Earth-to-space Elevator Proposed

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10-17-2003, 10:10 AM
sharedholder

Earth-to-space elevator proposed

LOS ALAMOS, N.M. (AP) - Researchers are proposing an elevator reaching 100,000 kilometres into the sky that would be able to launch payloads into space at a far lower cost than space shuttle.

The Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists are so convinced it can be a reality that they are working on their own time on technical details. Five to 10 scientists at any given time are analysing the economics, technical specifications of how the elevator would work and possible health risks to those using it.

Lab scientist Bryan Laubscher said researchers hope the U.S. Department of Energy can someday use the information to start investing in a space elevator.

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

The elevator shaft would be made of a strong, thin, lightweight material called carbon nanotubes. The shaft, really a 32 million-storey-tall cable, would be carried into orbit on a conventional spacecraft, then gradually dropped down to Earth and attached to an ocean platform along the equator.

Solar-powered crawlers would move up and down the elevator, carrying payloads of satellites or probes to be placed in Earth's orbit or beyond. They also would attach additional cables to the main shaft that eventually would become new elevators.

"It would create huge, huge savings over how we launch stuff now," said Ron Morgan, a health scientist working on the project. "From the top of it, we could throw things off to Mars or to the inner solar system. Launching those things on conventional rockets costs a fortune."

A payload on the shuttle costs about $15,000 US per kilogram to launch into orbit, while a payload on the first space elevator likely would cost about $1,000 per kilogram, which could drop to $50 to $100 in time, Laubscher said.

Significant technical questions remain. No one has made a carbon nanotube cable longer than a few metres but Laubscher said technology is improving daily, and a longer cable could be possible in a few years.

Also, the Earth's magnetosphere, far above where the shuttle typically travels, could be a radiation hazard. Scientists say that wouldn't rule out equipment launches or space tourism in lower orbits.

Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists in Washington, D.C., said the space elevator concept is ingenious but faces big obstacles including environmental and cost questions.

"My comment would be, 'Good luck,' " he said.

The researchers believe their time on the project is worth it.

"None of us can imagine how the space elevator will change the world," Morgan said. "I'd love to be here 15 years after the first one is built to see how the world changes. I think it will change everything."

SOURCE
10-17-2003, 10:23 AM
Riddler

I can see the headlines now;

" Space elevator disintegrates as flock of migrating storks crash into fog-shrouded cable ! " :P
10-17-2003, 10:27 AM
razorsharp013

Will there be a guy in said elevator with his hand out waiting for a huge tip cause he presed up? And what kind of musac will they play in it for your elevator riding enjoyment?
10-17-2003, 10:34 AM
Riddler

:D And will there be an emergency staircase in the event of fire ? :blink:
10-17-2003, 10:39 AM
uNz[i]

Amazing. They're inventing the skyhook.

About time too. :lol:
10-17-2003, 11:14 AM
Billy_Dean

They should be inventing an anti-gravity device instead of stupid space elevators.

What a target for Osama bin Laden's grandchildren.

:)
10-17-2003, 11:54 AM
Barbarossa

This idea has been kicking around for a long time, read Arthur C. Clarkes "The Fountains of Paradise" published in 1979.

Whether it will ever get built or not I don't know. The safeguards that would have to be put into place would be tremendous.
10-17-2003, 05:26 PM
Rat Faced

1979?

Its older than that..

Try Asimovs Foundation Series (Trantor)...copyrighted 1951

Ive seen the idea in a few books, havent a clue as to who 1st thought of it....probably someone an hour or so after the elevator was invented ;)
10-17-2003, 05:49 PM
bigboab

I am trying to imagine how this is going to be achieved. We have to assume a giant tube just hanging in the sky while the earth passes it by at its rotating speed.
Now the difficult bit. How do you make a connection. Or am I missing something.
10-17-2003, 07:08 PM
blackhatknight

how much do you think it would cost???

apperently a commerical "flight" to the moon (surprisingly only taking one day) would set you back, £100,000 (STG)

source: Sunday Times
10-20-2003, 02:28 PM
Barbarossa

Quote:

Originally posted by bigboab@17 October 2003 - 17:49
I am trying to imagine how this is going to be achieved. We have to assume a giant tube just hanging in the sky while the earth passes it by at its rotating speed.
Now the difficult bit. How do you make a connection. Or am I missing something.

The top of the elevator would essentially be in geostationary orbit, i.e. it would always be over the same point on the earths surface, so it could be permanently anchored there.

@rat faced, can't remember a space elevator in the Foundation series.... Trantor was a world-encompassing city, the centre of the Galactic Empire.

Looks like I might have to re-read them... :D
10-20-2003, 02:38 PM
Billy_Dean

The space elevator is credited to Arthur C Clarke, whether that makes him the first to mention it, I don't know.

:)
10-20-2003, 02:46 PM
Barbarossa

Quote:

Originally posted by Billy_Dean@20 October 2003 - 14:38
The space elevator is credited to Arthur C Clarke, whether that makes him the first to mention it, I don't know.

:)

I'm sure in the back of "The Fountains of Paradise" he credits someone else with the theory, I'll have a look when I get home.

There's loads of stuff on the web about it anyway.

http://www.spaceelevator.com/

Also, from http://www.eurekasci.com/SPACE_ELEVATOR/intro.html

Quote:

The space elevator first appeared in 1960 (Artsutanov) in a Russian technical journal. In the following years the concept appeared several times in technical journals (Isaacs, 1966; Pearson, 1975; Clarke, 1979) and then began to appear in science fiction (Clarke, 1978; Stanley Robinson, 1993). The simplest explanation of the space elevator concept is that it is a cable with one end attached to the Earth's surface and the other end in space beyond geosynchronous orbit (35,800 km altitude). The competing forces of gravity at the lower end and outward centripetal acceleration at the farther end keep the cable under tension and stationary over a single position on Earth. This cable, once deployed, can be ascended by mechanical means to Earth orbit. If a climber proceeds to the far end of the cable and releases it would have sufficient energy to escape from Earth's gravity well and travel to the Moon, Mars, Venus and the asteroids.
10-20-2003, 03:09 PM
ilw

Quote:

The competing forces of gravity at the lower end and outward centripetal acceleration at the farther end keep the cable under tension and stationary over a single position on Earth

That statement is just crap physics.

Theres an in depth analysis here(table of contents the first page of which is definitely worth glancing at here (Its an nteresting site, but I'm not sure the physics explanations are any better they make reference to centrifugal acceleration?)
Personally i'd never considered the scale of it, but check this picture out
http://www.isr.us/Downloads/niac_pdf...ges/fig1_1.gif

It faces quite a few problems as well

Quote:

There is a whole set of environmental threats the space elevator will need to survive including:

    * Lightning
    * Meteors
    * Space debris
    * Low-Earth-orbit
    * Wind
    * Atomic oxygen
    * Electromagnetic fields
    * Radiation
    * Erosion of cable by sulferic acid droplets in the upper atmosphere (Hieken, 2000)

Most of these are capable of destroying our space elevator on short order if we aren't careful. The first lightning storm or strong wind would destroy the bottom end of the cable, meteors would shred it before we even got the initial ribbon deployed, atomic oxygen will eat it in a month whereas a low-Earthorbit object would hit it every 250 days. Fortunately there are solutions to each of these problems.
10-23-2003, 01:13 AM
mogadishu

why dont they just get the elevator from willy wonka and the chocolate factory... it could go anywhere.
10-25-2003, 10:14 PM
Neo 721

The project was being considered by the European space agency, but these guys dont seem like the kind of orginization that consider such an undertaking judging by the amount of funding they get.
There is another problem where the hell would put such a thing, you could put in the middle of the sea but what about storms (one hell of a fall). and who would take resposibility of maintaining it. Also the cost, around $10 bln
10-25-2003, 10:28 PM
Rat Faced

I feel that $10 Bn is rather on the low side for a space elevator :blink:
10-26-2003, 04:42 AM
Evil Gemini

http://www.isr.us/Downloads/niac_pdf...ges/fig1_1.gif

PMSL!!!!! LMAO!!!!!

Quote:

why dont they just get the elevator from willy wonka and the chocolate factory... it could go anywhere.

Thats the exact same thing that popped in my head when i read the subject.
:D

This is the most stupidest idea i have ever heard!! How wide is this thing going to have to be to keep its strength and how far under the ground is it going to have to be to keep it steady ??

Imagine if it smashed and tipped :blink:
10-26-2003, 04:49 AM
Virtualbody1234

Just think about how high man has been able to build the tallest buildings.

Once you think about it you will realize how impossible this elevator is.
10-26-2003, 06:14 AM
SodiumChloride

Reminds me of the space elevator from Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri

It was a secret project you could only build after researching such futuristic things such as high-tensile solids and other high sci-fi stuff.

Maybe in a couple generations we'll build it
10-27-2003, 02:52 AM
dragon_bane

Everything starts with an idea. Once the world solves it major problems science it can work it "magic"
10-27-2003, 12:15 PM
Barbarossa

Quote:

Originally posted by Virtualbody1234@26 October 2003 - 04:49
Just think about how high man has been able to build the tallest buildings.

Once you think about it you will realize how impossible this elevator is.

Ah, well that's the trick isn't it!

You have to build it DOWN, not UP!! :lol: :lol:

@neattairoski: You also don't need deep foundations because it's anchored in geostationary orbit, you just need to anchor it on the ground. Near or on the equator preferably. It won't sway (much) because only a small fraction of it is subjected to the atmosphere, and you can choose the position to minimize that effect anyway.

Meteors, lightning and low flying satellites, spacejunk and aircraft are the hardest hazards to overcome..
10-29-2003, 12:36 AM
thewizeard

Quote:

Originally posted by barbarossa@27 October 2003 - 12:15

@neattairoski: You also don't need deep foundations because it's anchored in geostationary orbit, you just need to anchor it on the ground. Near or on the equator preferably. It won't sway (much) because only a small fraction of it is subjected to the atmosphere, and you can choose the position to minimize that effect anyway.

Meteors, lightning and low flying satellites, spacejunk and aircraft are the hardest hazards to overcome..

It will never happen, but if it did, the equator seems to be a silly place. I think on the south pole, aligned withe the axis would be a better position. There would be little or no centrifugal forces to contend with.... ;)
10-29-2003, 11:59 PM
Neo 721

I think this is all just an attemp to lower the cost of space travel, but they have obviosly took the ideas from the 5 year olds far too seriosly :blink:
10-30-2003, 05:08 PM
Will_518

you play Alpha centauri too, cool game, 'cos a lot of the stuff are so impossible now.

Of course this thing could work, who are we to say it can't? any of us read all the stuff those scientist guys have? All we are basing our arguement on is an old movie.

Is this literally gonna be an elevantor?
11-01-2003, 05:00 AM
The Kiler

Structual details people. The higher it gets, the wider it has to be. Otherwise it'll just fall down and kill everyone in earth. :lol:

I think the only thing the space elevator really has to worry about is UFOs crashing into it, making it fall and the goverment says it's a "terrorist attack"
11-02-2003, 11:59 PM
Is_this_name_taken_already

First off the Idea just would not work with what we have now. Just think about it, if this "space elevator" did manage to touch the ground or even get remotely close to it gravity would do some strange thing where it would crach the elevator into the ground and ofcouse kill us all

And if it was anchored on the equator it would be under so much preasure from the Earth spinning, since the farther you are from the point of origin the faster it would have to move, it would also fall down (this would also kill us all)

next this elevator would be so astronomicly huge it would require more resources than even are available to the world (you know the building houses and stuff)

Also the cost would be a larger number than most people could comprehend such as quadrilians of dolars (1,000,000,000,000,000) well this isnt really important I mean the U.S. is already in debt for a quarter of the cost

Another point I'd like to point out is all the problems IF it was build, solare flares, earth quakes, sunomies (STFU about my spelling), wars, Osama's grandchildren crashing nuclear powered space craft into it, and ofcouse those damn UFOs hitting it when they get drunk (and you guessed it this would probably kill us all too)

So if you did manage read thsi post of spelling and grammer errors you would have noticed at some point the posiblity of the "space elevator" is just imposible
11-03-2003, 10:38 AM
ilw

Umm are the last 5 or 6 people taking the piss or did you reallly not bother to try and understand how the space elevator works?
In theory the spinning of the elevator exactly matches the spinning of the earth, ie the entire thing has to be in geosynchronous orbit around the earth (hence the elevator must be located at the equator). Gravity is the unbalanced centripetal force that keeps the elevator going in a circle and not flying off into space. The entire cable (it will essentialy be a very large cable and not a building) that makes up the length of the elevator will be under tension (ie taut) NOT compression (like a building). Ie there is no weight to be applied to the earth, if it was perfectly set up and there were no weather conditions to worry about it wouldn't have to be attached to the earth at all, but would permanently hover above the exact same piece of ground. The reason why this elevator is now possible is becasue carbon nanotubes have been shown to have the tensile strength necessary to withstand the insane forces that the cable will experience.
Oh and generally in a rotating system there are no centrifugal forces (though i think in the case of the elevator there is)
11-03-2003, 11:04 AM
Barbarossa

Quote:

Originally posted by ilw@3 November 2003 - 10:38
Umm are the last 5 or 6 people taking the piss or did you reallly not bother to try and understand how the space elevator works?
In theory the spinning of the elevator exactly matches the spinning of the earth, ie the entire thing has to be in geosynchronous orbit around the earth (hence the elevator must be located at the equator). Gravity is the unbalanced centripetal force that keeps the elevator going in a circle and not flying off into space. The entire cable (it will essentialy be a very large cable and not a building) that makes up the length of the elevator will be under tension (ie taut) NOT compression (like a building). Ie there is no weight to be applied to the earth, if it was perfectly set up and there were no weather conditions to worry about it wouldn't have to be attached to the earth at all, but would permanently hover above the exact same piece of ground. The reason why this elevator is now possible is becasue carbon nanotubes have been shown to have the tensile strength necessary to withstand the insane forces that the cable will experience.
Oh and generally in a rotating system there are no centrifugal forces (though i think in the case of the elevator there is)

Not wanting to pick hairs, but there is no such thing as centrifugal force, it's simply inertia... <_<

Everything else you say I agree with, but the skeptics here are too small-minded to listen.. ;)
11-03-2003, 11:28 AM
ilw

Quote:

there is no such thing as centrifugal force

not quite ;)
centrifugal force is defined as a force acting away from the centre of rotation, as long as the centripetal force is great enough to combat this centrifugal force AND provide enough force to give rotating motion then it is possible. For instance the lift in an airplane doing circles around the world would basically be centrifugal. But yeah your right in most rotating systems centrifugal forces are either absent or negligible.