Jones Beene wrote:
> ... plus if we can also use the a long antenna-tether as the "ballast" i.e. > as the required drag mechanism against the absolute wind speed (in addition > to the drag of the collection airfoils or propellers), then that long tether > (half mile long??) which is a conductive wire, can serve a double purpose - > make that: attempt to harvest the slight charge differential and slight > ionization caused by tribology friction at that altitude. I have a hunch > that this "free-charge harvesting" could possibly be more fruitful than the > differential wind speed, or that there would be synergy there ... !!!!! Hey, that sounds like it has real potential (no pun intended)! Remember the tethered satellite fiasco? Nasa launched a tethered satellite from the Shuttle and, in very rough terms, the voltage difference between the satellite and the Shuttle blew the connecting cable to bits. IIRC this was blamed on the motion of the Shuttle across the Earth's magnetic field. It's also been mentioned as a "problem" for the space elevator. But one person's problem is sometimes someone else's solution. It's bugged me ever since I read about it that there's no way to turn this particular "problem" into a "solution"! Now, a free-flying kite (or, perhaps more practically, a balloon) would be moving at a few hundred MPH, while the Shuttle is moving at a few thousand MPH, so the generator effect is going to be much smaller for our hypothetical air-breathing power station. But with a half mile of wire there might still be enough of a jolt there to produce an interesting amount of power just from the B-field; tribo-electric generation, which seems much dicier to me, could be a possible additional source of power. As to harvesting the altitude voltage differential (as a third power source), I'm not sure how much power is available there. Lots of volts, but not sure of the capacity. Anybody know? I'm also afraid you might find you needed a really whopping big kite to produce a low enough resistance coupling to the air, conductivity of air being what it is (vanishingly small).
