On Sun, Apr 10, 2011 at 10:30 PM, Ash <[email protected]> wrote: > "I'm a little confused here. As I understand it, the primary use for > elevator technology is to make orbital insertion more economical. I don't > see the connection between that, protection from cosmic radiation, and > cruising speed in space flight." > > Methinks faster than mewrites. :) Radiation is a big problem in space, as > well as micrometeorites both of which are a race against time. A shuttle > launch exhausts nearly the entire fuel supply, and it is expensive, leaving > little fuel for the longest stretch of flight making it a very long trip to > Mars (for example). The best solution seems to establish permanent cargo > lifts into orbit to facilitate a space industry. >
I agree that developing space based industry should be incremental. It seems to me the logical sequence of events would be to develop a lunar mining colony and from there build manufacturing facilities. Supplying resources from the Moon would be far cheaper than shipping them up from Earth. As to micrometeorites, I don't know that this is as big an issue as it seems. After all, if you think about it, the ISS has been fending off rocks and space junk for 13 years now without a single major incident. Radiation and bone density loss are THE significant issues on extended spaceflights. These problems can be solved but the costs are far greater than most governments would consider. For that reason alone I think that we should abandon all exploration beyond the Moon until we have a working space-based economy in place with fully developed mining and manufacturing facilities. Like you said, there may be mining opportunities for various materials > (gases from Jupiter, and metals from other places). There is also plentiful > solar radiation, we could maser it down to the Earth from orbital > collectors. I think we could eventually set up a chain of reactors into > nearer Sun orbit that will undergo various processing that is too energy > consumptive to expore here on Earth. Thinking, processing metals, perhaps > reforming molecular structures that hold massive energy potential (aluminum > is one, but we could 'cook' up better I'm sure). So we could use them on > Earth, lift the cargo to a launching orbit, pass it into another orbit(s) > that take it through processing again to recharge after depleted. VERY cool > stuff. > Agreed. Very cool.
