Re: Beanstalks...

Ian> for 6 (the best of current non-nanofibers) it's about 1000.

Someone must have looked at having the base of the elevator up above
the atmosphere by now. You could have the base moving at 1000 m/s
relative to the equator, at a few hundred km altitude, which would make
a pretty reasonable target for a 767 with rocket assist.

The primary advantage is the lower orbit and thus the drop in length.
1000 m/s gets you a 30% drop in length. Since you get to higher v^2/r
values at lower altitudes, I would think it would improve the taper
value
quite a bit, to something more like 30-50 for 6 GPa material.

If people insist on having the bottom of the thing on the ground, the
orbiting mode might be a cheaper way of lifting all that mass.

Somebody wake me up when the taper value is around 10 for material
that is already made in bulk, with safety margins.

.