exploits




1895 : a scientist with the Russian name Konstantin takes as a starting point the Eiffel Tower to imagine a celestial castle, a 36000 height km tower.
Science Fiction.

1957 : Another scientist with another pretty Russian name (Yuri) thinks that a geostationary satellite would be the solution.

1960 : Yuri publishes its idea in the Pravda, specifying that the satellite would be used as a basis for the cable which would go down on ground.

1979 : Arthur Clarke publishes this idea in "Foutains of Paradise", a book of .. science fiction.

That's clear : until 1991, it was SciFi.

Trouble with cables.
The steel wire ropes used in the traditional elevators are too heavy and not resistant enough. Indeed, in the high buildings, the main part of the weight which must raise the cable of elevator is the cable itself. Consequence, in this case: with its own weight (imagine the distance), the cable yields.


In 1991, Sumio Iijima discovers the carbon nanotube.
This nanotube finds and will find many potential uses, in many fields, especially in the idea of the space elevator. A wire of nanotube, with a diameter equal to a few millimeters, can support 40 tons!! Ok .. cable : checked.
All is good now, we just have to fix the technical details.

To build the space elevator, a satellite must be put into geostationary orbit at 35.000 kilometers of our planet. This satellite should then release a rope of nanotube in direction of the Earth all while moving towards another orbit, more raised, thus reaching an altitude of 100.000 km at the time the rope would touch the ground.

Robotized claws, supplied with a laser beam pointed from a terrestrial base towards the space, would go up along the rope by adding more fibres of nanotube to reinforce the cable carbon. The station on the ground must be based on the level of the equator, in a place with calm weather (I mean no storms) in order to prevent that the lightning does not damage the rope.

Others "little" technical issues will find their solution day after day, before 2010, on this webiste.

Now come the political details. The price of this crazy thing is around 4 billion euros (a twelfth of the price of the MIR station, okay). But who will participate ? Who will use it ?
The NASA for sure, but they're not alone : Liftport Group or even Otis !
We talk about 100€ per kilo brought to the orbital station.

A good video is much better.

sources : legoux.org, june 2004, wikipedia, seed, nasa in 2000.
for those which do not know : nanotechnology and geosynchronous orbit