Re: Super-heavy lift reusable launcher

On Aug 11, 7:17 am, Ian Parker <ianpark...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 11 Aug, 02:22, "Martha Adams" <mh...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:





"Fred J. McCall" <fmcc...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in messagenews:fnku94h09auua2tcnth74eusaf7ksi28ct@xxxxxxxxxx

Ian Parker <ianpark...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

:On 10 Aug, 12:36, Fred J. McCall <fmcc...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
:> Ian Parker <ianpark...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
:>
:> :On 10 Aug, 11:50, Fred J. McCall <fmcc...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
:> :> Ian Parker <ianpark...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
:> :>
:> :> :On 9 Aug, 23:35, Fred J. McCall <fmcc...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
:> :> :> Ian Parker <ianpark...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

<snip>

In general, if William Mook is championing something, it is probably a
good thing to stay away from.  Mr Mook has a years-long reputation for
wanting undoable things done.

<snip>

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable
man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore,
all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

                                      --George Bernard Shaw

What??  !!  Must I make a point, *here,*
about "wanting undoable things done"?  In
sci.space.policy?  ??  What is this
newsgroup *for,* for the luvva Mike?

Well, I'll make my point.  In my view,
sci.space.policy is / or ought to be, a
place where we start some "undoable" on
its transition to "doable."

Titeotwawki -- mha  [sci.space.policy 2008 Aug 10]

I would put this another way. If we try to do undoable things, i mean
here things that are undoable because of grandiose engineering.

Grandiose engineering?

You mean something like spending $10 billion to move 270 million cubic
yards of Earth, at the cost of 5,700 American lives over a 10 year
period to build a 77 kilometer Panama Canal? Or do you mean
something like a land grant program for building 90,000 miles of rail
road track in 30 years for $30 billion, or perhaps you mean a direct
government subsidy for building 50,000 miles of interstate highways in
30 years at a cost of $430 billion, or a tax break, or do you mean
government guarantees and subsidies for supporting the development of
airlines over the past 45 years to the tune of building 25,750
aircraft among 970 airlines generating 3.7 trillion passenger
kilometers per year generating $560 billion of revenue each year, or
do you mean by grandiose engineering creating a company like COMSAT
who created and owned INTELSAT at a time when no communications
satellites existed, and spent hundreds of millions of dollars creating
these nonexistant things and billions of dollars of taxpayer money
losing money year after year - but which now number in the thousands
and generate over $650 billion per year in telecommunication services
world wide?

Is that the sort of grandiose engineering you mean that you think is
infeasible and can't change our way of life?

WE don't need anything like that today do we? lol.

I
don't mean things like antigravity and warp drive, you may well end up
with a dooable core.

Wait a minute! haha - you're saying something like changing a few
laws and tax codes to support a power satellite consortium or the
expansion of INTELSAT to support satellite arrays delivering global
wireless internet is infeasible because its too grandiose but spending
taxpayer money on technically impossible things like anti-gravity and
warp drive - is alright by you!

HAHAHA - you freaking lunatic! lol. sheez.

You may well find that SSP for example might not
fulfill all our energy requirements.

Since when is that a requirement? lol. Do you think McDonald or
Dairy Queen decide to build a restaurant on the basis of whether or
not it meets all the food requirements of the community in which they
work? Hell no! They decide on the basis of whether or not it makes
money. The only thing the government need do with the two programs
I've outlined - that you obviously think is grandiose - is to
establish an environment favorable to private investment - that's it.

Purely terrestrial methods might
be best for the simple generation of hydrogen.

Why? Do you have any numbers to back that up? Obviously you don't.
Well this is something I've given some thought to. First, all space
based power needs a receiver. I have developed an approach that lets
silicon solar panels double as efficient power receivers from
powersats. Second, let terrestrial solar power lead the way. I have
developed an approach that builds 480 sq km solar arrays - laid out in
25 km diameter circles - to generate 7,200 metric tons of hydrogen a
day from 64,800 tons of water per day - to displace 30,000 tons of
coal per day in coal fired power plants, to create 200,000 barrels of
gasoline diesel fuel per day - at a cost of $8 per barrel. Third, use
the revenue from the terrestrial energy producers to build your space
launch capacity and space based revenues. 200,000 barrels of fuels
per day represent $220 billion of NPV. The equipment only costs $8
billion. Monetizing only a small portion of this value provides $18
bilion to construct the supply chain for constructing and launching a
satellite constellation and a fleet of 500 ton payload RHLLVs to place
the constellation. The constellation earns $150 billion per year -
which is $3 trillion NPV. Monetize that to accelerate number of solar-
assisted CTL plants to 42 locations identified across the planet - and
build a 10,000 ton launcher and a 480 sq km 200 GW solar powersat
Fourth, use solar power satellite to expand the efficiency of, and
reduce the cost of terrestrial power from these existing sites. I
have shown that the 1/5th cent per kWh solar panel technology becomes
a 1/25th cent per kWh solar panel technology producing 16x the revenue
per year by adding a powersat constellation at GEO. The 42 coal to
liquid faclities produce 2.1 million b/d of liquid fuels -2.5% of the
total. Increasing this 16x increases output to 33.6 million b/d
liquid fuels - 40% of the world's total - generating $1.6 trillion -
with a NPV of $30 trillion.

However I feel that SSP
might well find a niche.

Powersats are critical to lowering the cost of solar power and
increasing the efficiency of solar energy production to the point that
it will displace and replace fossil fuels and provide for a general
expansion of industry throughout Earth while reducing human
environmental impact.

Phase 1 is the production of gasoline, diesel fuel and jet fuel from
coal water and sunlight with zero pollution - generating solar energy
at 1/5th cent per kWh while growing to capture 2.5% of the world's
energy market...

Phase 2 is the augmenting of the solar ground station with space based
power reducing cost to 1/25th cent per kWh - while increasing energy
yeilds by 16x per year. While gorwing to capture 40% of the world's
energy market without any increase in the size of the terrestrial
arrays.

Phase 3 is the augmenting of ground station power by using improved
satellite optics to beam power simultaneously to individual users
throughout the world - allowing people to dispense with fuels
altogether.

Phase 4 is constructing laser powered aerial vehicles capable of
extreme performance using MEMs based laser rocket arrays as propulsive
skins providing personal ballistic service to everyone thorughout the
world - starting with ballistic automated package delivery - capturing
$3 trillion per year in revenue - growing at 20% per year.

Phase 5 is sending a survey team out to the asteroid belt to capture
and return rich asteroid and asteroid fragments - and then orbit
telerobotic factories to convert that rich asteroidal feedstock into
raw materials, finished goods, consumer goods, food and fiber.

Phase 6 is building pressure vessels that are deorbited to form Cloud
Nine cities that float in the skies, and house up to 150,000 people.
20,000 of these provide refuge for the 3 billion poorest of us and a
stable place to grow financially.

Phase 7 is the ability for people to travel cheaply to orbit, and buy
orbiting space colonies to be owned personally as space homes.

Transmission appears to be in two variants optical and microwave.
Microwaves as Rand Simberg rightly points out are overwhelmingly
superior for bulk energy transmission. Is there an optical niche?

Nonsense. The energy per unit area is far too low for microwave to be
practical in smaller receivers and microwaves are far too dangerous to
have them widely used near the surface. Free electron lasers beaming
bandgap matched laser light to low cost silicon panels in the IR
window is just as efficient energywise, and is far superior in terms
of cost per watt and logistics - permitting the powering of rockets,
aircraft, autos,trucks and ocean going vessels as well as individual
homes.

I believe that lasers can be used to power a Nerva type engine.

Yes.

I
think LH containing soot could have an exhaust velocity of 10+ km/sec

Using 1,100 nm wavelength light - you don't need soot.
.
Lasers could also power aircraft.

Yes - conventional aircraft as well as advanced ballistic aircraft
using propulsive skins.

In these niche applications cloud
cover will not be a problem as all the action will take place either
above the clouds, or in a location where there are none.

You over-rate the difficulty associated with clouds. Consider that a
sunny spot on Earth receives 1,700 hours of sunlight per year. There
are 8,766 hours in a year! A place that had cloud cover 60% of the
time would have more than double the hours of satellite light than a
solar panel - doubling its capital efficiency and cutting its energy
storage needs by half.

Even in power applications powersat assisted terrestrial panels are
far superior than solar panels by themselves. Due to wavelength
limits its not feasible to use microwave to efficiently power
individual homes - it is possible with IR laser.

  - Ian Parker- Hide quoted text -

You've got it backwards. Microwave is the niche application - putting
a dome over NYC - and a dipole array inside the dome, and illuminating
it with microwaves through clouds 24/7 to provide AC power for the
entire city at low cost - sheilding the city - and receiving the power
well above the biosphere - is a niche application - though it wouldn't
look like such going in.

Besides, with the very high power densities possible with lasers,
tethered balloons flying above the clouds or satellite powered
aircraft cruising above the clouds take the bulk of the IR energy and
reform it for transmission by optical tethers through the clouds. So
an exceptionally cloudy city like London or Paris would float balloons
or fly tethered aircraft that would carry optical systems that would
take the satellite energy and send it down an optical fiber and
distribute it by optical fiber to individual users within the city.

Such a balloon or aircraft would be less expensive than a city-wide
dome.

Powering every home, office, factory, car, aircraft and ship on Earth
directly with IR lasers from space - either beamed directly to the
site (with short term storage or optical fiber intertie - temporary
clouds are not a problem as shown above)
.