up the Marine Node Design Considerations effort (I blogged about this earlier) while ISEC Director Dr. Bryan Laubscher will be heading up the Tether Material Status Update project.

So, go take a look at the current ISEC Strategic Plan, and if you see something that interests you and you want to get involved, send an email to pete.swan@isec.org.

As many of you know, there are currently two Space Elevator documentaries in the works and both of them are hoping to raise enough funds via Kickstarter to help them finalize their project.

A brief update on both:

Sky Line is a documentary about the people trying to build an earth-based space elevator.  According to their most recent update, this project has 124 backers, has raised a little over $12K (out of the $20K they need) and has 7 days to go to get fully funded.  In addition, they just sent out this status report:

As you may have heard, SKY LINE won indieWIRE’s Project of the Week on Monday, and it’s all thanks to YOU.  It was certainly a photo finish, as we pulled ahead by 17 votes by the time the poll closed.  We’re heartened by this growing community we’re building together, and look forward to continued success as we race toward the home stretch…

Speaking of finish lines, ours is only a week away!  We’re so pleased to have broken the 12k funding barrier (again thanks to all 122 of you) but that also means we have another 8k to go if we want to collect the funds — which is crucial for us to complete this movie and enter it into festivals. So as always, PLEASE SHARE this project with friends and colleagues, and together we will get there.  Here’s a handy link for sharing:  http://kck.st/1BXblCZ

Shoot the Moon is a documentary about the people trying to build a lunar-based space elevator.  According to their most recent update, this project has 294 backers, has raised a little over $18K (out of $37K) and has 13 days to go to get fully funded.

Please consider supporting one or both of these worthwhile projects – I have!

In February of 2012, the Japanese construction company Obayashi announced plans to build a space elevator by the year 2050 (I had previously blogged about this announcement here, here and here).  Recently however, there have been a flurry of stories about the Obayashi project and several readers pinged me about them, wondering “what’s new”.

As it turns out, nothing is new.  The story that started the press avalanche was this one, released on September 22nd by ABC-Australia North Asia correspondent Matthew Carney.  All of the other Obayashi-Space Elevator stories we’ve seen recently were spin-offs, pick-ups from this one.  I contacted Mr. Carney and asked him what prompted him to write the story; was there anything new to report?  He replied:

There was no specific development about the Obayashi space elevator project that prompted the story that was first made known in 2012.   I ran the story because the ABC has never reported on it and simply because it [is] an amazing story that I assumed an audience would appreciate.  In fact the story has been the third most popular story over the entire network in last month.  Pretty amazing so looking at doing a follow up.

So, that’s the scoop, no “new news”.  It’s still very encouraging of course, if this is a real project and not a publicity stunt.  It’s all going to come down to the materials – if the Japanese engineers (or anybody) can solve this problem, then it all becomes possible…

Incidentally, the Obayashi plan is one of the architectures being compared and contrasted in the current ISEC study, “Architectures and Roadmaps“.  It is being primarily coordinated by Michael “Fitzer” Fitzgerald.  At the recent Space Elevator Conference, Fitzer gave a presentation as to the status of the study and held a mini-workshop where conference participants could look at, critique and offer suggestions to the report as it stood at that time.  I believe the goal is to get this report published sometime early next year.  This report will be added to several others produced by ISEC and will be available in both printed and electronic format. (Click on the picture thumbnail of Fitzer giving his presentation to the 2014 ISEC Space Elevator Conference to view a larger version)

ISEC Director and EuroSpaceward liason Dr. Martin Lades sent me this article which he was a technical resource for and which was recently published in the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine.

The title of the article, “Die achtmillionste Etage” (The Eight Millionth Floor) refers to (roughly) the height of Geosynchronous orbit above the earth (assuming a floor height of 4 meters).

Dr. Lades also sent me these ‘fun facts’ about the publication:

“Conservative over-regional newspaper, with a circulation of ~400k, first shipped 1949, old school, second largest in Germany. Much closer to ‘The Financial Times’ if you would compare it and published in Frankfurt, the economic center for Germany.”

Wikipedia states:

• “It is the German newspaper with the widest circulation abroad, with its editors claiming to deliver the newspaper to 148 countries every day.”
• “The F.A.Z. promotes an image of making its readers think. The truth is stated to be sacred to the F.A.Z., so care is taken to clearly label news reports and comments as such.”

Dr. Lades concludes by writing: “…being published in that newspaper certainly counts as a step towards ‘people to stop laughing’ about a space elevator concept according to Clarke’s path for new endeavors.”

So, if you read German (or can run it through one of the automated translators), enjoy.

(Thank you Martin!)

This is interesting…

A Tether project proposed by Shizuoka University in Japan has been chosen by JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) to “…test space elevator technologies.”

From the article:

HAMAMATSU, Japan — Shizuoka University’s idea has been selected by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) for a project aimed at releasing an artificial satellite from the International Space Station, all with the aim of testing space elevator technologies.

A team led by Yoshiki Yamagiwa, a professor at the university’s graduate school of engineering, proposed using for the experiment two, 10cm cube-shaped satellites tied with a synthetic fiber…

There’s not much more to the article and a quick check around the internet shows no other english-language articles about this.  They do write that this experiment will be in fiscal 2016, so that means anytime from April 1st, 2016 on…

Reader Darren Coste sent me this story (in Japanese) a few days ago, but when I ran it through the Google translator, it was difficult to understand.

Of course this is very cool, but I am not 100% sure that this experiment is really to test “space elevator technologies”.  Readers may recall the 5-year Spaceward/NASA partnership, the “Space Elevator Games”.  Even though they were called the space elevator games, NASA was not interested in ‘space elevators’ nor did they create the prize money fund for ‘space elevators’.  Rather they were interested in furthering power-beaming and strong tether technology and Spaceward’s Ben Shelef leveraged that into the Space Elevator Games.  Similarly, this may be “just” a tether test, not a space elevator technology test.

Regardless if it is ‘really’ a space elevator experiment or not, testing tethers in space is absolutely essential to further our understanding of this crucial technology.  The article does not say what type of material  the ‘synthetic fiber’ is – it would be Über-cool if it was carbon nanotubes.

And, there is a decent possibility that the tether WILL be made of carbon nanotubes.  Long-time readers may remember that Shizuoka University brought a carbon nanotube tether to the Strong Tether competition in 2009.  It didn’t perform well, but the fact that it was there was important (the picture thumbnail, left, is the tether that Shizuoka entered in the competition – click on it to see a full-size version).

I will be pinging my friends at the Japan Space Elevator Association to see if they know more about this upcoming experiment – stay tuned!

This past Friday, Kate Knibbs over at Gizmodo posted a story about “The Quest to build an elevator to space”.

Kate covers most of the basics but one thought she posted kind of leaves me scratching my head.  “Wayward flocks of geese…could smash into it“.  I’m not sure why anyone would be concerned about this.  A tether strong enough to support a space elevator would not be concerned with a goose flying into it.  A plane, yes, a goose, no.  Think about a goose flying into a half or three-quarter inch steel cable.  The goose would be killed or severely injured.  A carbon nanotube tether (or whatever is used) will be much, MUCH stronger than a steel cable and won’t be concerned with bird strikes.

Note that this is not the same as bird strikes on commercial or military airplanes.  First of all, the force is much greater when a goose hits a plane in flight – the plane is flying several hundred miles per hour.  And second, the materials used to build a plane are not anywhere near as strong as what a space elevator tether would need to be.

Space debris IS an issue; this stuff is traveling thousands of miles per hour and will thus have a lot of energy, enough to damage or even sever the tether (if it is not designed correctly).  Ensuring that space elevator can survive space debris hits (because it WILL get hit) will be one of the “must” design criteria (the International Space Elevator Consortium did an in-depth study on this topic and published a report on it).

Finally, I have to mention one of the comments on the story – I found it very amusing.  People who regularly read this blog know that I am no fan of space-elevator disaster scenarios, but this is just too good to ignore.

Whoever came up with this, I salute you!

And I’m late on this, but now finally starting to catch up on my postings…

Noted science writer (and Keynote speaker at the 2014 ISEC Space Elevator Conference) Leonard David put up a story at space.com about the space elevator.  He attended all three days of the conference and used what he learned there as a basis for his thoughts about the space elevator.  Money quote from the article:

“The next steps for the development of space-elevator infrastructures are focused around the creation and funding of a Space Elevator Institute,” [Dr. Peter ]Swan said. The institute would fund research projects addressing critical issues.

The development of prototype experiments, including tether material design for tensile strength, would be funded by the Space Elevator Institute, he added.”

It’s a very good article about the conference and space elevator technology.

Another Space Elevator Documentary is being produced and needs support for its Kickstarter campaign.  Producer Alexis Santos of Bad Character productions, supplied me with this information about the effort:

I’m working on a feature-length documentary about a space elevator (yes, the one that was Kickstarted). It’s called Shoot The Moon, and it’ll follow Michael Laine and the LiftPort team as they tackle their biggest experiment yet: sending a robot up 30,000 feet on a tether.

It’s never been done before, and when they do it, it’ll be the tallest free-standing human structure in existence — not to mention the highest a robot has ever gone without the help of rockets or an airplane. The chance of failure is real. The robot could come crashing down 5.68 miles to Earth and crush a 14-year dream, the space elevator idea… and our crew. If it’s a success, we could well be watching a revolution in commercial space.

We’ve just launched a Kickstarter campaign to complete the film, complete with miniature model-based effects.

Funding for this project closes Thursday morning, October 23rd.

I have blogged earlier about Sky Line, the new Space Elevator Documentary being produced by Going Up! Films and have asked all of you to support their Kickstarter campaign (and I do so again – this is a very worthwhile project and something that needs to be done).

Earlier this week, indieWIRE had chosen this project as its “Project of the Day” and now it has a chance to win the “Project of the Week” award.  This would be a very good thing for this Documentary campaign, bringing it increased visibility and assistance in their digital distribution.

But to win, they need you to vote for it.  Please visit the voting site and cast your vote for Sky Line.  Voting ends Monday morning – thank you!

The online Washington Post today posted a piece about the Space Elevator by Dominic Basulto.  It’s a good, generally accurate overview of the Space Elevator and was brought about by Dominic’s learning about the Diamond Nanothreads, the new “wonder material’ being much discussed these days.

Dominic contacted me while writing the story, asking my opinion on whether or not Space Elevator’s were feasible, given today’s technology.  I answered that the materials are just not there yet, though work in the lab shows much promise, and he accurately quoted me in his story.

Nice to see the Space Elevator make the Washington Post.  One item of note; he linked to a story about a Russian Space Elevator (I blogged about this way back when) and in that article, they fail to mention Yuri Artsutanov, the true father of the modern-day concept of the Space Elevator.  The man just gets no respect, even in the Russian press.  When he attended the ISEC Space Elevator Conference in 2010 (and what a treat it was to meet him), he told me (via his translator) that he and his family were essentially “persona non grata” in the old Soviet Union and that seems to have carried over to Russia.  They should treat him better and acknowledge his contributions – he’s a national treasure for that country.

The picture, above, is from the 2010 Conference.  Yuri is sitting with Roger Gilbertson, the person responsible for tracking down Yuri’s original article and having it translated into English.  At the conference, Yuri pointed out a few mistakes in the translation and worked with Roger to get them fixed.  The entire story of how Roger was able to get this article translated is fascinating and is chronicled in Volume 1 of CLIMB, the Space Elevator Journal.

Incidentally, Roger is now working for SpaceX, in charge of Public Relations I believe.  You can click on the picture thumbnail to see a full-size version of the picture.

I must admit, I have mixed feelings about this.  On one hand, the trilogy was EXCELLENT.  Exciting, thought-provoking, outstanding science-fiction.  On the other hand, the destruction to the Planet Mars following the sabotage of the Martian Space Elevator was gloriously, elaborately, excruciatingly described.

Current thinking dictates that a “real” space elevator would not be built like the one that Robinson described in Red Mars but I fear that is going to get lost in the shuffle.  I can already imagine the reaction once this production goes live; “See, we must never build a space elevator because it’s too dangerous – look what could happen!”

On the other hand, there is the old saw about “There is no such thing as bad publicity”.  Yeah, right.  Maybe we can seize it as a “teaching moment”? 🙁

Still, I’m looking forward to it – I hope they do justice to the book and it doesn’t turn out to be one of these “loosely based upon…” productions.

And, if you haven’t read the Red/Green/Blue Mars trilogy, you’re missing a treat.  It really is wonderful reading, well deserving the many awards it received.

While this topic is not directly related to a space-elevator, I thought you would find it as interesting as I did.  And, with the recent news that NASA has chosen Boeing and SpaceX to ferry astronauts to/from the Space Station, it’s pretty timely.

Krista Coleman sent me a link to an infographic, a portion reproduced below, detailing some of the spinoffs that have been created due to NASA’s efforts over the past several decades.  Some I already knew, some were surprises to me.

Who knew that we could blame NASA for selfies!

To see the entire infographic, click here.

Thanks Krista!

In the Fall, 2014 issue of the National Space Society’s Ad Astra magazine, there is a four page article on the Space Elevator.

Unlocking the potential of space elevators is a four page article, written by Peter Swan (president of ISEC) and Cathy Swan, that referenced and summarized the recent IAA study on Space Elevators.  The whole article (which you can read here) is very good, but for me, the “money quote” was:

“The mission [for space business] for success is simple: Reduce the price for access to GEO to $500/kg while changing the model to: daily, routine, smooth-riding, less dangerous, environmentally sound, open size/mass criteria and mission enabling.”

Indeed…

One of the items which popped up in my FeedDemon Reader a while ago was a Blog post from a group called Sustainable Nano. They are: “The Center for Sustainable Nanotechnology is an initiative funded by the National Science Foundation to carry out research that will enable the development of sustainable, societally beneficial nanotechnologies. We are a group of well-connected but geographically diffuse scientists—at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (Hamers & Pedersen groups), University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (Klaper group), the University of Minnesota (Haynes group), the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (Murphy group), Northwestern University (Geiger group), and the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (Orr).” It’s a neat website with plenty of interesting posts – I do like poking around in it.

Anyway to the post in question: “Space Elevator: A Lasting Dream for a Sky-reaching Tree“. The post describes the basics of the space elevator and how a product like carbon nanotubes, one of their group’s focus, could make it all possible. Pretty standard stuff, but the graphics are worth commenting on…

The first graphic shows how a space elevator is “held up” by using the comparison to holding a stick with a rope attached to it and, the other end of the rope attached to some sort of counterweight. Spin the rope about your head (or, in the post’s example, spin your entire body) and, if you’re going fast enough, the rope will stick out straight from you towards the counterweight simulating the appearance of a space elevator. This is a common enough analogy, but does have its flaws. A space elevator is held up by balancing the forces of gravity and centrifugal force but this analogy is only demonstrating the centrifugal force portion. You (or the stick) have taken the place of gravity by holding the “earth-end” of the tether and keeping the counterweight from flying away. But I can’t think of a better way to demonstrate it and it does have the advantage of quickly being able to demonstrate the basic idea. In the graphic though, it shows Geostationary orbit (GEO) much closer to the counterweight than to the earth and the center of mass of the system at GEO (that’s where the arrows in the graphic seem to be pointing to). Using the standard Edwards/Westling model, the elevator tether is 100,000 km long while GEO is approximately 35,700 km above the surface, i.e. much closer to earth than to the counterweight at the end of the tether. Regarding the location of the center of mass of the system, it needs to be above GEO.  I, myself, used to erroneously think that the center of mass would be at GEO and have visited this topic before. Dr. Blaise Gassend wrote up a simple explanation of why the center of mass has to be ABOVE geosynchronous (geostationary – GEO) orbit.

The second graphic, the one referring to the almost-certainly necessary taper of the elevator tether is one that I’ve seen in similar format several times before. I’ve wanted to address it before, but just haven’t – I’ve been too lazy to try and draw my own version of the “correct” ratios for a tethered taper (I’m just familiar enough with Photoshop to be dangerous…). You’ll note that the blog post shows the tether increasing from a point at the earths surface to something much wider at GEO and then reducing back to a point at the counterweight. Ignoring the location of GEO (the same as in the first graphic), the idea of the tether widening from the earth to GEO and then narrowing from GEO to the counterweight is correct. But the ratio is wrong:

Creating my own model took me a lot longer than I had first thought – I redid it a half-dozen times before I had something I thought was worthwhile. Of course it’s not to scale either, but the ratio of the taper width at the earth’s surface (13.52) to its width at GEO (35.44) to its width at the counterweight (23.88) is correct. Also, given the shown length of the tether, the location of GEO is correct. The graphic is greatly “squooshed” of course, being much shorter than a real tether in this scale (by several orders of magnitude). But the difference between the length and the width of the tether demands this type of alteration.

One other thought; I think when most people look at drawings of tether taper, they assume that it’s the width of the tether which must alter. That’s not necessarily the case. It can also be the thickness and that, I think, would have advantages. If the width of the tether was constant (once you’re above the atmosphere – in the atmosphere it may well be a cable), then you don’t have to design a climber which can accommodate varying widths; much easier, I think to design a climber for a tether with a varying thickness. But then again, maybe it will be something like a Hoytether.

Anyway, enough. Where did I get my numbers? They came from the most excellent spreadsheet developed by long time friend of the space elevator Maurice Franklin and which you can find by clicking on its page link at the top of blog (The SE Analysis Spreadsheet). I’ve blogged about this before, and I’d like to encourage readers to play around with it – when you do, you really begin to get a feel for the physical constraints that engineers and scientists have to deal with in the real world. I used his Edwards/Westling Baseline model with no changes.

Several weeks ago, I was contacted by the people at NeomamStudios, telling me about a graphic they had put together showing the total cost of living on the Moon.  This was part of the 45th Moon Landing Anniversary Celebration and is, I think, of interest to people who support the idea of a Space Elevator.

If you are like me, and believe that the major (or at least “a” major) use of the Space Elevator is to help us colonize the solar system and, to paraphrase Robert Heinlein, get some of our eggs out of earth’s “basket”, then numbers like this are what we need to make our case.  It will be very, very, very, very expensive to create and support a lunar colony using traditional rocket technology, there’s just no getting around it.  A space elevator is the only feasible way to do something like this.

I could have reproduced the entire graphic here, but it’s quite large and I’d rather link to one which is already out there.  I went to the Neomam web site and the graphic is there, so I’ve linked to it and reproduced just a portion of it here.  And, lo and behold, when I went to their website, I found they had also created a graphic showing numbers for the living costs on Mars.  I’ve also reproduced a portion of that graphic here and clicking on either one of them will take you to the Neoman website where you can see the full graphics.

Fun facts from the graphics:

• On Mars, it would cost $37,244 to watch Psy’s Gangnam Style in HD on YouTube.
• On the Moon, downloading “Fly me to the Moon” would cost about 12.8 cents.

CNBC’s John Schoen wrote an article about the Space Elevator, releasing it just before the recent Space Elevator Conference and I am just getting ’round now to linking to it…

In addition to writing about Space Elevators, John also discusses flying cars and freight drones. ISEC‘s Peter Swan is quoted in the story.

There are also, unfortunately, the usual inane comments about space elevators in the article’s Comments section.  I tried to correct a couple of the worst, but it’s like trying to drain a lake with a spoon 🙁

An idea that has been occasionally discussed is to use the space elevator to launch radioactive waste to the sun, a permanent waste disposal plan if there ever was one…

The magazine Popular Science had an article about this in 2010.   It’s been a subject of blog discussions/debates (like this one on PhysicsForum and this one on the ScienceForum).  It was even a topic during the “Shotgun Science” section of the 2013 Space Elevator Conference (I can’t remember who did that particular presentation).

German blogger Kai Malmus gives us his uniquely European thoughts on this topic here.  According to Mr. Malmus, a Commission (put into action by the German government and all opposition parties) has been empowered to find a solution within the next couple of years and then start construction by of a waste storage unit here on earth by 2032.  All of Europe, indeed all of the fission-using world, is searching for an answer to this problem.  And, anyone who has followed the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste depository saga in the USA over the past 25+ years, knows that it is a political football to end all political footballs.

Is using a Space Elevator to get rid of nuclear waste a practical idea?  I don’t think so, but not for the “usual reasons”.  People worry about the safety of the elevator but I believe we can produce an elevator lift system of very high reliability.  Payloads will all have some sort of guidance system so that if the unlikely happens, they can be safely splash-landed in the ocean.  And people worry about somehow contaminating the sun with this waste.  The sun is so enormous, that it could handle this relative paltry amount of additional matter without even noticing it.

However, “paltry amount” is, as I said, relative, and therein lies the problem, IMHO.

How much nuclear waste do we produce each year?  According to World Nuclear Association website, about 200,000 metric tons of low and intermediate levels of waste and about 10,000 metric tons of high-level nuclear waste are produced each year.  And then there is the “legacy waste problem“, hundreds of thousands of more metric tons of waste that must be dealt with somehow.

Assuming that we’re not going to see a functioning space elevator until probably at least 2035 (and I’m being optimistic here) and the fact that the initial elevator(s) aren’t going to carry more than double-digit tons of payload (and there will be multiple customers clamoring for the space elevator’s services) and the fact that the nuclear industry is continuing to produce nuclear waste, I’m afraid that this is a problem which is going to have to be solved here, on the planet, without the help of a Space Elevator.

I wish I could be more optimistic – the idea sounds grand, kind of like space-based solar power.  But when you run the numbers, then things don’t look so cheery…

Perhaps only a very tiny portion of this waste truly needs to be disposed of, then maybe.  But if that’s true, then it can probably be dealt with here and we won’t need a space elevator to get rid of it.

But I invite debate on the matter – prove me wrong!

This is always a fun session.  People can suggest not-fully-thought-out ideas (another way of saying “half-baked”?) to the crowd and use them as an initial ‘sounding board’ to see if it has merit or not.  Over the years, we’ve heard some good ideas in this session and, frankly, some really wacky ones, too, but as I started out saying, they’re always a lot fun.  Great to see people challenging assumptions and thinking outside of that box…

There were six speakers:

David Schilling proposed covering satellites with an aerogel, several inches (a foot?) thick.  He reasoned that this cover could act as a barrier to space debris/dust that would hit the satellite and, if the debris was big enough to penetrate the aerogel, the aerogel would act to keep the satellite in, more or less, one piece, thus minimizing space debris, and all with only a minimal addition of weight to the satellite.

Keith Loftstrom suggested keeping emotions out of reactions to someone else’s idea.  And a reminder, be your own skeptic first.  Run the numbers on a proposal before you bother bringing it to anyone elese.

Charles Gorlinski suggested we pay more attention to building in some redundancy into a space elevator system and proposed, for example, using multiple tethers, all heading to the same Apex Anchor (counterweight) separated by some sort of spacing ring.  If one tether breaks, the system does not disintegrate.

Dr. Bryan Laubscher asked all attendees to network, network, network, looking for people / corporations / government agencies, etc. with money and, if/when found, to direct them Peter Swan (for space elevator interest) or to himself (Bryan) for carbon nanotube development interest.

Michael Laine briefly talked about LiftPort’s Lunar Elevator project and showed an animation of creating the Lunar Space Elevator.  He thinks it is possible to do this “within the current decade” at a cost of ~USD 800 million.

Finally, Phil Richter gave us some thoughts from his perspective as a structural engineer.  He proposed a much wider tether, perhaps 10m or 100m wide, for several reasons; 1) redundancy/stronger/safety/stability 2) changing the structure’s aspect ratio – something that structural engineers know is important 3) Logistics – easier to work with 4) Economy of scale and 5) better from a budgeting estimate viewpoint.

I really like the aerogel-cushioned satellite idea – it makes so much sense that there has to be something wrong with it…

There are three Mini-Workshops scheduled for this conference and the first one is now underway.  Dr. John Knapman will be directing this Workshop aimed at getting several small groups to focus on the various Research Activities needed to advance our understanding of the space elevator.  John categorized several different topics (broadly categorized into topics that some work has been done on and those topics that have been largely untouched) and some of these will be focused on by these various groups.  The goals of this workshop, as in all workshops, are to get people brainstorming about these topics and come up with ideas and action items to attack them.

This afternoon’s presentations started with Akira Tsuchida talking about a new IAA study; “Road to Space Elevator Era”.  This will be a follow-on to the recently released IAA report Space Elevators: An Assessment of the Technological Feasibility and the Way Forward.  One of they key outputs of this report will be the Space Elevator Prediction Feasibility Index (SEPFI).  I am going to be very interested in this – it should be a rigorous engineering review and prediction as to if and when, in the IAA’s opinion, a space elevator can be built.

As part of his presention, Akira also mentioned that the Science Council of Japan defined the Space Elevator project as part of the Master Plan for large research projects – 2014.  It is the first step of starting very small research but has recognized Space Elevator as National project.  Hopefully this will lead to significant government funding.

The next presentation was by Shuichi Ohno, chairman of JSEA, the Japan Space Elevator Association.  JSEA has been around for many years, and like ISEC, is dedicated to advancing our understanding of the Space Elevator.  Four people from Japan (three from JSEA) are attending the ISEC conference.  Mr. Ohno’s presentation started by talking about the activities of JSEA.  This includes several Climber competitions, including one, SPEC, which now requires climbers to ascend 1,200 meters.  They have ambitious plans for 2015 – increasing this amount to 5,000 meters (Note: they had the 2014 competition earlier this month and, unfortunately, I’ve not posted about it yet – I will rectify that after the conference.  You can find information about it here.)

Shuichi ended his presentation with a challenge to the US – to begin, again, conducting climber competitions, and this time, to do it in cooperation with JSEA.

Devin Jacobson, an American living in Japan and a member of JSEA, gave the next presentation; JSEA Outreach efforts and potential Business collaboration, or, The Space Elevator – Business or Pleasure?  Devin discussed about how, if we want to make a space elevator “real”, we will need to have to have more funding and he discussed some possibilities of how that could happen. For example, he talked about how the balloon climber competitions have advanced the art of being to able to send communications from a ballon based node – handy when needed in temporary situations (like a natural disaster or similar).