> > High-altitude hovering aircraft would also be very useful for television > broadcasts and cell phone towers. For television they would probably be > better than satellites, and much cheaper. > > Safety would be an issue. Five million autonomous kites would cause > accidents from time to time. Kites would go out of control and crash, or > aircraft would collide with them. Stored up hydrogen might explode. They > would also be unsightly, and at their home base where they would be taking > off and landing all day long they would be noisy. However, many large > cities are close to oceans or deserts where the kites could be deployed > without bothering anyone and without hurting anyone if they fell. But no > energy system is perfect. Even wind turbines cause deaths. Workmen fall > from them and are electrocuted. However wind turbines are the safest source > of energy yet devised. They are much safer than nuclear power plants, which > have killed thousands of people during the mining and preparation of > uranium. Modern uranium mines are supposed to be safer, but they are still > a threat. > > The kites would pollute less than any other energy source except cold > fusion. The only pollution would be in the manufacture and disposal of > equipment. It would not take much material to construct 5 million light > aircraft. Most of the material would be carbon composite, which is not > toxic as far as I know. Carbon is available in unlimited amounts. > > Some people have objected to building large unsightly ground-based wind > turbines close to historic places and wilderness areas. These kites would > be so high up in the sky they would probably not be visible, and many of > them would be out over the open ocean, as I said. > > They would take up practically no space on the ground. They share this > attribute with offshore wind turbines. > > - Jed
Wind turbines are not unsightly, they are graceful expressions of modern technology as art. Just go outside Barstow, California and look for yourself. Autonomous craft can and should be equipped with computers and GPS so that they stay out of TCA's and transport corridors and they will be no problem if they stay where they should. Errant drones can be automatically landed by redundant systems that take over upon the failure of primaries. To self destruct them would be wastefull of the cost of the equipment and possibly a danger to others in the vicinity, and one can never know for certain that an area is truly empty. I routinely would go into the deepest desert areas in North America to hunt jack rabbits. Standing Bear
