Seeking beyond the rocket equation - the prospect of space elevators

Space Forward - An Interdisciplinary Podcast

English - January 31, 2021 09:30 - 1 hour - 57.2 MB
Astronomy Science Technology space astronomy planetary science moon space law astrophysics nasa esa artemis mars Homepage Download Apple Podcasts Google Podcasts Overcast Castro Pocket Casts RSS feed

Next Episode: A Space for Humanity - Ethics and Governance for Living together in the Space Age

This episode has at its core the implications of Tsiolkovsky’s rocket equation, which figures the hard limits of rocket-based payload transportation to Earth’s orbit.
Furthermore, rockets are expensive, up to failure, risky and carry too little payload.

Making rockets more efficient reminds analogically of Henry Ford’s classic:
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses”.
One of the non-rocket approaches to get a fast, cheap, safe and repeatable transport to orbit is the Space Elevator concept which we are going to cover in the episode with our guest, the amazing Josh Bernard-Cooper, a University of St Andrews Physics and Philosophy student, International Space University alumni and Research Assistant at the International Space Elevator Consortium.

CONTENT
00:00:00 Intro
00:02:00 The basic concept of a space elevator
00:12:00 Google X, NASA
00:16:00 Motivation to build elevators
00:24:00 Design concepts
00:32:00 Speed of the climber and radiation
00:34:00 Main Challenges
00:37:00 Space debris and elevator collaps
00:38:00 Best place on Earth to install the elevator
00:40:00 Beta test the elevator on Moon and Mars?
00:41:00 Optimal Altitude for beta best
00:44:00 How many people are involved?
00:47:00 Non-rocket launcher ideas
00:49:00 Fundings, Prizes, Sponsors
00:52:00 Elevator in 10 years?
00:57:00 Realists vs Futurists
00:59:00 Why a lead blanket is useful in the Elevator

SHOWNOTES

Joshua Bernard-Cooper https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshua-be…
International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC) https://www.isec.org