Space Elevators
1. Space elevators represent an unproven but promising technology for transporting objects, and possibly even people, into space while avoiding the enormous cost involved in rocket-propelled launches into orbit. Most versions of the space elevator concept involve a thin but incredibly strong tether stretched between a mobile or fixed base station on Earth and a counterweight in space. Objects would be lifted into space or lowered down to Earth via cables stretched along the tether.2. While most of the public remains unaware of the concept, space elevators have appeared in the works of popular authors such as Arther C. Clarke (the novel 2061: Odyssey Three) and Robert A. Heinlein (the novel Friday) for decades. In fact, the idea of a space elevator is well over 100 years old. In 1895 the Russian scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky's writings described a space castle connected to Earth via a cable. And recorded comments from the maverick scientist/inventor Nikola Tesla suggest he also toyed with the space elevator concept.
3. In recent years, work has accelerated to bring the concept to reality. NASA scientists have outlined plans on how a space elevator could be constructed, and the LiftPort Group (a collection of companies formed in 2003) is actively testing materials and methods to build the first working space elevator.
4. The LiftPort Group is working toward a launch for the inaugural space elevator on October 27, 2031. The group aims to reach many milestones on the way to that date, with one being the opening of a planned factory to produce mass quantities of the carbon nanotubes that would serve as the elevator's tether.
5. A space elevator would require approximately 62,000 miles of carbon nanotube ribbon to stretch between the base on Earth and counterweight in space.
6. A tethered space elevator requires a base located along or near the Earth's equator due to the planet's rotation. Some designs have the base at a fixed location on ground, while others envision a sea-based station that could make necessary location adjustments.
7. LiftPort has successfully performed a number of tests of space elevator technology, running tethers as high as a mile in the air connected to platforms suspended by high-altitude balloons. Robotic lifters climbed and descended the tethers throughout the tests.
8. A number of challenges must be overcome before the first space elevator becomes reality. The paths of satellites in Earth's orbit below the elevator's counterweight would eventually cross the elevator's tether, requiring these satellites to be programmed to avoid a collision. And other objects like meteoroids and micrometeorites pose an even higher risk since little to no time would exist to change the elevator's location. Other hazards such as severe weather and deterioration of the carbon nanotubes add to the list of potential problems that elevator proponents are working to overcome.
9. "I'm convinced that the space elevator is practical and doable," physicist Bradley Edwards of Carbon Designs Inc. told www.Space.com. "In 12 years, we could be launching tons of payload every three days, at just a little over a couple hundred dollars a pound. In 15 years we could have a dozen cables running full steam putting 50 tons in space every day for even less, including upper middle class individuals wanting a joyride into space."
10. Edwards has proposed an alternate method to the widely accepted launch scenario of dropping the full mass of the tether from space to Earth. Edwards envisions establishing a thinner "seed" tether, then pulling thicker and thicker cables one by one up the length of the seed until a fully workable elevator is complete. This method could conceivably take less than a decade to bring a functional elevator to reality, versus the several decades the other plans could take.
Sources: www.space.com; www.liftport.com; www.spaceelevatorblog.com; www.wikipedia.org
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