Re: We can meet all our needs through space development

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• From: Willie.Mookie@xxxxxxxxx
• Date: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 01:01:38 -0800 (PST)

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On Jan 30, 9:11 pm, Einar <eina...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Jan 30, 2:44 pm, Willie.Moo...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:

On Jan 29, 10:52 pm, Einar <eina...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

like
expectations of 13% efficiency not 40% as you appear to assume with
solar energy. A large difference.

While 13% was the norm in the 1980s for silicon wafers and one can
actually point to them, they are not the norm for multi-specral
wafers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectrolab

NREL has already demonstrated that multi-spectral cells exceed 40%
efficiency.

But they´re far more expensive and moreover the 40% efficiency you
were using existe only in laboratory, like I think I pointed out to
you earlier.

At high concentrations,the critical cost of dollars per watt is
actually better with these systems, which is why my company is using
them. Expense is something I've been working on for 14 years now.
Spectrolab has done studies to show they can increase production
levels to support 1.4 TW per year required to compete head to head
against conventional energy sources without government subsidy.

You should work with what is commonly available.

That's like saying 19th century man should build SSTs out of
steamships. What is commonly available today does not predict what
will be available in 5 or 10 years. That's why you need to go to the
lab and think about things based on first principle and deep
understanding - not make gratuitous statements from your gut.

I have posted this to you before, but these people have an idea of
replasing much of the fossil fule use in USA.

I gave them that idea in 1994.

"A Solar Grand Plan
By 2050 solar power could end U.S. dependence on foreign oil and slash
greenhouse gas emissions"http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-solar-grand-plan

They intend to only use cheap 13% efficiency wafers, and have made a
plan which sounds very doable within theyr stated timeframe, i.e. to
2050.

Presently 30% of all silicon produced goes into manufacturing solar
panels.
Presently solar 400 megawatts per year of solar panels are produced.
Presently humanity consumes energy at a rate of 15,000,000 MW
Presently energy use grows at 4% per annum - that's 600,000 MW

To meet all future energy needs with solar sources using conventional
solar panels within the next 15 years requires that 2,000,000 MW per
year be produced.

To meet all future energy needs with solar sources using my CPV solar
panels operating at 18% efficiency within the next 15 years,requires
that 1,400,000 MW per year be produced.

At 1x solar intensity we must produce solar panels at 5,000 times the
rate they are currently produced and produce silicon 1,500x greater
volume.

At 2000x solar intensity (using my system) wemust produce solar panels
3,500 times the rate they are currently produced and produce silicon
1.5x the rate it is being produced today.

However, the what I keep repeating to you is that, while I think your
ideas are potentially workable, the timeframe you have thrown at us is
clearly unrealistic.

Where have you done the work to support your statements?

2100 sounds like a workable timeframe for such extensice ideas.

I think starting today with an appropriate level of investment, 2035
to 2045 is a good time to complete the program I've outlined here.

Consider that this is 27 to 37 years

From 1903 to 1927 - from the first powered flight of the Wright
Brothers to Lindberg crossing the Atlantic was 24 years

From 1927 to 1947 - from Lindberg to Yeager breaking the sound barrier
- 20 years

From 1927 to 1957 - from Yeager to the first satellite Sputnik - 10
years

From 1957 to 1969 - from Sputnik to Armstrong/Aldrin - 12 years

In 1967 - the Russian space program was in tatters, it was obvious
that the US was going to make it to the moon, and LBJ cut back
severely investments in space, following up the cutbacks he made in
the 1965 and 1966 budgets - which stopped the increase in expenditures
(December 21, 1963 less than one month after Kennedy's assasination
Johnson and McNamara cut back the nuclear rocket and other nuclear
propulsion programs) - so after this period, humanity exited the fast
track to the stars while a two generations of rocket folk have become
used to slow and steady and diminishing expectations -

In an emergency the US, and other industrial nations have shown a
remarkable capacity to increase the production of things that seemed
impossible to build just a few years earlier. Consider the production
of war materiel during world war two.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_production_during_World_War_II

Following the attack on Pearl Harbor America shifted into high gear
and produced massive amounts of war goods. Most impressive to me is
the production of 141 merchant aircraft carriers in an 18 month
period.

Similar transformations can be wrought less dramatically by industry
in short periods of time.

For example in 1910 International Business Machines sold its first
computer to the US Census Bureau and predicted at that time every
industrial nation may have need of one. By 1950 IBM felt that the
Fortune 500 might have need of their powerful mainframe computers. By
1960 that was expanded to maybe 10,000 machines. Famously their
mathematical experts felt that there would always be an economy of
scale to make large-scale computing more favored over smaller
computers. Even as late as 1967 IBM still maintained that only major
corporations with annual sales over $5 million could make use of a
computer.

Actual computer now in use exceeded 1 billion by 2007 - and will
likely exceed the human population within the next 10 years.
Depending on how you define computers. Digital processors of the type
found on every remote control - exceed the capacity of early computing
platforms - and they exceeded the human population 10 years ago.

From 1967 where expert opinion could argue convincingly that fewer
than 50,000 machines would be sold worldwide - to 2007 where 500
million machines will be sold in12 months - a factor of 10,000 - in 40
years.

Why not do it here? What does it take? Appropriate levels of
investment in appropriate goals.

Anyow,
by 2050 we will probably be ready to expand solar energy production
into space.

Dude, we needed solar energy production in space in 1970... my
reasoning below.

Have you looked at the price of oil recently? In December 2004 when I
was interviewed at the White House by OSTP about energy policy, oil
was $22 per barrel, and the Saudis had announced privately they were
going off the $22 price cap. What could America do? I said fill the
Strategic Petroleum Reserve with US made synfuel from coal at $25 per
barrel - using not only my process, but the dozen other processes that
are struggling out there. This will send a signal to Wall Street and
the Saudis that if prices stay over $25 per barrel America has an
alternative. They didn't like this idea. Instead the opted for Regime
Change in Iraq promising in part to pay for it with low price oil that
people would gladly sell us at $12 per barrel.

Actually if you adjust things for inflation, you will see that ever
since oil was discovered in Titusville Pa, and ever since Rockerfellar
started refining it after the Civil War - first for lamp oil, later
for gasoline - the price of energy in the industrial world - expressed
in $ per barrel has dropped from 1860 to 1960 from $100 per barrel to
$2 per barrel. In 1940s King Hubbert, a Geophysicist that worked for
the Feds to estimate energy reserves of Germany in world war 2 -
indicated that by 1970 the US would peak in oil output and enter
secondary production, and that by 2010 the world would peak in oil
output and enter secondary production. In the 1950s expert opinion
was that nuclear power would displace chemical power by 1970 so we
didn't have to worry about it. The US entered secondary production in
1970 which produced an oil crisis and gave OPEC - which had existed
powerless in the 1940s and 50s - emerged as the arbiter of oil pricing
in the world. From 1970 through 2000 the largest most massive
transfer of wealth in the history of mankind has occurred as the US
European and Japanese populations have paid increasing amount of their
productive output for the oil needed to run their industrial plants.
In the 1970s we became the worlds largest importer. In the 1990s we
became the world's largest creditor. In 2001 we were attacked by
spoiled brats turned zealots who were spoiled by the tremendous wealth
their families earned at our expense.

Prices have risen steadily from $2 per barrel in 1960s to $100 per
barrel again. As a result, capital formation rates, industrial
productivity and industrial growth has been severely restricted - and
far lower than it might have been. Many of the rosy scenarios of the
1960s were predicated on a continuing 3.9% drop per year in energy
prices - with a continuing 8% growth in industrial output. What has
happened there has been a steady 8% rise in oil prices,while there has
been zero net growth in real terms - despite massive increases in
automation and computing capacity.

What makes you think we can wait until 2050?

If over the past 50 years (1960 to 2010) we had seen a continuation of
the 3.9% drop per year in energy prices, and a continuation of the
real 8% per year growth in industrial output - we would be at $211,000
per person per year GDP (instead of $45,000 per capita per year) and
the price of a barrel of oil would be $0.30 - THAT'S THIRTY CENTS A
BARREL!!! Our energy use would be 100 million barrels per day - just
for the US.

I´ll expect that before then there will be a time of experimentation,

Yes. That's what we're doing now.

i.e. small scale experiments with small solar powerstations,

Yes, we're experimenting with power beaming even as we speak.

experiments with beemed power, etc.

Yep,.

That´s what is allways lacking in your suggestions,,,

?

the inevitable
experimental phase.

We've been doing experiments since 2003 on this topic ... I have a
very clear program of R&D mapped out. I have funds budgeted. I have
a road map. What is your rationale to say that a 37 year program
won't see as much progress as we have seen in say - personal
computing?

By 2050 the experimental phase might be over

When do you imagine it starts?

and
we may be ready to begin your project of building them on a
significant scale - the way you suggest.

When do you imagine experiments will start? Why do you think
Spectrolab is saying what they're saying? Why do you think we're
shooting for 60% conversion efficiencies today with 6 junction cells?
Why do you think we're shooting for 85% efficiencies with diode and
free electron lasers today? lol. Why do you think we're working with
large aperture optics today?

Now, when silicon is exposed to light, what happens is determined by
the colors of the light striking it.  In the case of the sun, this is
given by the planck curve of a black body radiator operating at 5800K
- through an atmosphere that absorbs some of the energy - principally
hydrogen...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_bodyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S...

So photons that are longer or redder than 1,108 nm - don't operate the
silicon cell.  They merely heat it.

And, photons that are shorter or bluer than 1,108 nm - contribute only
the bandgap energy to the circuit. (if its properly balanced with a
load)

What happens to the extra energy?   Well, it shows up as ballistic
energy in the photons in the conduction band - yep - heating the
photocell again.

Then there's the recombination of electrons that get formed but not
picked up - this depends on temperature.

And that's not the only source of loss - there are junction losses -
resistances in the cell itself that cause current squared times
resistance (i-squared r) losses - which also causes heating.

The I-squared r losses can be reduced by reducing junction resistance
- in cells like those designed by Bob Swanson at Sunpower - or by
reducing current for a given power by increasing number of junctions
in series - in cells like those designed by Bernie Sater at Photovolt
- or by combining the two together like I do with my cells at Mok
Industries.

Keeping the silicon cool is how to reduce dark current losses.

This leaves you with ineffective photons.  The long-wave photons that
don't contribute to the cells operation - and the short wave photons
that contribute onlty the bandgap energy.

Since the planck curve graphs in the references I gave are energy per
wavelength versus wavelength - the area under the curve.

For each wavelength, take a ratio of the wavelength and the bandgap
wavelength in the case of silicon 1,108 nm - and multiply the solar
output by that ratio.  So, for example, the energy in a photon with a
wavelength of 554 nm (green) contributes only half its energy to the
operation of the circuit.  277 nm (Violet) contributes only one-
quarter its energy to the operation of the circuit. Do this across the
entire planck curve (its called convolving the silicon response curve
and the solar black body curve) - and you get what each color
contributes to the operation of the silicon cell. Now integrate the
convolved curves to get the area.   Then, finally, divide the smaller
area of the convolved curve with the larger area of the planck aka
blackbody curve - and you get a number - around 23% - with small
junction losses and temperature losses.

Now what Spectrolab did - is they combined photocells of different
wavelengths and arranged to have bandgap matched light fall on each
type - and use the output of all of them.   NREL has shown that they
operate at 40.7% efficiency with 3 bandgaps.  We are discussing
building 6 bandgap system (GaAs can be doped to change its bandgap
energy) - that is expected to have efficiencies exceeding 60% - the
practical limit seems to be 20 bandgaps - with 80% efficiencies

So, 40% has been achieved

60% is a reasonable near term research target (and the focus of
current research, visit my web site, fill out a contact form,and I
will send you a white paper)

80% is a plausible long term achievement

I quoted 40% overall...

That sounds truly like an excellent technology, but how expensive
would such cells be when compaired to those that already are in mass
production?

I answer the cost questions below. At $12 per square inch its 40x
more expensive than polycrystalline cells. Because they're able to
operate at 5,000x solar intensity - the cost per watt- which is the
central figure here to keep in mind - is less than a penny a watt.
Now, also at 5,000x solar intensity - modest production scales
translate to massive power levels. Furthermore, the scale at which
Spectralab can produce today is sufficient to meet my immediate
terrestrial needs. The scale it can produce at given sufficient
investment capital - appropriate to the value created - it can meet
the needs I outlined above.

How quickly can the price be reduced through economies of
scale?

They already produce at a price and in a volume that meets my needs -
and they can exceed expectations going forward.

Do they contain very expensive materials that will result in
them staying expensive no matter what?

You have missed a central point. My patened concentrating
technologies reduce the importance of material costs. At 5,000x solar
intensity - used in space applications - these systems are less than a
penny a watt -

These are worthy considerations. Remember you intend to use these on a
very large scale, presumably first in groundstations.

Depends on the details of the application. 5,000x solar intensity is
difficult to achieve optically with systems that are cheaply put on
the ground. 1,000x concentration - no problem - so we're sticking
with silicon for ground applications - float silicon at $1 per square
inch - yet the PV costs are on the order of a penny a watt.

The people with
the abow mentioned plan intend to make do with less sophisticated
technology, and still think that it will be possible to significantly
reduce the use of imported oil over the period to 2050.

I will make America an energy exporter again before we reach the peak
in global output..

The program I find believable assumed that it will take some years to
achieve that 13% efficiency,

40% has already been achieved, I'm funding research to see if we can
achieve 60% by doubling the number of junctions, and qualified
researchers feel that by increasing the number of junctions further
using MEMs technology - it may be possible to get to 80% ...

MEMs are a most important innovation. Clever use of manufacturing
techniques originally used in manufacture of chips, is how most of
them are made. The airbag of my car probably is activated by such a
MEM.

It is definitely activated by a MEM. MEMs has proven very important
in handling heat loads efficiently as well as managing optical
properties.

The question will the bee weather the trick of the chip makers can be
repeated, i.e. to make enough of them to shrink the prices down to
reasonable levels.

The consumer electronics industry advances a generation every 18
months. Solar applications do not need the same type of
improvements. So, the 15% of productive capacity per year that gets
tossed aside as new plants are built, are available for solar panel
producers. Someone like myself who has sponsored half a dozen
substantial solar energy projects around the world, find themselves
flush with cash to buy a handful o fthese facilities and outfit them
for production of 100 BILLION watts of panels per year - 14 plants
like these are needed to meet the need for solar panels on a scale
required to make a significant difference in the energy picture of
this planet.

Success with these early projects will translate into being a dominant
player in the world's $4 trillion annual energy market - and with 80%
margins - (I sell fuels not hardware or technology) - I will have
adequate resources to expand my base.

14 plants producing 17 sq km of solar panels a day will require 2,647
days (7 yrs 3 mos) to cover 45,000 sq km of the 100,000 sq km of land
I have optioned across the US. This is sufficient to supply 287
million tons of hydrogen each year from solar sources using my 18%
efficient solar panels. 177 million tons of hydrogen displaces 1.1
billion tons of coal in the nation's power plants - and an additional
110 million tons of hydrogen are combined by direct hydrogenation - no
burning of coal - no production of CO2 - to produce 7.7 billion
barrels of liquid fuels. This permits the US a surplus of 1.2 billion
barrels a year - which may be exported. AT $80 per barrel margin
this generates $616 billion per year. About 15% of the world's market
for energy. Microsoft rose in 15 years from nothing to challenge IBM
as the leader in computer technology, and now owns 98% of the
operating system market worldwide. These are achievable goals, given
that I have spent the past 14 years laying the ground work for the
next 16.

With this sort of revenue, what will it take to dominate the field
going forward?

There are two approaches -

1) keep doing what works - build more panels and more panel
production plants. Increase the number of terrestrial plants to 150 -
and blanket 550,000 sq km of Earth to make 3.34 billion tons of
hydrogen gas - to displace all current needs. This will be completed
in an additional 15 years- and by that time - 25 years from today -
energy use will be 266% what it is today - assuming a 4% annual
compounded increase in energy use. So, we'll control 37% of the
market.

2) do something more efficient - build solar power satellites -
allowing me to generate 20x the energy from the same terrestrial
installation - by adding 50,000 sq km of solar panels in space - while
reducing my cost per watt to less than 1 cent - and pass a portion of
that savings on to my customers to promote rapid growth in demand.
Here I will have enough power to produce 7 billion tons of hydrogen
gas per year, total demand will rise at 7% - total demand in 25 years
will be 542% - I will control 40% of the market - and make 3x the
profit.

But if expensive materials are used, or materials which supply could
cause a bottleneck,

AT 5,000x concentration possible with this technology, the bottleneck
is in the silicon operated at 1x concentration - as I showed above.

then they might stay expensive anyhow.

Yes, they will even get more expensive, but on a dollar per watt basis
- they will get less expensive due to clever optical design.

Moreover,
many of the chips have become so incredibly complex, so expensive to
develope that even though they are mass produced in great numbers, they
´re not especially cheap to purchase.

If you own the process where that is done, you will get them at cost.
The cost is on the order of hundreds of millions of dollars. To put
up a plant, especially a retooled plant purchased at a discount -
costs again hundreds of millions of dollars. The value created is
hundreds of billions of dollars. Not a bad deal.

That is importan, the price.

The dollars per watt and bottlenecks are important. concentrating
sunlight with low cost optics is a critical factor here and why that
has been a central point of my research.

If you are to persuate people to use
them.

I make a commodity - gasoline, diesel fuel and jet fuel - and sell it
at market rates. No one needs any persuasion. Getting utilities to
buy hydrogen is a different matter. I am working on a program now to
buy stranded facilities and undervalued facilities, and coal companies
with power plants - to get them off dead center - and begin the
transformation to a hydrogen economy with our coal fired plants.

Today, older tech solar cells have become cheap enough that
average people can affor to use them on a reasonable scale.

Conventional solar power made with polysilicon is an energy sink. You
need to cheaply concentrate solar energy to reverse that.

Solar
cells f.e. on the roof of a house can really shrink the electricity
bill.

Not when you count the cost of capital tied up in conventional panels
you don't.

 as current mass produced solar cells do
not achieve more than 10%,

I am mass producing CPV systems that routinely achieve 18%

At what cost when compaired with cheaper cells?

$0.07 per peak watt including all balance of system costs - when
producing hydrogen.

I can only assume that you are expecting what is now only possible in
controlled laboratory settings will become practical mass production,
which by the way is not an obvious assumption.

Lets do more than quote numbers shall we.  Lets look behind the
numbers and then we can come to some logical conclusions.

The number you give is an average based on systems that use amorphous
or polycrystalling construction.  Junction losses are extraordinarily
high in these systems.  This is deemed acceptable because they can get
their silicon at very low cost compared to pure float silicon that is
a pure crystal.

What you term - experimental or laboratory - systems have far higher
efficiency.because they use float silicon - that costs about $1 per
square inch.  This is about 3x higher in price than polysilicon
systems - but the output is less than double (14% versus 23%) -

I use float silicon - but fabricated in a way and cut into dies that
allow me to operate it at 1,000x solar intensity.  (see my web pagehttp://www.usoal.com) - this cuts the PV costs per watt way down, and
lets me operate at higher efficiencies.

Ditto with the UTJ cells from spectrolab.  They have a germanium
subtrate - and CVD epitaxially grown - GaAs and InPh layers - whose
thickness allows efficient capture of specific colors of light. These
are $12 per sq inch in quantity.

So, here's the deal; lets compare the older design, with my current
design (Patent #7,081,584 - Mook), and whats in the labs today that
I'm expecting to use on orbit tomorrow;

      sunlight - 645 milliwatts per square inch terrestrial clear day
                    881 milliwatts per square inch space earth orbit

      mass produced conventional solar panels
                     14% efficient
                        1x concentration
                     645 milliwatts per square inch solar
                      90.3 milliwatts electrical per square inch
                   $0.30 per square inch cost
                   $3.32 per peak watt (PV cost)

      Mok terrestrial PV
                      18% efficient (filtered)
                   1000x concentration
                    645 watts per square inch solar
                    116 watts electrical per square inch
                   $1.00 per square inch cost
                   $0.01 per peak watt (PV Cost)

      Spetrolab 6J PV (research)
                      55% efficient
                   5,000x concentration
                   4,405 watts per square inch solar
                   2,422 watts per square inch electrical
                  $12.00 per square inch cost
                  $0.005 per peak watt (PV Cost)

I simply must disbelieve your figures until you can give some idea how
you are arriving at them.

I have not only given you pointers to research results from one of my
vendors independently verified by government laboratories, I have
given you an insight into my current research efforts.

Thank you for that. But as your figures clearly demonstrate the newer
technologies are more expensive per square inc over to far more
expensive per square inc.

So? Its dollars per peak watt that is the critical factor. which is
why I computed it for you.

That matters a lot, when you intend to use them on a large scale

No, get your mind around the fact that you don't need as much material
when you concentrate. How do you think I got a lower dollar per watt
figure with a more expensive material? The supply problems would come
if we produced enough solar panels to meet all our needs - with
conventional panels. Not when we use concentrator systems.

Lets look at a 100 mm diameterwafer

1x solar intensity - terrestrial 1.1 watt electrical
1000x solar intensity - terrestrial 1,412 watt electrical
.5000x solar intensity - space 27,293 watt electrical

You need thousands of times more wafers to equal the capacity of the
concentrator system - so even if you pay 3 to 40 times as much for it
- you're still ahead- and your supply problems are non-existent with
the concentrator systems.

However, there is naturally the issue in what setting the planned use
is for. I wouldn´t be surpriced, once perfected and shown to be
reliable, the high energy per square inch types will dominate
installations where cost per square inch is not so great an issue but
energy produced per square inch is.

Concentrators cannot increase the intensity of sunlight - however,
higher efficiency systems do make for smaller overall systems. The
critical factor is DOLLARS PER WATT - and my systems reduce costs to
PENNIES PER WATT - so there's really no comparison.

Since you didn't bring it up, I haven't yet addressed the other big
issue - the laser efficiency, and then the efficiency of the
conversion on the ground.  Free electron lasers have achieved 30%
efficiencies 20 years ago, diode lasers routinely exceed 10%
efficiency - yet are less tunable.

http://www.frascati.enea.it/fis/lac/fel/fel2.htmhttp://www.alfalight....

The military has focused on lightweight compact applications for
years.  But both teams believe for sound and valid reasons that 80% to
85% efficiencies are achievable with a dedicated effort over the next
five years.

So, I have used those figures for my estimates here.

    sunglight --->  DC electricity      55%     55%
    DC electricity ---> laser energy  85%     47%
    laser energy ---> DC electricity  85%     40%

That´s a bit of an assumption.

What is?

By the way, the asteroid project you appear to be assuming sounds
really seriously expensive.

Cost is only one aspect, value created is the other.  So, it is
important to create more value than you spend in order to achieve your
goals.

Now, this asteroid operation is clearly an operation in which the will
inevitably have to be a testing period.

Correct.

This will necessiate a large
trained cadre of astronauts.

Yes.

This will moreover also necessiate quite
bit of EVA training of those astronauts.

Yes

This will in addition
necessiate the development of deepspace vessels,

Yes.

I´d say preferably
nuclear powered.

That is not in my planning. Reusable heavy lift launchers hydrogen/
oxygen powered, reusable heavy kick stages, hydrogen/oxygen powered,
Reusable heavy lift launchers - laser powered with hydrogen
propellant, reusable heavy kick stages hydrogen propellant laser
powered, deep space laser probe/scan, deep space laser power, deep
space laser propulsion. This is the development arc. Payloads will
be, communication satellites, telerobotics, space tourists, space
industry research, power satellites, moon based factories, mars base,
asteroidal base, near sun solar power satellite, asteroid movement,
asteroid capture, asteroid process research, test run, expansion; raw
materials, finished goods, assembled goods, agriculture, forestry,
homes.

Now, I know you have suggested beemed power over the
distance from the Sun. But that´s another development project with a
testing period all of its own, and expenses, potential bottlenecks,
etc, etc.

Yes. The communication satellite network will generate a revenue in
excess of $80 billion per year - greater than all the budgets of all
the space programs of all humanity. This covers launch infrastructure
and launch vehicle development. Capturing 15% of a $4 trillion market
generates $600 billion per year 12.5% allocated to power satellites
doubles the figure above - and develops powersatellite build out
infrastructure, and all the processes needed to support it- including
ground and flight staff.

Please note that Mercury 7 astronauts were called for in 1959 and the
first astronauts were flying in 1961. In September 1962, nine pilot
astronauts were chosen and 14 more were selected in October 1963. This
is when Armstrong came aboard. He was on the moon by 1969. 11
scientist astronauts were added to the astronaut program in 1967 and
one went to the moon in 1971. I don't see why you think it impossible
to train the right people to do the jobs asked of them.

Beemed power will require years of testing, first small scale then
large scale all of its own.

That's right and its going on today.

Now, today we may not foresee any great
difficulties. But there allmost allways are difficulties, especially
when working in an environment humans stichtly speaking still have got
very litle experience in working within.

That's true and I am speaking from experience. What are you speaking
from?

But, if we accept nuclear power for at the very least the first
generation of deep space wessels, then at least that operation´s
initial successes will not depend on the rate of development of the
other program you apparently intend to run at the same time.

The HEU that formed the heart of Nerva still exists and is at Jackass
flats under DOE control. It has been proposed for a number of
missions. I have proposed that a nuclear tug be produced using the
NEBA III reactor designed by the DOE using this material. A 5 MW
thermal reactor producing about 60 kg of thrust at a 900 sec Isp.
These can be built for about $90 million each - all we need is
approval. My bankers - First Boston - said they'd fund it if we could
be assured of launch. I went to the White House and spoke with Bill
Clinton about this and the OSTP. We didn't want to trust the nuclear
regulatory people, and the law allows the President to circumvent
regulation and permit launching of nuclear reactors into space under
his direct order. This was at the time Newt Gingrich and Clinton shut
down the government. Al Gore didn't like the idea. So the whole
thing was shelved. But, we had gotten NASA (who wanted a Pluto probe)
and the Air Force (representing NSA I think) who wanted a very capable
satelite built around our tug design, and others - along with my
commercial interest. A two-stage to orbit RLV - with an SSME in the
first stage, and four RL10 in the second stage would put an Atlas
class payload up very cheaply. The tug would stay in orbit and
basically multiply our payloads to high orbit. We'd develop automated
docking and propellant transfer methods - and a satellite bus
concept. Anyway we were going to launch Teledesic satellites - and we
had First Boston ready to issue bonds after we got approvals to launch
(with appropriate oversight of course) - I spent a year at that and it
didn't work.

Aanyway, since then I don't see anything happening with nuclear -
though NASA has been soft selling that issue with their Pluto mission
and their new probe to Jupiter. I could forsee the nuclear thermal
rocket turning into a universal space power source - first A 2 MW
electrical generator - using a Brayton cycle - powering an ion rocket
- then a general power source -for a Mars Direct sort of thing - and
lunar and mars bases and so forth. I could see the popularity robot
probes across the solar system would have - especially with
interplanetary internet - and the EPA wanted us to dispose of nuclear
rockets every so many flight cycles So every four years we'd take a
tug - dock with a scientific payload, and do a deep space mission like
the Jupiter probe proposed later by NASA... It would have been great
- but it wasn't to be.

No, I'm sticking with laser thermal and laser detonation - there might
be a case for laser ion - but that's what I'm doing in my long-range
planning.

So
different development scedules, unforseen bottlenecks need not harm
that operation as well.

Putting a nuclear power source in your planning guarantees
bottlenecks.

You need allways to be able to take such in stride.

That's true, that's why you make sure you're making money at each
step. For example I could see that no matter who developed cost
effective solar panels - certain properties would have a high value.
So, I signed options and actually got paid to sign those options.
That helped put us light years ahead of others in the solar panel
technologies we own. Now we're sponsoring energy deals around the
world. That makes us money. Next we'll actually produce synfuels -
or as I like to call them sunfuels - and that will create about $40
billion in value for my companies. This will be used to exercise
those options I spoke of and put up the factories needed and do the
other things I spoke of. Success with that will allow a massive
expansion of our R&D leading up to real power sats by 2015-2018 time
frame - and expansion to a full blown system by 2025-2030 time frame.
Along the way we'll do the other things mentioned - running up to
asteroidal capture and processing - expanding from test systems to
high value processes - to lower value as costs drop - ending
ultimately with a spaceship in every garage and a space station for
every family - while turning everyone into million dollar a year (in
real terms) income earners.

Now again about the asteroids, a test will have to be made with
capture and moving an asteroid. Now, an easy in the relative test
operation might be to attempt to move one of the asteroid that orbit
close to the Earth/Moon system around the Sun.

Its best to do it in deep space far from Earth in directions that will
never impact Earth.

Now, such tests are
very important, as you need to know weather you assumption are really
reasonable, i.e. that shining a laser can tell you enough about the
rock to be hauled in to be a practical method for future use, which
was one of the methods you mentioned.

This sort of test can be done on the moon - at sites that have already
been surveyed in detail. When you get around to actually moving
something, its best to work in the asteroid belt before attempting to
do something around Earth. Giving Mars a new moon, or changing the
orbits of Diemos or Phobos - since Phobos is falling to Mars - it
would be a candidate for 'fixing' - during a trip there. Grabbing an
asteroid from the asteroid belt and bringing it into a controlled
orbit around Mars would be another test.

You need also to test the
capture operation itself, if for no other reason that your personnel
will need such training. But also in order to develope that operation
itself.

And gain sufficient political support and answer negatives -
absolutely.

Most likely several such tests at the very least will be necessary in
order to hone the methods used. In addition as they will be necessary
for training purposes of the personnel, and therefore will need
probably to continue.

I agree. Yet, you are needlessly dismissive, and don't quote any
time frames or rationale for your attitudes.

Look at the history of lunar orbit rendezvous. Tom Dolan proposed it
in 1959 and it was championed by John Houbolt. NASA thought it too
risky, so Houbolt went outside channels and got support of it above
his immediate superiors late in 1961. This raised a shitstorm that
went right to Webb which was resolved favorably in the summer of
1962. Now, the contractors didn't know for sure that would be the
mode decided on until that summer. It wasn't until 1963 that they
started actually bending metal - and the first LEM wasn't flown until
1969 - meanwhile simulators were built and astronauts were trained -
and a test flight was made in Earth orbit in early 1969 - and by the
summer of 1969 landing on the moon.

Naturally, there are several different problems. It would require
quite a different operation to attempt to capture an asteroid which is
only a looselly bound rubble, than an one which is solid through. Each
type will need testing and training of its own.

That is correct - and each planned use and so forth. Absolutely. Did
you know there are over 100 different kinds of recovery methods for
oil well and gas well drilling? Based on the range of environmental
and geological conditions? I know this because I'm in the process of
patenting an improved recovery method and each kind has its own set of
claims. I imagine that there will be at least as many methods of
asteroidal recovery - and probably more so. So, just as you
concentrate on certain asteroids at first, you also concentrate on
certain high value supply chains at first. I'm not saying nickel is
going to be the one - that would be premature - but nickel does come
from deposits that came from meteorite falls. Nickel is a well know
strategic material that will be highly valued in an economy whose
energy supplies are growing. So, that may be the very first supply
chain we will augment. That means we enter strategic relations with
major nickel marketers and enter off-take contracts with them- this
gives us details - very specific details about what sorts of nickel or
nickel ore is useful to them - and then, that informs the whole
process. Repeat this process hundreds of times across hundreds of
materials and you get an idea of what its going to take to transfer
our resource base for strategic materials off world.

Once you have exhausted the opportunities in filling the supply chains
for raw materials- you add processes to deliver processed goods -
instead of iron ore for example, you ship steel. then you fabricate
steel parts for example, then you create finished goods - assembled
goods - then agriculture - then forestry products - then homes as I
said.

I expect this beginning phase to take from 15 - 20 years,

Why? When we went from nothing in 1959 to the moon in 1969? That
was a bit leap in far less than 20 years.

concervative expectation. All through that time these personnel would
have to be maintained, the scientists paid theyr salaries,
etc...something you are familiar with.

Yes. It took Sony nearly a decade to develop the trinitron tube and
bring it market. It took HP nearly a decade to develop the inkjet
printer and bring it to market. It took Intel nearly a decade to
develop IC technology and bring it to market. Why do you think it
would take longer than this to do any of the steps I speak of ??

The ships themselves would also
be expensive.

So? The critical aspect is the value they create relative to their
cost.

It would be cheaper to send small ion
powered probes to check on the asteroids.

Cheaper than what?   Please explain how you analysed the program and
come to this conclusion.  Recall, that we precede dispatching the
probes with a terrestrial program of observation, and follow it up by
dispatching crews to the selected asteroids for processing.

What powers the ion engines in your suggested approach?  I use beamed
laser energy.

What makes you think an ion engine is superior to a laser engine of
the same specific impulse but higher thrust to weight?

I am building an infrastructure to carry out a program.  Does the use
of ion engine technology assist in that?  If so how?  Why is it
superior to laser propulsion systems that have equal specific impulse
and higher thrust to weight?

The ion engines using solar cell power, are a tried and tested system.

What size collector area are you contemplating? What thrust levels?
What power levels? A solar powered system driving an ion engine in
the asteroid belt at high specific impulse - would take decades to
maneuver itself,, and totally incapable of doing anything significant
in a reasonable time. Augmented by laser energy from Earth things
improve. Using laser energy to energize propellant directly - thrust
to weight improves dramatically.

That´s what they have going for them.

So you ARE suggesting we build SSTs out of steamships! lol If it
cannot meet the needs of the mission - then they're not suitable.
Sorry. I don't care how reliable they are. When building for the
future, why not use technology appropriate to the task? Ion engines
especially solar powered lack the thrust toweight and total thrust to
be an effective propulsion platform fo rthe mission I am
contemplating.

Thus they will clearly be
relativelly cheap,

Not really - because there is no commercial demand for ion engines to
start out with, whereas by the time I envision my laser kick stage to
be built - there will be significant commercial demand for beamed
power and I will have developed a laser powered booster to increase
rate of power satellite deployment..

especially if massproduced.

Yes that always helps.

So many could be made.
That means theyr use will not depend on the development scedules of
all the other systems you intend to be developing.

That is true of any system - even laser propulsion systems - which
have higher thrust to weight.

Remember, you are
planning to do this all in the incredibly short period till 2050.

Yes.

So,
I presume that all developmens scedules more or less have to run at
the same time.

Well, there is some staging - but yes.

So, to safe time ion engined probes can be put into production right
now,,,for all what it´s worth.

No, my research with laser propulsion and other's research results
have indicated that this is a very interesting technology to develop -
especially if you have 20 GW laser power satellites on orbit to drive
them.

In addition, you idea for Earth observation necessiated apparently the
construction of number of sites. Those are not cheap.

I stated, that $30 million per year over 3 years will get me the data
I need. A continued funding of $3 million per year thereafter
provides a continuing stream of scientific and commercial data about
small bodies.

Depending though
on the size of the observatories you have in mind.

A complete survey of the 300,000 known objects that might fit our
preliminary criterion.

But, as you intend
them to give the best idea possible from over here, they sound like
expensive large mirrors to achieve the necessary resolution of such
tiny at that distance objects.

olbi -optical long baseline interferometry - I have a whole research
lab dedicated to advanced optics. As part of the power beam control
and so forth for the proposed power sats. One of the side issues that
our technology is capable of doing is creating optical long baseline
interferometry using optical fibers between commercial telescopes - a
quite modest array properly outfitted can create quite good images
according to our models. We'll see. Furthermore, we will be building
big optical systems - so, this is an important feature - and building
a modest ground system from scratch - is a good way to train and get
competent before doing stuff on orbit. We don't want to be like TRW
with Hubble do we? lol.
.

Now, such observatories can cost
several billion apiece.

Depends on the details. We think we can build an adequate system for
about $75 million - and staff it for $3 million per year.

So, ion engined probes while slow can be a cheap in the relative
option.

They're too slow to meet my mission requirement if solar powered.
they will never get approval to fly if nuclear powered. they might
work if laser powered, but that option is as risky technically as a
laser propulsion system having the same performance and higher thrust
to weight. So, you see my thought process here.

They, I emphasize, may be means to grant your project the
necessary capability of surviving unatticipated development
bottlenecks...

There are about 300 open issues in the last white paper completed on
this program There were no show stoppers - just variables in the
budgets and time frames. My goal is to push people to achieve on a
schedule thats realistic but gets done before they retire and collect
pensions.

that when designing completelly new space based systems
are considered allmost inevitable by reasonably zynical space people.

As I said, the experience in the last two generations of space people
have made them cynical - and unrealistically pessimistic. Those are
the types who will not be working on my projects.

Remember, laser propulsion is a separate developmen program.

ITs best to think in terms of skill sets. Laser power beaming - laser
energy conversion - and so forth.

Most
certainly, it would be one of the necessary tests of such a system
during its development phase to test it on something,

Yes - there are laser thermal, laser detonation, laser electrics...
All have been bench tested in my labs.

so some of the
probes might be launched away from Earth by a laser in Earth orbit.

They'll be flown on Earth first, and first flight tested in kick
stages on the reusable launcher - and later adapted to power the
reusable launcher fleet itself - increasing flight rates from once
every two weeks to four flights per day.

After all they´d need to be
observed close up, as you appear to realize.

Of course - but you don't need to observe all of them close up.  Then
you need to process those you finally select.

But a swarm of small probes can speed things up, and increase your
chances of actually getting things done in time.

Swarm? How many are in a swarm? I mentioned that 1,000 probes would
be sent to survey 6,700 asteroids picked from 45,000 that are selected
from 300,000 to start. 1,000 probes and 6,700 targets is an
unprecedentedly large number of targets in the history of space
travel. Its like the Normandy invasion or something. So, I don't
know what you find about that that makes it seem its not enough in
your book! lol. This may seem like a lot, but this will be built on
the heels of sending up 660 comsats to create a wireless network for
Earth (and earn enough $$ to fund everything else on the space side)
- so 1,000 satellites immediately following that - would just be the
thing to keep the production lines busy. This would pre-date the
construction of power satellites on a massive scale - while the power
satellites were being tested.

The problem with Earth
observatories is that at the distance we are talking about, the pixels
have become pretty large.

I have some options on land in Chile in the atacama region - its one
of the sunniest places on Earth and it will be a fantastic solar panel
site to feed HVDC electricty to a wire running the entire length of
Chile.  Chile is sort of like 4 Californias stacked end to end..
right on the Pacific.  A perfect place for the baby boomers to retire
- provided there is enough power and infrastructure to support them.
A beachside house for everyone.

Atacama desert also has an astronomical observatory.

http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/May06/Atacama.Giovanelli.html

An advanced terrestrial telescope system is easily placed there -
built around large numbers of commercially available telescopes -
operated with AI/automatically - using a variety of optical techniques
to create an optical vlbi as well as adaptive optics - a new approach
I've developed to remove the atmosphere effects -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tip-tilt_mirrorhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_optics

Those methods of cancelling out athmosphere effects, like you rightly
point out are new. The observatories that are using them indeed are
all new or much renovated. Many of them can even be controlled through
the internet by someone with access. I have spent years chatting with
astronomers,,,so this isn´t an entirelly unfamiliar territory.

I have been a research associate as a graduate student to several
astronomers so I have hands on experience with this stuff.

These methods remember have limitations.

So? You need to be more specific if you want to make that into an
objection.

They work best if you look
through the athmosphere the shortest distance out of it and it´s
better to have less of it abow your observatory than more but that´s
true of all observatories. Still, the more of the athmosphere you are
looking through the less effective the adaptive obtics are in
cancelling out the disturbance.

There's a cosine function to the error term. Other than the error
term being larger at higher angles, what other limitation do you see?
There are basically two methods in wide use - one is to have a
reference star and remove twinkle, the other is to scatter laser
energy from the atmosphere directly - and read the phase changes
needed - there are methods that have not been used in optics that take
advantage of interferometric techniques between two observers of the
same point - fact is, I know by experiments already in the can we can
take great pictures of asteroids sufficient for our needs.
.

That has created the contraint that
the observatories have been limited the angles of view.

You are quoting papers published early in the art - you are not making
accurate predictions of even where we are today let alone where we
will be in two to three years.

So even the best of them will only give a
very rough idea what to expect.

You are talking out of your gut - not out of a sound knowledge base.
Are you familiar with the Rayleigh limit in optics?  It tells you what
sort of resolving power you get for a given apeture at a given
distance.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_telescope#Angular_resolution

Ar = 1.22 lambda / D

Optical telescopes can be joined by optical fibers, synchronized by
laser pulses and using holographic techniques,to create synthetic
apetures that are very large, even while the elements are mass
produced.   So a modest array of telescopes in the Atacama desert can
do quite a lot to observe asteroids.

But those will not have adabtive optics.

Yes they will.

Mind you it doesn´t matter
how many scopes you gather together in that fashion.

Yes it does.

There is still a
limitation in how much resolution you can get.

Yes - but that resolution is adequate.

What a large group of
scope can enable you is to gather a lot of light,

Please read about very long baseline interferometry - and the
reconstruction of phase information. Also a little information theory
about the same signals coming from the same source along different
paths with different errors in each - there is a way to average out
errors accumulated in this way - assumig a random process.

which mean you can
observe either of the to; very faint objects or very distant ones.

Obviously you can configure a mulit-dimensional system in a number of
ways for a number of effects. You have failed to show by any rational
means - by computing for instance the limits you speak of - to support
your dismissive commentary.

But the asteroid are so small at the distance,

How small?

there is no way even
with huge constellations of observatories, to observe theyr surfaces

??? Cornell has already using microwave vlbi to image the surface of
asteroids in the belt!!! Didn't you look at the references I
gave?? sheez.. The Rayleigh limit is linear with respect to
wavelength. Say we use 1,000 nm wavelengths - these are 1 million
times longer than the microwave wavelengths used in the Cornell
picture - this means we can have baselines 1 million times shorter -
so intead of 5,000 km - we're talking 5 meters - to get the same
resolution. 50 meters improves resolution 10x. 5 km improves it
1000x. There are limits due to the atmosphere - but choose the right
wavelength, apply adaptive optics - and noise cancellation tricks -
and we should be able to produce maps as good as that already being
produced and likely 10x better. We're talking an optical setup that's
reliably operating with an effective aperture of 5000 meters!!!!
We'll do this for about $75 million in hardware, and continue
operating it at $3 million per year ---

in except the most rough manner. Like I said, the pixels are to large
in the relation to the size of the objects being observed.

Depends on your apeture dog. That's why I gave you the formula.
Without numbers you don't make any sense. I gave you a picture of an
asteroid. Lets leave out atmospheric disperson for a minute and just
do the apeture computation. Lets say we're operating at 1 micron
wavelength with a 50 meter diameter - constructed by VLBI - in the
optical range - we're getting accurate phase information over optical
fibers that are tying the imaging systems together. and the
atmosphere is effectively removed by adaptive and other techniques for
anything 20 degrees above the horizon - so we've got a 140 degree
field of regard above our heads - what's the smallest spot we can see
1.499 AU away? (Ceres orbit 2.499 AU, Earth orbit 1.000 AU -
difference 1.499 AU)

That's 223.85 billion meters -

Ar = lambda / D = 1e-6 / 5000 = 2e-10 radians - 44.77 meters diameter
airy disk at 1.499 AU.

What you need to do is to bring the mirrors in closer like can be done
with spaceprobes.

Two satellites similar to hubble connected by an open optical laser
link (rather than fibers) can replicate what I describe here in space
- without the atmospheric distortion- at about 50x the cost ($3,8
billion) - but we need to do the Atacama tests first. Then after we
do the VLBI hubble style tests on orbit - then, we will have the
skills and background to take the next step reliably - sending probes
to the asteroid belt.

Then you don´t need a very large mirror, only a very
well made one. A superhighgrade camera.

Correct.

Microwaves have far longer wavelengths, but operated at far larger
distances - vlbi - very long baseline interferometry - can achieve
remarkable results in the microwave region

http://www.news.cornell.edu/releases/Aug99/AsteroidPix.bpf.html

LOL, and Arecibo is well large.

Arecibo didn't take this picture alone it was constructed by very long
baseline interferometry - which was the point.

You were proposing constructing a
number of observatories.

YEs.

The asteroid in question was only at the
distance of 5,3 million miles.

Yes.

It was therefore very much closer to
the Earth than the asteroids in the asteroid belt.

About 1/50,000th the distance.

"The astronomical unit (AU or au or a.u. or sometimes ua) is a unit of
length approximately equal to the distance from the Earth to the Sun.
The currently accepted value of the AU is 149,597,870,691 ± 30 metres
(nearly 150 million kilometres or 93 million miles)."

Please don't talk down to me - I gave you previously distances to
Ceres as a representative of the asteroid belt - in terms of AU - I
have computed rayleigh limits of various VLBI systems in the optical
range using AU - where do you get off talking to me like this?
Obviously you cannot respond usefully to the topic at hand so seek to
act as some sort of expert by your tone. How many years have you been
in grad school working your ass off as a research associate for an
astronomer? I know what the hell I'm talking about - I'm answering
your questions because you obviously don't know what the hell your
talking about - so don't talk to me like that.

Near Earth asteroids are those that orbit within the distance of a
single astronomical unit from Earth. Naturally those in  groups can be
imaged from surface based observatories.

The point is how it was done sir. It was done through VLBI. The
Very Large Array is an example of how groups of telescopes can be
joined in this way. The same can be done with optical telescopes by
developing certain skills - and since those skills are important to
the development of open optical data communications in space, and
inthe development of power beaming from space - they're the focus of
our early efforts in this development arc.

But that´s quite another
thing when we are talking about those the orbit witin the asteroid
belt propers,,,the pixels are to small or to large, whichever way you
prefer to think it.

You keep repeating the same fuzzy thinking and handwaving - why not
sit down and compute the requirements of a system? I have just shown
that two quite modest off-the-shelf telescopes modified with 5 km of
optical fiber and appropriate adaptive optics could theoretically
resolve objects to 50 meters at the asteroid belt when viewed from
Earth. What are you talking about?

A $30 million per year terrestrial program can achieve the goals I
have for it in 3 years according to the universities that I have
spoken with - continued funding of the equipment at a far lower level
- will allow it to continue finding new asteroids and mapping them to
the same degree.

Universities naturally want your money.

Please quit talking to me like I'm a damned fool.

But mapping them, will
probably mean mapping theyr orbits, in theyr speak, not theyr
surfaces...

Both will be attempted. Again, you're talking down to me for no
damned good reason. Your the one who hand waves and refuses to say
precisely what your objections are. Why the hell do you talk to me as
I I'd spen $75 million without looking very seriously at it first?
sheez.

as tha´s clearly not possible at the distance involved

Why? Give me the reasoning and the computations that show why its
impossible? I gave you an estimate of what I think is possible with
the system I'm developing.

except in very, very roughest outlines and then only with the very
largest.

Now you're waffling because you don't know, because you didn't do the
work to back up your statements. not good.

Depends on the details friend.

Lets say images of surfaces from Earth are low resolution as you
assert without any proof or computation - even though I gave you all
the details - lets say that's true anyway. Computing the orbits of a
large number of objects in great detail and then recomputing those and
going back and recomputing them on a regular program gives you an
interaction figure for the population - this identifies unknown
objects it also begins to estimate mass. Total reflectivity begins to
estimate size. All this without images of the type I showed you.
Next we illuminate them with a known wavelength and see what happens.
That gives you an estimate of total brightness at that wavelength,
which can give you a better estimate of size. We can do spectral
analysis as we pass a razor blade across the image - and note any
shift of spectrum - do this for several orientations - to estimate
spin and speed of spin. Same thing with a tuned laser pulse swept
across the object while we're looking at it. All this without
images. then, if we can focus the beam of the laser sufficiently -
and this requires optics 5 km or more in size - which is obviously
built around one of our 7 km diameter collectors - as a fresnel plate
- orbiting some distance from the 100 m diameter laser emitter - so
clearly it wil be done AFTer we have built the sort of very near term
system i'm describing - we focus 20 GW onto a spot 50 meters across -
that vaporizes part of the surface - and the spectrum of the emission
is analyzed to get a read on composition - and the orbit is computed
again after to determine any changes to get a really accurate idea of
total mass...

thats a lot of data without pictures.

but I think we'll get reasonable pictures and do more with them than
you suggest here - and then we'll orbit two or more hubble style
telescopes - capable of operating vlbi fashion and outclass anything
the hubble planetary camera has produced.

This before we beam energy to the asteroids - which develops other
skill sets - needed to power stuff and propulsion units at the
asteroid belt.

Of course sending sensible energy to an asteroid and observing the
effect on the ground - is a far larger program. Yet, assuming power
satellites on orbit feeding energy to terrestrial systems on Earth -
it is easy to see what sort of optical upgrades are required to make
spots on asteroidal surfaces that can produce jets.

Oh, so you were actually thinking about blasting them with lasers from
over here. Yeah, indeed that would call for some incredible focusing
of the laser in order so that the beem will not become far, far to
wide at that distance.

Yes the same 7 km concentrator needed for the power sats, could hold a
fresnel plate the same size some distance form a 100 m laser emitters
for a 20 GW station. This would permit making 30 to 50 m diameter
spots on an asteroid. This would allow us to build capailities to
beam power to laser propulsion and laser powered systems in the
asteroid belt.

Wow...really. That will be gigantically expensive.

It would cost about $9 billion

You are talking
about a huge focusing system.

7 km diameter - the same size as the $4.5 billion 20 GW solar
powersat.

Ultra precision

Yes.

well beyond anything
possible today.

No

Orbital mind you.

Yes

Will have to be shielded against
micrometeroids, one hit could ruin the whole thing.

No.

Think in terms of
hundreds of billion.

Why? The budget I have is $9 billion based on the development
programfor the power sats. Although if all the stuff were custom
built specifically for the system I described, it would add up to
about $45 billion by that time - but those other things would be
paying their way.

REcall I have a $175 billion a year space budget by investing 12.5% of
my energy revenues in payloads and 82.5% odd of my comsat revenues in
space launch. Of this $175 billion per year - $35 billion per year is
to develop new capabilities and capacities and $10 billion is
fundamental research on things I think are worth doing.

Admittedly the alternative is also super expensive, i.e. a trained
cadre of astronauts. Deep space vessels. But those you will have to
use aniway.

Yes, but you will use fewer of them more efficiently and get the job
done quicker because you spent a few tens of billions to gather data
about the task you need to do before hand.

The problem with rubble piles is that they can´t be shifted, lest they
come apart.

Why not?  Explain your reasoning.  Consider that you're in zero
gravity.  So, shifting a loose load under those conditions -
especially one that is gravitationally bound already - is not the same
as doing the same thing on Earth under one gravity. So, lets start
right there.

Eeer...we are talking about a very small levels of gravity.

Yes. I know that. That doesn't explain your reasoning. I compute
elsewhere you move 85 microns per second per second with my system
that's 8.5 micro-gees - I was off by a factor of 9.82 haha... The
surface gravity of Ceres is 28,000 microgees. The size of the
asteroids are such that the surface gravity is only a small fraction
of the acceleration - so how will something like that come apart -
especially if you use gravity tug?

Obviously it won't. Again, I'm talking about things I've done the
hard work of figuring out, and you're dismissing it without any basis
whatever - and saying offensive things to me besides.

Quit talking down to me.

Meaning

I know the gee forces involved sir, I computed them for you - so why
are you talking to me as if I don't know this? You're the one who
doesn't know what he's talking about. Consider you have said that
rubble piles cannot be moved. no numbers. no work to actually figure
it out. I have done the work, I have read the literature, and I have
built a program preliminary program - based on that work.

that if say you happened to be standing on the surface,
hypothetically, then simply jumping would launch you into orbit.

or to escape sure - but while it may make you feel superior to say
such things to me- first off - i am well aware of that, secondly, it
has nothing at all to do with the relative accelerations needed for
the mission and the acceleration limits of the rubble piles you keep
throwing up for no reason.

The gravity is to small to compact them together.

So? Its large enouhg to hold them together if accelerated by a
gravity tug at 8.5 microgees - and that's fast enough to get you into
a hohmann transfer orbit to earth in a few months.

So they are very
loselly bound.

you keep saying that as if you hadn't said it before. loosely bound
is not a technical description. 8.5 micro gees acceleration is.
gravity tug is. 28,000 microgee surface gravity is.

That astronomers know as a fact, as many of them even
the metallic ones have smaller density than water..

I know. MAny but not all - that's the point. Since even a modest
high density metallic asteroid can be useful those are one class we'll
be looking for.

.which can only be
explained if there are large empty space within due to them being so
looselly bound together that theyr material isn´t actually compaced at
all.

Yes, you have said this about a thosuand times - you have yet to make
any rational conclusion to support your contention that loosely bound
objects cannot be moved period. Fact is they can be moved if they are
moved by gravity tug - at gee forces far less than their surface
gravity. the big issue is, or one issue, is are the gee forces needed
to navigate reliably smaller or larger than the surface gravity? the
answer is - they're smaller. 28,000 versus 8 - pretty big
difference. What do you say to that - cause i already gave you
numbers. You say nothing useful - and talk to me like I don't know
the range of things involved. I GAVE YOU THE NUMBERS DOG - don't talk
down to me.

Yeah really, they would come apart. You can trust that.

Not if they're falling freely toward another object at rates far less
than their surface gravity - sheez. Add dynamics to your list of
courses you freshen up on. sheez.

For example, you could get a dense metallic asteroid orbiting nearby,
attach a thruster to it, and use the metallic asteroid as propellant
and a gravity 'tug' - to pull both back to Earth - at reasonable gees
in reasonable times.

Even the metallic asteroids will not be used to acceleration.

why? Not all the metallics are rubble piles - some are quite dense.

I´m
talking about those that are solid through. They will have been stable
in theyr environment for billions of years. You absolutelly don´t want
to begin to shift them with high acceleration.

WHO SAID ANYTHING ABOUT HIGH ACCELERATION? I said 85 microgees - and
that's even 10x higher than needed 8.5 microgees is just fine.

In such a case even
they might come apart.

Any gravititationally bound body will come apart when tidal forces
exceed surface gravity - that's what the Roche limit is all about.
Surface gravity on an asteroid is small - Ceres is 0.028 gees - that's
28,000 microgees. To execute an 8 km/sec delta vee in 36 months (most
of this is at perihelion by the way) requires 8.5 microgees - well
below the surface gravity of Ceres. In fact 3,500 times less -
clearly I could move a drop of water 1 km in diameter by the methods
and at the rate i'm talking about. So, why do you keep saying the
same offensive dismissive and bone-headed thing over and over again
like I'm not hearing you.

Remember these are rocks that are in space. Never have seen any
athmosphere. Theyr qualities are not identical to rocks you can
observe here on Earth.

This I know as well. Recall I mentioned that some may need refletive
coatings to protect themon their journey. i said that for this
reason.

Then, consider that taking the asteroids apart is a step in the
process using them to build stuff.   Since the rubble piles are
already broken apart, it seems that part of the work is already done.

Will be very tricky to shift them any.

Why? Specifically why will the process i've described not work?
Asteroids affect one another. Find one that's the right density and
consistency, and use it to deflect others by gravitational
interaction.

But, a factory ship might be
able to use an one if the ship would first travel to each of them.

These things are all in free fall - we have days weeks months to do
things - its not like loading a ship in port. But we do not have
decades and centuries to do things - that's the point.

Then either of the two tugs could move the product gradually over to
Earth or solar sail could be attached to each cargo item independently

Solar sails like solar powered ion rockets lack sufficient thrust to
do things in time frames of less than a century - unless you're
talking about sample return - then small size doesn't matter. If you
are talking about maintaining a mass flow rate to keep everyone fed
and clothed and so forth - then size does matter and solar sails don't
cut it.

and then that could cruise ever so gradually over to Earth.

How gradually? You got numbers? That's my trouble with you -
especially irritating when you take a superior tone that is totally
unjustified.

Solar
sails as is known can either of the two cruise on solar energy alone
or they can be speeded up with lasers.

Yes, but the energy requirements to match mass flow rates - which is
the important criterion for doing things cheaply - are 100,000s of
times greater - so, since even at pennies per watt a factor of
100,000 adds too much to the cost. That is, using propellant mass
saves so much energy its worth it - in creating systems that operate
at low enough costs to make a difference to even the poorest people on
Earth.

There's a difference between a sample return mission - and something
that makes a difference in people's lives every day.

You keep mentioning costs - people today spend something like $4.5
trillion per year on food. The US spends $1.5 trillion per year on
food - as the global economy grows, this is likely therefore to grow
to $33 trillion a year - over time - so, with a 30% margin - and 10x
earnings valuation - the ag satellite system is worth $100 trillion -
so investing $100 billion to develop the skills needed to build it -
seems well worth the effort - if it can be done in a reasonable time.
That is, high risk developments need to get something like a 40%
compounded rate of return. A 1000 to 1 return must be delivered in
less than 20 years to maintain this rate. So this is the time frame
to get a return on this scale of investment. Of course earning
revenue along the way and reinvesting a portion of it, reduces the out
of pocket costs dramatically - even while a trillion dollars or more
are spent over that same 20 year period.

An alternative type of operation, but quite possible.

The same rayleigh limit that you seem to be talking about in your
griping about imaging asteroids or sending up a flare of material from
asteroids - limits the ablity to transmit energy to laser light sails
at the asteroids from Earth - so, your enthusiasm here is inconsistent
with your abject lack of enthusiasm for the other things I mentioned.

You´d need some sort of a factory ship on the spot, is my
expectation.

I said you'd need to dispatch crews to the asteroids you selected to
process them for return.   Since it takes about 7 years on a hohmann
transfer orbit to bring back an asteroid, and a year or a year and a
half at each end to accelerate them - you'll have time to do quite a
bit of work en-route.

But an alternative is for the refined ore to cruise on a solar sail of
its own towars Earth.

Solar sails don't produce enough thrust at the asteroid belt to
maintain the mass flow rate needed for economic operation. Laser
power requirements are 200,000x greater than for an optimal performing
rocket also laser powered.

A very economic operation it would appear.
Hohmanns transfer can be made with low thrust.

Power cost more money than propellant in the asteroid belt, so
optimizing power levels is critical to economic success. I already
said energy is optimal when exhaust speed equals delta vee. For a
given mass flow rate this means lowest power. Using photons directly
you divide the power level by the speed of light after multiplying by
two. This is a huge factor. In the case of a rocket's power, you
divde by the exhaust velocity squared. - and since its far far lower
than the speed of light the factor is far larger - meaning less power
is needed for a given propulsive effect.

You appear not to consider solar sails as propulsion method,

I considered it and rejected it because the thrusts are too low to
meet my requirement that it take less than 18 months to impart the
required delta vee to the targets.

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/glenn/testfacilities/Sailing_on_Sunbeams....

But, you really want to accelerate asteroids gently.

I know - surface gravities are measured in hundreds to thousands of
microgees - and practical acceleration rates are 8 to 10 microgees (I
did the calculations inmy head before and forgot a factor of 10 for
g0) - and solar sails accelerate these masses in the nanogee range.
meaning centuries of navigation at these power levels or alternatively
return kilogram levels of samples - but nothing sufficient for
industry.

So solar sails
really would be ideal.

They seem so until you actually do the work needed to analyze their
performance.

Anyhow, we have time enough. The asteroids aren
´t going anywhere.

But we are. To make this system work requires humans. Human may self
destruct in their battle over limited resources. All species live
within a range. When they overpopulate their range there is a die
off. Those that remain live at a lower level than before the die off.

Humans are unique in that they use technology to extend their range.
Lowland apes without shelter or clothing could never live in temperate
or polar regions. But with technology large populations exist in
ranges for which humans are not naturally suited.

Over the past 100,000 years humans have learned to be more cooperative
than other large mammals because through cooperation they have been
able to develop new resources in the frontier by working together
using technology that creates an extension of their range - to create
a frontier that enriches and informs the center.

Our mythic structures reflect this fasicnation with the frontier.
Mythic heroes routinely transcend the mundane to enter a transcendant
realm where they discover a great secret that is returned to mundane
reality and becomes a great boon to humanity.

The frontiers of Earth ended with Captain Cooks circumnavigation of
the world. The world has become increasingly embattled and
competitive in the time since. Without a new frontier which has a
realistic chance of making huge differences in our resource situation
- on a time scale needed by us - we will go to war over limited
resources remaining on Earth and this war will be nuclear. Those who
have the least to lose, will be the first to use nuclear weapons.
Once a few nukes are set off - there is no convincing reason they will
not be used in larger numbers. In the end the carrying capacity of
Earth for humans will be significantlyreduced, our tenure as a
technical species will end. Our ability to carry out this program
will no longer exist.

The asteroids will certainly still be there.

We may not - not as a technical species with a proclivity to cooperate
to develop the frontier.

Even if we survive, and reestablish our technical capacity - the die
off will have changed us - and we will likely be even less cooperative
than we are today - so it is extremely unlikely that we would even
entertain such programs of grand cooperation at that time. we may not
even think of it.

Low power equals low thrust equals long mission times.   This may be
acceptable for missions like planetary defense where you locate an
asteroid that will collide with Earth in 206 years and then dispatch a
solar sail to take 100 years to modify its orbit - and its orbit is
earth crossing so its spends time closer to the sun than Earth.

They can be speeded up with your beemed power,

Not if i can't make a jet appear in my telescope.

in which case theyr
thrust will depend on the power of your laser.

Yes, and a laser light sail needs 200,000x the energy of a rocket to
develop the same thrust to maintain the same mass flow rate.

In addition, as the
target will be far larger than your intended one, i.e. the backend of
whatever unit you intend to do the accelerating,

So? What makes you think that uneven illumination or wasting power is
a good thing?

the problem of
focusing the beem will be more managable presumably.

I'd be more impressed if you even acted like you could carry out a
calculation to support that statement. I have given you all the tools
you have ignored them. I must conclude you don't know what I'm
talking about - which means you don't know what you're talking about.

It is unacceptable for something you want to get done to feed all the
people of Earth before 2040 operating at distances where light levels
are only a small fraction of what they are at Earth.  It als is
unacceptable if you want to earn a profit in your lifetime.

There is no reason to decide to feed all the people of Earth by that
time in that fashion.

Yes there is. There's money to be made. Look, lets say I tap into
the power of the sun to end energy shortages on Earth and get energy
prices under control. That means the global economy will undergo a
big surge. That means higher incomes. That means more demand for
stuff. The average US citizen consumes 11x of EVERYTHING compared to
the average citizen of Earth. WHERE WILL IT COME FROM IN A GROWING
ECONOMY? It won't come from Earth. And that's just a modest point.
The average millionaire in the world - and there are 9.5 million of
them with a total net worth of $40 trillion - these folks on a per
capita basis consume 220x that of the average person in the world.

Imagine a global economy booming at 10% growth per annum
compounded.in 25 years everyone will be demanding resources at the US
per capita rate.in 57 years everyone will be demanding resources at
the rate of today's millionaires. That's 2033 - and 2065
repsectively. I backed it off to 2045 for the US level - because I
didn't think we could do it quicker. BUT IT WILL DEFINITELY BE
NEEDED.

Failure to resolve these resource issues will create an economic
downturn that will lead to war, and in the nuclear age, especially
with loose nukes in terrorist hands - will lead to the decimation of
our current world industry and the end of our capacity as a space
faring people for generations and perhaps permanently.

We have lived over here quite comfortably for a
long time.

That is correct, but our demand on the planet has grown exponentially
until the 1960s, then real growth stopped due to energy shortages -
and that created our current system of allocating pain away from the
so called 'great powers' which created discontent among the havenots -
which resulted in acts of terror against those self same great
powers. The demands of india and china are unsustainable by any
resources available on Earth. Strong global growth made possible by
unlimited low cost energy - run into major roadblocks because of
shortages that are sure to appear in other strategic materials. Once
we start harvesting off world resources, this is a natural development
arc to continue. To maintain economic growth rates at 8% to 10% per
year - we need to be getting most of our resources off world -
assuming no major die off- and increasing longevity.

I reckon that if food produced in space in the fashion you suggest
becomes economic, then it will be imported to Earth. That way, large
tracts of land currently used for food production could be given back
to nature,,,yet the population would essentially stay put.

Yes - that will occur over a 30 to 40 year period - however continued
improvements in space travel techniques will mean that food satellites
will be joined by forest satellites and those will be joined later by
space homes...

Ceres is a good representative asteroid.  Its the biggest and the
first one discovered.  It has a semimajor axis of 2.76AU - that means
that the sunlight on Ceres is only 13.1% of that on Earth.  So, you'll
need 7.6 times the sail area at Ceres as you need on Earth to get the
same level of thrust - or get 1/8th the thrust as you do on earth -
and what takes a day to do on Earth with a solar sail - will take a
week on Ceres. since power level equates to thrust - thrust is very
low.

Thrust and specific impulse and power are related.   Solar sails use
photons, the specific impulse is infinite since no propellant is used
- but the power needed to produce a Newton of thrust is tremendous.
Using laser energy generated in Earth orbit from sunlight, and beaming
that reliably to a thruster in the asteroid belt, to move material
around  - can operate at a wide range of specific impulses.  Either as
a laser light sail - with infinite specific impulse or energizing a
portion of the asteroidal mass.  What specific impulse do we need?
The answer is, the one that has the least cost and time associated
with it.  And that is, the one where the specific impulse has the
exhaust speed equal delta vee.  For a hohmann transfer orbit from
Ceres this is around 800 sec Isp.

I would like to keep Ceres undisturbed.

Why?

The fact is that moving it
would disturb the rest of the asteroid belt in a hard to predict
fashion.

Why? Its rather easy to predict. Besides, we only need a small
fraction of

After all Ceres is a large percentage of the overall mass of
the asteroid belt.

A reason to develop it. It is easier to explore completely than the
moon. It has greater volume of materials than is available in the
CRUST of the Earth... check it out... Its easier to mine than the
Earth.

9.46e20 kg total mass of Ceres - 1.27e20 kg - mass of the entire
Earth's crust to a depth of 100 meters (including all the area under
the oceans!!) - The mass of Ceres is 2 billion times greater thant
all the 1000 fragments each 1 km in diameter (I'm assuming a spherical
fragment) put together.

Why wouldn' t you go to Ceres?? It makes no sense to exclude it. If
volatiles are found there in great abundance, if mines can be easily
sunk deep into its interior, if materials can easily be tossed off the
surface with a catapault - what better place to find what you need?
Moving 1/2,000,000,000th of it out of the asteroid belt won't change a
damn thing -

Believe me, you really dont whish to move Ceres or

What rational reason can you give me to believe anything you say? You
make these blind assertions with absolutely nothing to back it up.

the other five largest asteroids. Gravity is a bitch sometimes.

Gravity is 28/1000th of a gee - escape velocity is 0.51 km/sec - the
delta vee needed at the asteroid belt is around 1.5 km/sec to enter a
hohmann transfer orbit - so, you're talking about 2 km /sec The
dwarf planet is 487 km in diameter. A 50 km long rail operating at 4
gees would shoot stuff off world with no propellant far more
efficiently than any solar sail. A large laser collector could power
the rail. A laser powered propulsion unit would do course corrections
and final terminal boost to bring it into orbit around Earth. 1,000
elements each 100 meters in diameter - would from a 1 km diameter
group -all 1,000,000 elements would be launched in over a 96 year
period from a single launcher. 20 launchers would dispatch all the
material in 5 years.

Anyhow, Ceres might sometime become rather useful for a whole other
purpose, i.e. moving the Earth itself.

Its too big for that - there are smaller asteroids that have been
proposed for that - that's a long term project anyway.

But if a large enough object
moves in an orbital resonance between the Earth and Jubiter, the orbit
of Earth can be gradually widened.

I know I read the report when it first came out. The asteroid needed
is very small compared to Ceres.

An option humanity might really like to keep open for the later
future.

You are making a false choice. You must know that you are making a
false choice. Reducing the mass of Ceres by a factor of 1 in 2
billion won't do a damn thing to the asteroid belt or our ability to
use ceres any way we like in the future.

but they
have the merit of not needing fuel

Thats true but they need a tremendous amount of energy.  Given that
energy -particularly solar energy- is in short supply while billions
of metric tons of materials are freely available to use as propellant
- one clearly would like to reduce energy use to a minimum.  Since
there are other constraints of a for profit system - such as getting
things done in less than a decade - thrust levels needed cannot be
achieved by any practical solar sail system.  The mass of the sail
gets unweildy when trying to move things quickly at that distance.

But with Solar sail in comination with beemed energy, you´d not need
to waste any mass.

You haven't done the calculation - why is that? To maintain a given
mass flow rate means to apply a given thrust continously. This means
a certain power level. You need 200,000 times the power level to
maintain a given mass flow rate with laser light sails as you do with
rockets optimally sized to be most energy efficient.

Do the work then state your conclusion - otherwise - be quiet.
Sheez. You talked on and on about how difficult it was to project
power and observe asteroid from EArth - now you say its easy. Fact is
you need both - and light sails were considered and found wanting. I
have given you all the reasons in gory detail. Rather than address
those reasons rationally, you blithely ignore them and have a tone
when you talk like you have superior knowledge. You do not. You have
yet to demonstrate you have knowledge equal to me - let alone superior
knowledge.

Look a culture in decline is different than a culture in the rise. A
culture in decline values and rewards the kind of behavior you
exhibit. People in a declining culture think those who find
objections - no matter how weakly based - are smart. People in a
declining culture think those who propose a course of action - no
matter how soundly based - are naive. You have this attitude that I'm
naive - by your choice of words by the tone of your conversation. I
have given you no real reason to have that attitude - save that I am
proposing a course of action and you are saying that course of action
is impractical.

You have yet to respond on a matter of substance to ANYTHING i have
said. You are a child of a declining culture. I am a child of a
culture at its peak. We're from the same nation, just different
time. I would suggest you actually do some work to back up your
dismissive statements before making any more.
.

and would also benefit from your
lasers you assume will be plased in the viscinity of the Sun.

Compute the power level needed to bring the 21,000 metric tons of
material from the asteroid belt each day using an optimized laser
rocket blasting 36,000 metric tons of propellant - which was less than
20 GW.  and compute the power needed to do the same thing - with laser
light sails.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poynting_vectorhttp://science.howstuffwo...

  Force = 2* Power / speed of light

Now 21,000 metric tons per day is 243 kg per second.  The delta vee
total at both ends of the journey is 8,000 m/sec - I have limited the
acceleration time to 36 months overall - 94.67 million seconds.

    Velocity = acceleration x time

so,   acceleration = velocity / time
                          = 8,000 m/s / 94,672,800 s
                          = 8.45e-5 m/s2

    Force = mass x acceleration

Now the acceleration period is 3 years - and in 3 years at a 21,000
metric tons per day rate a total of

              mass = 243 kg/sec x 94,672,800 sec = 23,005,490,400 kg

    Force = 23.00e+9 kg * 8.45e-5 m/s2 = 1,943,964 Newtons

    Force = 2 x Power / speed of light

Rewriting this to solve for power level needed

     Power = Force * speed of light / 2
               = 1.944e+6 * 3e+8 / 2 = 2.916e+14 = 291.6 TRILLION
watts

This reduces the mass flow needed to be supplied by the asteroid belt
to zero.  However, it increases the power level of the system by a
factor of about 15,000 !!!!   Using solar power at the asteroid belt
means collector area is increased by a factor of 115,000x from what I
proposed originally.   Since the station masses 500 metric tons and
covers 75.5 sq km.  Converting to solar sails means we need 7.5
million metric tons of sails if powered from earth and 57.5 million
metric tons of sails/collectors if powered from the asteroid belt.

The sails can be reprocessed into useful stuff when they arrive, but
the cost of making the sails is wasted - then there's the logistical
problem of having sails the areas needed.   No, the lower cost system
is the one I have proposed with very few technical risks..

Now, the thing is you only need these asteroids at this scale levels
if it´s there is a reason to move all foodproduction into space.

Yes mass flow rate scales with thrust and that scales with power. so,
youcan return samples at the power levels I'm postulating - you can
return crews - using high specific impulse or laser light sails.
Which might be doable. But if you're talking about maintaining a
practical industrial system - you need to use rockets with an exhaust
speed of about 8km/sec

So, you got that right.

Now, as to your point - there is no reason to move all food production
into space. YEs there is, because you have hundreds of billions
perhaps trillions of dollars of non recurring engineering costs and
you want to spread that over as much sales volume as you can. So, if
you reduce mass flow 200,000x - you reduce revenue stream 200,000
tiomes, and you reduce market capitalizatoin 200,000 - and you cannot
justify spending the kind of money I'm talking about without capturing
a significant portion of the world's food supply.,

Why not? We're already polluting Earth with fertilizer run off and
tens of thousands of people every day are dying of hunger, millions
are mal nourished and these numbers are increasing.

Furthermore, you are again making a statement where you have not done
the work. I already said that America spend 11x more per person on
food than the rest of the world. In a global economy that was growing
at 10% per annum -and a US economy that is growing at 5.4% per annum
for 56 years would find per capita incomes equal at 220x current
global standard or 20x current US standard ($1 million per person per
year) - to sustain this rate of growth we will quickly outstrip the
resources of Earth to sustain this growth. To meet this need, and
reduce the impact humanity has on Earth - and avoid a die off - we
will need to develop this resource along the lines I've described.

the reason is only to supply rawmaterials for industry, then the most
economic method possible would be used.

The goal is to make tapping off-world resources the most ecoomic
method to use. Clearly given the tremendous power requirements of
solar sails or laser light sails - the least expensive approach would
be to use rockets operating with an exhaust speed equal to delta vee
of the mission to maintain the highest mass flow rate at the lowest
possible cost.

Solar sails, they can be
accelerated with a laser,

Yes, I spoke with Bob Forward at Harvard about this when we switched
on Horowitz' Project BETA - I'm very familiar with how that is done.
That's why when i analyzed it, I could see that given the power levels
we had in orbit at that time, we were better served by going with
rockets of the right specific impulse. Sample and crew returns, crew
dispatched doesn't need this highly efficient operation - but the bulk
of the mass DOES. How many times do i have to say this before you get
it?

but they also can move without such a boost.

Why do you not talk in numbers? gee forces - that's what we're
talking about.

In addition, it might be more sence to operate factory ships that
would cruise about the asteroid belt. In that case the sails would
only be moving the refined ore packages.

It would make most sense to build a laser powered rail gun on Ceres -
and launch 100 meter diameter containers with the stuff you wanted
once every 50 seconds from 20 launchers - that way you'd accumulate
all you needed in 5 years.

I don´t think it´s necessary to move all foodproduction into space.

How much should be moved?

Obviously, I think as much as possible for the reasons already
stated. Besides if you're going to go to the trouble to grow one
radish in space,why not spread the development cost to get the whole
radish market? I mean, when you're in orbit, particularly a sun
synchronous orbit - you can deliver radishes to anyone anywhere - and
since you can do it more cheaply than anyone - especially when
considering the logistical costs and surface transportation costs - as
well as intangibles like freshness and rapidity of response (5 minutes
from the field to your table) - there is no reason you should not seek
to dominate the market if you're going to spend a nickel to do it
anyway.

Why would you tell Bill Gates that Microsoft shouldn't sell operating
systems for more than 3% of the computer market because no one made
operating systems in that quantity for that type of platform before.
Oh my God we can't risk the Bank of America mainframe on this crazy
Gates character taking over the market. lol Of course Gates didn't
care about all of that and ignored such foolishness as he moved
forward.

At
the present time the Earth is making sufficient amount of food for
all,

Yeah - becaus the alternative would be to have a die off today -
people get hungry if they don't eat. The question is what about
tomorrow? What about tomorrow if people have more money to spend and
more time? This will bid up the prices for food, increase the amount
o fland in cultivation - and ultimately lead to a collapse if the
system breaks anywhere. To remove this pressure from th esystem - new
off world sources are develooped. Once developed, why not seek to
take advantage of the new approach to lower costs below anything seen
before, and dominate the market with price quality ease of delivery
etc.

That's like saying all the operating systems today meet everyone's
needs today. duh. that tells us nothing about future needs or future
growth potential or looming problems or opportunities.

even though it´s somewhat unequally distributed meaning food is
scarce for some.

Of course - those are the ones causing trouble - feed them, give them
a future worthy of human beings - and they will turn into a valuable
resource rather than a source of trouble.

It would make sence to produce food in space for
those who come to live there.

Not if they alone have to pay the huge development cost. We want to
get meal costs down to $0.40 per meal - remember? You don't do that
selling 300 meals a month. IT makes no sense whatever.

I'm proposing to spend something on th eorder of a half trillion
dollars over the next 40 years to develop off world resources - not
just food - why wouldn't I want to sell as much as I could as quickly
as I could?? The market justify it - $4.5 trillion a year today for
food- with potential to grow to $33 trillion over 25 years- and $660
trillion in 56 years.

Earth would continue to supply its own food.

Obviously - that tells us nothing about the potential of what I
propose - and where it might end up.

The thing with asteroids, would be gentle movements. Sounds very
doubtful that even the solid ones would be able to handle rapit rates
of movement, so gentle acceleration perhaps like 0,001g or even
0,0001g which would make solar sails ideal.

You haven't done the calculations.  I can accept no less than 84.5
micro gees.  This can be done with quite reasonable thrusts
(approximately 200,000 kgf) - rubble piles can easily be moved at
these levels using gravity tugs.  So attaching to an appropriately
sized dense metallic asteroid and navigating appropriately around a
rubble pile, brings both back.  Building a pipe from the rubble pile
and pumping volatiles into the rocket engine - energized by laser
light from a powersat in Earth orbit - provides adequate propellant to
maintain the thrust for the needed period.

Using laser sails at the same power setting reduces the mass flow rate
to a trickle.

At the present time it´s not known wether asteroids can be safely
moved at that rate.

Ever compute the Roche limit of a planet? Accelerate an asteroid at
1/100th its surface gravity by causing it to fall at that rate toward
another body you've attached a rocket too - it doesn't matter if its
totally liquid it'll all move together.

Besides, that's only one sort. In places like Ceres - you'll be able
to build launchers that can easily meet your needs just from Ceres.

That´s a rather big undertainty don´t you think.

There are a big number of equally viable development paths that are
OR'd together. I mean there's a difference between AND and OR in the
logical development of a plan. If something has a 50/50 chance of
working- and you have 20 equally viable things - with that probability
of success -you OR them together - that means that any one of them can
work to ahieve your goal. In this case depsite the big uncertainty of
each path - the goal is virtually assured. with 99,999905%
certainty.despite the uncertainty of any one path.
I

assume that the rate of movement will have to be gentle.

I not only have given you the rate of movement - I have given you
surface gravity and the rate of acceleration needed to sustain the
mass flow rate needed for market mastery. Now, what have you given
me? You keep repeating the same damn fool things you did at first.
WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY GENTLE? What do you mean by rate of movement? I'm
talking accleration - I evne gave you a figure 8.5 microgees. that's
whats needed to navigate out of the astreroid belt with no problems to
my plan. Solar sails operate at this scale and power at the nanogee
level - not sufficient.

That´s a reasonable assumption I think.

Why do you conclude that 8.5 microgees is not a 'gentle' 'rate of
movement'

You have said nothing concrete in response to my very detailed
analysis.

In addition, as you think
rubble piles can be strapped together in some fashion.

I didn't say that.

..a delicate
operation for certain, I think you´d prefer towing to pulling. In fact
towing may be preferable to pulling.

If done gravitationally yes.

Yeah right, then you will have to be moving a quite massive oject

ALL THE OBJECTS WE'RE TALKING ABOUT ARE MASSIVE sheez,

for
them to cling to.

Cling? Things fall in space - toward gravity sources - they fall at
a certain acceleration - this can induce tidal forces - which can
cause things to tear apart - which is what I suppose you're talking
about or trying to talk about - and we want to do things quickly
enough to be of practical use to those building the system -

Problem there are none available that can be safely
moved.

Why do you say that? Surface gravities are 100s and 1000s of
microgees. The acceleration I need to impart is 10s of microgees.
The power level using rockets is acceptable. The power level using
light sails is too high.

I'm moving the asteroids anyway at this rate - regardless of their
mass. Since the surface gravity of the asteroid is 10 to 100 times
the acceleration rate I'm imparting - I can execute a controlled
gravity tug on a loose rubble pile without tearing it apart by
navigating to within 3 to 10 asteroid radii of it. That's 1.5 to 5 km
for an asteroid 1 km in diameter.

At the very least none massive enough.

You make a statement like this with absolutely nothing to back it up.
How massive? How large an acceleration? Do you know how to
calculate force between to bodies? How to calculate acceleration
knowing mass, radius and the gravitational constant? Sheez.

Gravity is a bitch sometimes.

Nonsequitor

In addition it´s necessary to consider the effects on the other
asteroids.

That's right.

Which means you have to leave the more massive asteroid alone.

No it doesn't
It means you must consider the effects on other asteroids.
What makes you think I can't do that?

That
means you´ll lack the eer massive object you intend to let that rubble
cling to.

No it doesn't. A 200,000 kgf rocket can accelerate 2.35 billion tons
of material at 8.5 microgees. At 1 ton per cubic meter (water
density) that's a sphere 1.65 km in diameter - larger than the 1.00 km
diameter object in my reference design. Its surface gravity is 23
microgee.

The path chosen has to be very carefully worked out, as
after all you really don´t whish to make other asteroids careen out of
theyr orbits.

Correct

That will go out of the window if you attempt to shift any of the 5
largest asteroids.

No it won't.

They will have to be a big no.

No they won't,

They can though
probably be safely mined by a mining ship which would move to them.

Building a rail gun on them and tossing off 100 m diameter containers
is a possibility - but 10 or 20 of them operating at the same time -
will likely cause orbits to change - but as you said, you'll have to
take that into account - that is model the response and plan for it -
and if you're clever enough use it to good effect.

That means it´s very unlikely that some sort of a direct
trajectory towards the Earth will prove practical.

You are talking about terminal maneuvers during the 18 month period
the asteroid is undergoing powered thrust.  The 7 years it spends in
transit this will unlikely be a problem.  There are issues related to
the stream of asteroids produced however, and that can actually assist
things.

That time probably will at the very least be 14 years, probably longer
than that.

Please show me your calculations. 8.5 microgees gets everything done
in 10 years. 5 years of mining operations - that's 15 years total.
2 year outbound flight - 3 years prior to that for surveys and what
not - A total of 20 years - starting in 2020 - gets you done by 2040.

More probably it
will be necessary to take several orbits around the Sun, before an
asteroid can be finally moved out of the belt proper.

Please show me your analysis on this?   Certainly, if you have vastly
lower gee forces than I am contemplating you will take centuries to
move things.  So, yes you will go round and round and round the sun as
you spiral end.  Assuming nothing breaks in all that time.

Ceres orbital period is 4.599 years.  My limit on acceleration says we
have to complete the delta vee at the asteroid belt in less than a
year - the delta vee at the asteroid belt is the smaller one - so,
that means you're clear of the belt in less than 1/5th a turn.  You
have about two years to slow into Earth orbit.  Here you're chasing
the Earth a couple of times around the sun before sliding into your
spot in polar orbit above Earth.

Now, Ceres will clearly be a big 'NO,'

No reason to conclude that.

unless you whish to observe the
orbits of a significant percentage of the other asteroids change as
you move it.

I never said that - the power levels are not high enough - I am
proposing moving 1/2,000,000,000th the mass of Ceres into Earth orbit
to build what I have planned.

Undoubtedly interesting to watch, but you might not be
popular with the rest of humanity afterwards.

Why?

It will depend on which asteroid, naturally, but with more than
million of them about, I expect that it will take several Solar orbits
to nudge the average small average size asteroid free if the intend is
to cause the minimum disturbance to other asteroids.

In any case you will run simulations of what you intend to do before
you actually do it - and then plan you trajectory so that you achieve
what you want and not what you don't want. This is true no matter who
big the object.

Think about it, even though the volume of the Solar system is vast,
and the volume of the asteroid belt huge, most are orbiting more or
less along the plane of the rest of the Solar System. You will
inevitably be crossing a real lot of orbits of the other asteroids.
You will have to move it, nudge it, each time, when there is a good
distance so gravity effects will be minimal. Sounds reasonable it will
tale several orbits,

The less time you spend in the vicinity of something the less likely
it will affect you. Quick is always better than slow in this regard.
I have said the total acceleration time is less than 3 years -
terminal maneuvering will be modeled for any movement of any object -
so, your concerns are unjustified - why do you think numerical models
cannot be relied upon to address these issues?

even when assuming that you will be using the
technologies you are assuming and moreover assuming that they really
will work the way you assume they´ll work.

So my expectation is that you will be making a series of nudges till
you are free of the other orbits.

You will plan your trajectory with a numerical model before you
actually carry it out. When you do you will carry it out the quickest
way possible given your energy level and thrustor efficiency.

So moving clear will take unknown
number of years,

You will do it in months - and know precisely the maneuvers and thrust
applications you'll nee.

depending on the number of orbits necessary to cross.

You will know precisely what movements to take and the order in which
to take them - shortly after you know the 1,000 bodies you will take.
Like you said, they're not going anywhere until we say so.

I think it would be reasonable to reckon with 5 - 10 years of gentle
moving and nudging untill Earth orbit.

You haven't done any analysis of the critical factors and are wrongly
assuming I haven't analyzed the noncritical factors you cite.  That's
why you are making so many mistakes.

A hohmann transfer orbit from Ceres to Earth is about 7 years.  I have
put a 10 year limit on the transfer - this gets us the 84.5 micro gee
limit.  You have proposed using solar sails, any practical solar sail
operated at the asteroid belt will take centuries not decades to
complete a transfer.

Assuming there are no other orbits in between that must not be
disturbed.

Why do you think I assume that? Especially when I said there will be
terminal maneuvering to do. Why do you assume something will take 10
years when it could easily be done in 10 hours?

However, that´s not the reality. Remember over million
asteroids.

REmember i already know that. You miss my point and talk me like I'm
stupid. all the orbits of all the objects are very wll known. When
the 1,000 are chosen, the precise order of battle and thrustor
arrangements and so forth will have been worked out in computer models
before the first people arrive. Just like vonBraun could tell us the
precise minute an Apollo capsule would land in the ocean, at the time
it was launched from Earth - so too will the crews of the capture
teams know precisely the terminal manuvers needed to carry out their
missions - in the asteroid belt and in arriving at Earth.

And we can´t move the largest asteroids.

No reason we can't except for the power levels needed to do so in a
reasonable time.

It may even be that 15 - 20
years would even be necessary for the more fragile or distant ones.

You are talking out of your hat.  You haven't done the numbers so you
are just waving your hands.

True,

Well there you go. Thats why nothing you say makes a lick of sense.

but it´s clear you are talking about a time consuming affair if
you really intend not to send asteroids careening this and that way.

You have absolutely no appreication of what you're talking about.

The surface gravity of even a small rubble pile is greater than 84.5
microgees.

The surface gravity of Ceres is 28,000 microgees.

Ceres must not be moved.

Pieces of it certainly will be.

The force exerted by an 800 sec Isp laser powered thruster operated at
a GW scale is 200,000 kgf -
The force exerted by an infinite Isp laser light sail operated at the
same power level is 4 kgf -

Now, your ideas sound very nice,

Yours do not - they are dead wrong.

but your figures sound to good to be
true.

Where?   The figures you cite are either out of date or wrong.

Einar

I would suggest you spend a little more thought on your responses in
the future.

Now, I haven´t said that your ideas are impossible.

That is wise.

Only that the
timeframe you suggest is.

You have no basis for saying that. In fact you said that we don't
NEED to do it quickly or on the scale I suggest. I think we do both
for humanitarian reasons as well as reasons of economy. Money does
have a time value and if you're going to invest in this particular
technology, you might as well get as big a part of the market as you
can.

Einar

.

---

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