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Once again, all together now;<\/p>\nOnce again, all together now;<\/p>\n
\nHappy birthday to you!
\nHappy birthday to you!
\nHappy birthday dear Space Elevator Blog!
\nHappy birthday to you! <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\nFour years ago yesterday, I started this blog. It\u2019s been yet another exciting year. In keeping with my tradition of writing an ‘anniversary post’ (first year summary<\/a>, second year summary<\/a> and third year summary<\/a>), the following is a list of, IMHO, the more significant happenings in the past 12 months that I was privileged to cover:<\/p>\n
The Space Elevator Games has a winner!<\/a>\u00a0 After several years of ever-increasing competition requirements and competitor sophistication, The Spaceward Foundation<\/a> and NASA<\/a> awarded Team LaserMotive<\/a> the very cool prize sum of $900,000.\u00a0 This was for their >2meter\/second run (which they did multiple times) in the 2009 Climber \/ Power-Beaming competition in the Space Elevator Games.\u00a0 Coverage of these Games was extensive, both via the Internet, including uStream (which I was privileged to moderate along with Bryan Laubscher) and in the conventional media.\u00a0 Kudo’s must also be given to the other two competitors in this competition, the Kansas City Space Pirates<\/a> and USST<\/a>.\u00a0 Both of these teams have proved they’re very capable and I fully expect them to compete for the $1.1 Million dollars in prize money still available.\u00a0 Plans for the 2010 Climber \/ Power-Beaming competition continue apace and will be announced here and at the official site of the Space Elevator Games<\/a> when finalized.\u00a0 In the Strong Tether Competition<\/a> (the other half of the Space Elevator Games), a team from Japan brought the second, ever, carbon nanotube tether to the competition.\u00a0 Though this tether was not strong enough to win a prize, it is a portent of things to come.\u00a0 This year’s Strong Tether competition will be held, again, at the upcoming Space Elevator Conference (August 13-15) in Redmond, Washington.<\/p>\n
ISEC<\/a> becomes a real organization.\u00a0 After spending some time ‘finding our way’, the International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC) finally emerged as a real force in the Space Elevator community.\u00a0 I am privileged to be the President of this group and it is a real joy to be able to work with many of the movers and shakers in the Space Elevator effort.\u00a0 We’ve adopted our first Strategic Plan and are in the process of making it happen.\u00a0 Each year, we will adopt a space elevator-related topic as our theme for that year and focus our activities around it.\u00a0 This year it is Space Debris Mitigation.\u00a0 We have a ‘red team’ headed up by ISEC Director Peter Swan preparing a paper on this topic.\u00a0 The Pearson prize will be awarded for the best paper presented this year on this topic.\u00a0 This topic will be a theme at the Space Elevator Conference.\u00a0 The ISEC Journal will also adopt this as a theme.\u00a0 We have a Library Project underway, whereby we will create a central repository \/ search engine for the major papers and studies on this topic.\u00a0 And finally, the ISEC Poster for 2010 will have Space Debris Mitigation as its theme.<\/p>\n
Artsutanov and Pearson prizes announced<\/a>.\u00a0 I am particularly thrilled with this development.\u00a0 Yuri Artsutanov and Jerome Pearson are two of the co-inventors of the modern-day thinking about Space Elevator design and operation.\u00a0 ISEC is honoring these two innovators with prizes named after them.\u00a0 The Pearson prize is $1,500 and will be awarded to that individual who submits the best paper on our 2010 theme; Space Debris Mitigation.\u00a0 The Artsutanov prize is $2,500 and will be awarded to that individual who submits the best paper on any other Space Elevator related topic.\u00a0 In addition, ISEC will invite these prize winners to the 2010 Space Elevator Conference to present their winning papers and receive their winnings.\u00a0 ISEC will cover travel and lodging expenses for the winners.\u00a0 Abstracts are beginning to come in and it looks like we’re going to have some very interesting papers created.\u00a0 The deadline for abstract submission is May 15th and details for these prizes can be found on the ISEC website<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Japan – The Japan Space Elevator Association (JSEA)<\/a> sponsored the first Asian Space Elevator Competition<\/a> in August of 2009.\u00a0 The winning team was from Germany.\u00a0 In addition, JSEA, sponsored two Space Elevator competitions (LASER ’09<\/a> and LASER ’10) aimed at getting school children interested in the concept of a Space Elevator.\u00a0 Finally, JSEA held its second annual Space Elevator Conference in December of 2009.\u00a0 This is a very active group and we expect great things from them in the future.<\/p>\n
EuroSpaceward Conference<\/a> – I was able to attend the 2009 EuroSpaceward Conference (held in Luxembourg in December) and was privileged to be able to make a presentation on ISEC and our future plans.\u00a0 This is the third year in a row that EuroSpaceward has hosted this conference, but it’s the first time I’ve been able to attend.\u00a0 The conference was excellent; very informative and a lot of fun to be at.\u00a0 They’ve just announced their fourth annual conference for Dec 4-5 of this year.\u00a0 Markus Klettner heads up this organization and it, too, is very active in the Space Elevator effort.<\/p>\n
The 2009 Space Elevator Conference<\/a>.\u00a0 This was the second year in a row that the conference was held at the Microsoft Conference center in Redmond, Washington and I’m very pleased to say that they will host the 2010 conference<\/a> again this year (August 13-15).\u00a0 The Conference facilities are outstanding and contributed to a most-excellent conference this past year.\u00a0 With all of the ISEC activities we have planned for this year at the conference and, with the Strong Tether competition again being held at the conference, I think this year’s conference will be the best ever.<\/p>\n
The Elevator2Space series debuted in 2009 and published a series of 26 episodes.\u00a0 All of them are funny – it’s difficult to pick a favorite (though I really liked this one<\/a> and this one<\/a> and this one<\/a>).\u00a0 You can view all of the episodes on their website<\/a>.\u00a0 Very, very creative.<\/p>\n
Other highlights include seeing Designs for a Space Elevator Base Station<\/a>, honoring the 40th Anniversary<\/a> of the first moon landing, the publishing of Space Tethers and Space Elevators<\/a> and, of course, celebrating the announcement<\/a> of the world’s first space elevator.<\/p>\n
I’ve also enjoyed watching the traffic at this site continuing to grow.\u00a0 This Space Elevator Blog has recorded well over 288,000 hits since we’ve begun and we’ve been visited by people from 185 different countries!\u00a0 That’s not all of them, but we’re getting close ?<\/p>\n
I also have to mention, again, the fun I had working with Ben Shelef of the Spaceward Foundation and the people at NASA (especially John Kelly and Andy Petro) in the planning and testing leading up to the Climber \/ Power-Beaming half of the Space Elevator Games.\u00a0 As most of you know, this competition was held at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center.\u00a0 This is located inside of Edwards Air Force base in the Mojave desert in California.\u00a0 It is one of the most \u00dcber-cool things I’ve ever been involved in.\u00a0 I put up several posts about this (a couple are here<\/a> and here<\/a>), but just have to mention it again – it was unbelievably awesome!<\/p>\n
Finally, this past year was special to me on a personal note; I welcomed my first grandchild<\/a> and I turned 60.\u00a0 I’m now, officially, getting old…<\/p>\n
What will the next 12 months bring?\u00a0 We have the Space Elevator Games (American and Japanese) to look forward to.\u00a0 We have Space Elevator Conferences (American and European) to look forward to.\u00a0 ISEC will continue to coordinate efforts in the Space Elevator arena.\u00a0 And I’m sure we’ll be surprised by other activities in the Space Elevator effort.<\/p>\n