Big Dumb Boosters revisited

RobertDyck · 2007-01-04 12:38:42

You know, Tom, you were a real pill to interject that crap--about a MOVIE, for God's sake--into what is a deeply important debate between two contributors who really know what they're talking about. So withhold the sideline levity, please, until they've had their say and we've all had a chance to contribute. Sorry to be so frank, but you asked for it.
You brought up the subject of Star Wars, not I.
Yeah, I know what your trying to do, your trying to discredit an idea by using a perjoritive, by calling it names if you will. By associating missile defense with light sabers, X-wing fighters, and the Force, you hope to discredit the idea.

No Tom, you're the one who brought up George Lucas (movie producer), destroying planets, and making films; not dictice. My discussion with GCNRevenger referenced President Ronald Regan's military research program called Strategic Defense Initiative, nic named by the media as "Star Wars". Do you really not know what SDI was? It was rather important in many ways.

I would like to introduce you to yet another website
Wikipedia

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-04 14:08:10

You know, Tom, you were a real pill to interject that crap--about a MOVIE, for God's sake--into what is a deeply important debate between two contributors who really know what they're talking about. So withhold the sideline levity, please, until they've had their say and we've all had a chance to contribute. Sorry to be so frank, but you asked for it.
You brought up the subject of Star Wars, not I.
Yeah, I know what your trying to do, your trying to discredit an idea by using a perjoritive, by calling it names if you will. By associating missile defense with light sabers, X-wing fighters, and the Force, you hope to discredit the idea.
No Tom, you're the one who brought up George Lucas (movie producer), destroying planets, and making films; not dictice. My discussion with GCNRevenger referenced President Ronald Regan's military research program called Strategic Defense Initiative, nic named by the media as "Star Wars". Do you really not know what SDI was? It was rather important in many ways.
I would like to introduce you to yet another website
Wikipedia

It was always refered to as Star Wars by its detractors, not its advocates, the idea being that this is all science fiction and therefore not worth pursuing or spending money on, and calling it Star Wars is an attempt not to take it seriously. The Media is a bit one-sided. If you call it something, you should call it for what it is.

One thing space based lasers might be used for is to incinerate Osama Bin Lauden, I think that would be a nice use for it, especially if you couple it with a Spy Satellite, so you can see him on a television screen, press a button and he's dead. A Spy satellite Spaced based laser can also be used to each for missile launch sites, such as the ones used to rocket Israel, and then zap them. A laser is not banned by any current treaties, it is not a weapon of mass destruction, it is quite conventional in fact, and the best things about lasers is that you can't see them coming, they travel at the speed of light and the first time you know about them is after you've been hit.

dicktice · 2007-01-04 16:34:19

Goodnight and good luck, Tom, with your personal nightmares.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-05 10:36:12

Goodnight and good luck, Tom, with your personal nightmares.

More like Bin Laden's nightmares I think. We must stay militarily current in Space and on the ground. Not to be means to subject ourselves to someone else's space based laser. Can it knock out nukes? Perhaps, you can count on the enemy finding some way to get the nukes through, perhaps by unconventional means, but a missile defense system would make the enemy work at it, and if we have control of space, this makes it easier for us to hit them than for them to hit us. I think a country like Iran is doing all it can to make missiles that can hit us. A missile defense can help stop their missiles, and perhaps space based lasers can hit gound targets too, maybe take out the leaders of our enemies, and I think that is not a bad thing.

RobertDyck · 2007-01-05 11:28:03

I'm not going to debate your empty-headed broken-moral-compass evil drivel. Yes thats right, evil, which is what happens when you throw away your belief in either good or evil. Because if there is no evil then there is no need to fear, right? There's no problem if you just redefine our enemies away.

I'm disappointed. We had just started to discuss rationally again. A belief in peace is not evil. It is not productive to throw around emotionally charged words like "evil". I could argue invading Iraq was evil. If you wish to debate this, we can do so in "Political Potlock I" under "Free Chat". This thread is to debate big expendable rockets vs. large reusable shuttle. As a debate point I presented a point made by one person who was involved with SDI research. It dealt with technology development, not geopolitics. Let's leave political debates there; we can debate there until our typing fingers are raw.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-05 13:52:06

I'm not going to debate your empty-headed broken-moral-compass evil drivel. Yes thats right, evil, which is what happens when you throw away your belief in either good or evil. Because if there is no evil then there is no need to fear, right? There's no problem if you just redefine our enemies away.
I'm disappointed. We had just started to discuss rationally again. A belief in peace is not evil. It is not productive to throw around emotionally charged words like "evil". I could argue invading Iraq was evil. If you wish to debate this, we can do so in "Political Potlock I" under "Free Chat". This thread is to debate big expendable rockets vs. large reusable shuttle. As a debate point I presented a point made by one person who was involved with SDI research. It dealt with technology development, not geopolitics. Let's leave political debates there; we can debate there until our typing fingers are raw.

Considering that you brought out this debate in the first place by saying that Iran and North Korea are not threats to us.

No, neither Iran nor North Korea are threats. North Korea has stated several times that they will not let themselves be invaded, and they will do what ever is necessary to defend themselves. They don't have any intention of invading USA or anyone else. The sole exception is South Korea. They want to reunify the Koreas. How that will be accomplished is in question, but American threats to invade North Korea simply result in their developing effective defences. If you feel their defences are an effective threat to USA, then that is exactly what they intended. They fully realize that if they use a nuclear weapon against US soil, American will retaliate by saturation bombing them with strategic thermonuclear bombs. Their country will become a radioactive hole in the ground. Consequently they will never mount a first strike against the US, no matter what. However, if the US invades North Korea with a force as strong and as effective as the one that took out Iraq, they will launch a revenge attack as the last gasping breath of their government. North Korean government officials also know that if America invades their country, they personally will either be killed during the attack, or if they survive there will be a trial like Saddam and they will be executed. Consequently they have nothing to loose by taking out as many Americans as they can in their defeat. This means their nuclear weapons are a colossal waste of money, they can't ever use them. Well, not unless you invade North Korea first. Are you the treat? Are you the invader? Do you really intend to use military force to conquer/occupy/subjugate North Korea? If so you are the enemy of the world. If not, then sit back in the knowledge that North Korea's weapons are a paper tiger. They can't ever use them. The more they waste on such weapons, the less they have to build their economy. By wasting money on such weapons they only damage themselves.

ABM systems aren't just for threat A or threat B. They take so long to fully implement that they must anticipate a generic threat from an unknown country sometime in the future. We can't just spring up ABM systems only at the moment we need them such as when missiles are in the air and are heading toward us.

ABM systems are inherently defensive, their destructive potential is small, they can destroy an incoming warhead, or perhaps a person on the ground from orbit.

Wanting peace and having it are two different things. The best way to preserve the peace is to make it clear to our enemies that they will pay a high price in any war they start with us, and the damage they will do to us will be minimal anyway. I think Saddam Hussein is a good example in this, he paid the ultimate price for his aggressions against us and because of that, the next dictator will think long and hard before he decides to take us on by starting a War.

ABM systems minimize the damage an enemy can do to us, and our nuclear deterrent will make him pay the price for initiating hostilities with us. Control of space above will make it easy for us to hit our enemies and hard for our enemies to hit us. We don't have to let him destroy New York City and Los Angeles before retaliating. With an ABM system, they can try, we can shoot down their missiles and then we'll make him sorry!

dicktice · 2007-01-05 19:44:51

Please for pity's sake Tom, put a sock in it and let the booster debate to go on.

GCNRevenger · 2007-01-05 23:30:31

You've based everything on the assumption that a space station is useless. I disagree. You also claimed maintaining the Hubble space telescope was also useless. Again I disagree. The Shuttle did science in LEO before the station was built, but NASA originally intended it to service a station. As many people pointed, a reusable shuttle is a waste of time and money if it doesn't have a destination. That station can now do the science so reusable shuttle now has a purpose. However, the per launch cost of the shuttle is greater than a Proton or Ariane launch vehicle, each of which as similar cargo capacity, which is one reason I argue to replace the big expensive shuttle with a small one and use a BDB for cargo. Again, sensitive experiments built to fit in a science drawer can go on the mini shuttle.
Alternatively, use a BDB to lift modules for orbital assembly of a fully reusable interplanetary spacecraft. The Mars orbit rendezvous architecture uses a reusable spacecraft to go from LEO to Mars orbit, parks in Mars orbit until the mission is over, then comes back to LEO. Initially it uses expendable TMI/TEI stages, but that can later be replaced with a reusable one. Getting crew to that interplanetary spacecraft is a key part of the architecture. So the space taxi is part of a manned mission to Mars.
Do you want more examples? The principle is simple; use a BDB for bulk cargo because it's cheap, and a small taxi for crew because crew is not expendable and life support systems are expensive.

The space station is indeed worthless! Why is it that nobody seems to be able to come up with a justification for it to exist except some esoteric and unimportant life sciences? Or a little of this or that or the other, big deal. It is obvious beyond any argument that going up to continually prop up Hubble or any small-to-moderate space object is just a terrible investment versus simple replacement. After all, much of the cost is tied up in the designing, and serial production lowers per-unit cost. But in any event, by the time such a reuseable shuttle will be available, both the station and Hubble will be probably be gone.

Again, an RLV is not going to be a near-term project, a flight every year or two to exchange Mars crews from a reuseable transit vehicle doesn't make much sense. One Ares-I a year to get crews up and down would be plenty.

Other examples are unnecessary, or perhaps they are, since the ones you've given don't really support your thesis much

I maintain that large expendable rockets are good, but only up to a point: they are likely sufficient to build small Lunar and Mars bases, send massive probes all the way around the solar system, and maybe to launch a portion of a manned ship to the outer planets... but that is the limit of their utility.

In order to commercialize human space travel and industrialization (Lunar mining, orbital tourism, etc), colonization of Mars, or space-to-Earth solar power, much less expensive means of launch as well as a smaller, more granular means will be needed. To explore the outer planets, and for NASA to do this while simultaneously operating Lunar/Mars bases, they too will need a cheaper launch than any sort of expendable rocket, large or small.

Thats what we need an RLV for, and thats when we will need one too. And in this time frame, for these purposes, a dinky taxi is useless.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-06 09:02:58

There are two different kinds of scales of economy, one is that of repeated use and the other is that of size. What if we built a giant rocket to launch a single space station in one piece? A Sea Dragon, or a Nova might be just the sort of vehicle for that. I don't know when the day of the RLV will come, it keeps on receding into the future. NASA seems incapable of building one, it makes many fits and starts, but it seems each RLV project was a waste of money that could have been better spend on giant launch vehicles. Studies of the Project Orion seem to indicate that Saturn Vs aren't anywhere near the top of the scale for giant launch vehicles, excluding the nuclear issue, studies were done to determine the largest possible launch vehicle based on structural limitations, it turns out that a launch vehicle the size of a sky scrapper could be built. Chemical rocket engines could be scaled up, and with staging sizable payloads could be brought into orbit. One possibility if solar cells become light enough is to launch Solar Power Satellites that unfold upon deployment. You would want to launch those in the largest possible launch vehicles that one can build and in as few pieces as possible. The solar cells would have to be light and the launch vehicles gigantic to minimize launch costs, if the two could meet somewhere in the middle then the initial investment could be recouped through power generation.

GCNRevenger · 2007-01-06 10:52:08

No Tom, you've been drinking the same kool-aid as publiusr

Giant super rockets, ones in excess of the scale of Saturn-V/Ares-V/Energia-Vulcain, are probably a bad idea, and they are the top of the scale of practical rockets. They won't be much cheaper because of the difficulty of reliably building, handling, and integrating such huge structures. Saturn-V class rockets are already skyscraper size, and we don't move around skyscrapers much now do we? Anyway, large solid and liquid engines have approximately become inexpensive enough that three or four Ares-V class rockets probably wouldn't be more expensive than one gargantuan megarocket anyway if we built them in number.

I think that we could probably build a true RLV today if we really tried and poured a bunch of money into it. However I think that if we wait for technology to progress a little bit it will wind up being easier. Another generation of composites for structure/tanks, refined 5th-generation hydrogen engines, and improved aerodynamic tricks will really help bring down the size and cost.

The "nuclear issue" is really very simple: solid core nuclear engines can't provide a big enough increase in performance to warrant using them. Liquid/gas core rockets will release large amounts of fallout no matter how they are arranged, and even worse are the "salt water" rockets. Nuclear pulse rockets (Project Orion) aren't going to happen either because of the engineering and simple economies involved: first building the dispenser mechanism will be fairly hard, as will the creation of an entirely new type of directed superhigh reliability atomic bomb. Second, Orion only achieves its efficiency when it is very wide (to catch the shockwave) which will limit its usefulness, but most importantly is simply the extreme cost of the atomic bombs. Atomic bombs are really quite expensive, easily costing tens of millions each, so even a short flight worth will cost billions. Being propelled by atomic bombs, I doubt it will be practical to land an Orion bomb-rocket, making it effectively an expendable launch vehicle. The cost of throwing away an Orion every time you use one is extremely unrealistic.

Nuclear propulsion for ships in space, not for launch vehicles

Solar power satellite practicality is extremely dependent on the cost of launch, and even big heavy lifters are probably not good enough, at least not for the collector array itself. An RLV lends itself to this role very well, regularly lanuching mass-produced array segments, carrying them all the way the to the SPS station without the need for a tug, then returning for the next flight. Or, at the very least, putting them in orbit for a one-way ion tug to lift the assembled structure to GEO.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-06 13:15:14

No Tom, you've been drinking the same kool-aid as publiusr
Giant super rockets, ones in excess of the scale of Saturn-V/Ares-V/Energia-Vulcain, are probably a bad idea, and they are the top of the scale of practical rockets. They won't be much cheaper because of the difficulty of reliably building, handling, and integrating such huge structures. Saturn-V class rockets are already skyscraper size, and we don't move around skyscrapers much now do we? Anyway, large solid and liquid engines have approximately become inexpensive enough that three or four Ares-V class rockets probably wouldn't be more expensive than one gargantuan megarocket anyway if we built them in number.

Another thing that occurs to me is that the collecting area of an SPS doesn't need to be made of solar cells, it could be a mirror for instance. A solar sail is essentially a mirror too, and it is very thin. Perhaps the key thing would be to launch thin metal reflectors shaped to focus the Sun's rays on a particular spot, and at that spot, you place a solar furnace.

I think that we could probably build a true RLV today if we really tried and poured a bunch of money into it. However I think that if we wait for technology to progress a little bit it will wind up being easier. Another generation of composites for structure/tanks, refined 5th-generation hydrogen engines, and improved aerodynamic tricks will really help bring down the size and cost.

The "nuclear issue" is really very simple: solid core nuclear engines can't provide a big enough increase in performance to warrant using them. Liquid/gas core rockets will release large amounts of fallout no matter how they are arranged, and even worse are the "salt water" rockets. Nuclear pulse rockets (Project Orion) aren't going to happen either because of the engineering and simple economies involved: first building the dispenser mechanism will be fairly hard, as will the creation of an entirely new type of directed superhigh reliability atomic bomb. Second, Orion only achieves its efficiency when it is very wide (to catch the shockwave) which will limit its usefulness, but most importantly is simply the extreme cost of the atomic bombs. Atomic bombs are really quite expensive, easily costing tens of millions each, so even a short flight worth will cost billions. Being propelled by atomic bombs, I doubt it will be practical to land an Orion bomb-rocket, making it effectively an expendable launch vehicle. The cost of throwing away an Orion every time you use one is extremely unrealistic.
Nuclear propulsion for ships in space, not for launch vehicles

How about a controlled thermo-nuclear rocket using not bombs but a thermo-nuclear reactor to heat the propellet to Nerva-like temperatures? You could call this idea the TNERVA rocket. Say you use liquid hydrogen to cool the superconductors and create a magnetic bottle, heat up the plasma inside until it sustains a thermonuclear reaction, and the liquid hydrogen is pumped closer to the reaction chamber until it is heated to a hot gas, but still containable by a rocket nozzil and then it is expelled out the bottom of the rocket. Thermonuclear rockets would have very little fallout, since the primary product of the reaction is gamma rays and neutrons.

Solar power satellite practicality is extremely dependent on the cost of launch, and even big heavy lifters are probably not good enough, at least not for the collector array itself. An RLV lends itself to this role very well, regularly lanuching mass-produced array segments, carrying them all the way the to the SPS station without the need for a tug, then returning for the next flight. Or, at the very least, putting them in orbit for a one-way ion tug to lift the assembled structure to GEO.

You would still want to put it together in as few launches as possible. I guess though if you had thermonuclear reactors to build rockets out of, you wouldn't need SPS satellites.

GCNRevenger · 2007-01-06 13:34:59

Pure thermonuclear reactions aren't a practical source of energy now and will probably never be at this rate. Even if they were there is the concept of thrust-to-weight ratio, which beyond any doubt precludes the use of regular confinement fusion power for regular ballistic-style rockets. The reactor and the generator needed to run it are just too heavy, and adds too much dead weight to the rocket, wiping out the payload and even making it too heavy to reach orbit, guaranteed.

Solar heating of the ground is not a good idea, light would be scattered too much and directing the beam too difficult. Also, it would be bad for people/plants/etc surrounding the target.

And why is minimizing the number of launches as possible? When we have a true RLV, more launches (of reasonable size), not less, are desirable to take advantage of economies of scale.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-06 19:49:52

Pure thermonuclear reactions aren't a practical source of energy now and will probably never be at this rate. Even if they were there is the concept of thrust-to-weight ratio, which beyond any doubt precludes the use of regular confinement fusion power for regular ballistic-style rockets. The reactor and the generator needed to run it are just too heavy, and adds too much dead weight to the rocket, wiping out the payload and even making it too heavy to reach orbit, guaranteed.

Do fission plants produce more power per unit weight than fusion plants? Fusion reactions are more energetic. If you just use the fusion plasma as a propellent, you get low thrust. My idea is to increase the reaction mass so that is comparable to a NERVA Rocket. We just substitute the source of the radiation that heats the hydrogen from a fission rod to a thermonuclear reactor. Larger ones will be more efficient that smaller ones.

Solar heating of the ground is not a good idea, light would be scattered too much and directing the beam too difficult. Also, it would be bad for people/plants/etc surrounding the target.

I was actually thinking of a solar furnace in space along with the thin mirrors. The mirrors would focus the light onto the furnace, and some fluid would be heated, driving a generator and the generator would power a microwave transmitter which would transmit microwaves to a ground receiving station to be converted back into electricity.

And why is minimizing the number of launches as possible? When we have a true RLV, more launches (of reasonable size), not less, are desirable to take advantage of economies of scale.

GCNRevenger · 2007-01-06 20:50:40

Fusion plants produce much more energy per gram of fuel, but either nuclear reaction produces plenty of specific energy for launch purposes, the problem is converting the energy into motion, and what equipment is required to do so.

Again, fusion produces much more energy per gram of fuel, but regular confinement fusion produces FAR less power per mass of reactor, and probably always will. In fact it produces so little, it can't even lift itself off the ground probably.

This is assuming that the hurdles of making confinement fusion work in the first place can be solved. Right now, using the fancy Helium-3 fuel, a fusion reactor can just barely make a fraction more power than it consumes. That means you have to "burn" huge amounts of fuel to produce much energy, and the equipment to do so wouldn't fit in the VAB.

Its not the amount of energy in the fuel that is the problem, either fission or fusion make gobs, the problem is using that energy. The equipment to access the energy involved in fusion is extremely heavy, which is precisely the thing it cannot be in a rocket.
___________________________________________________________

Reflectors to an orbiting collector won't do, since their orbits would be to different. Tracking the beam onto the target would be difficult.

cIclops · 2007-01-07 05:36:15

AFAIK fusion breakeven has still not been achieved. During a visit to JET in England after they achieved about 16 MW of fusion power using double that to get the reaction started, it was clear that the whole shebang weighed thousands of tons - including massive flywheels to store the megajoules of energy to pulse heat the plasma.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-07 09:41:40

Fusion plants produce much more energy per gram of fuel, but either nuclear reaction produces plenty of specific energy for launch purposes, the problem is converting the energy into motion, and what equipment is required to do so.
Again, fusion produces much more energy per gram of fuel, but regular confinement fusion produces FAR less power per mass of reactor, and probably always will. In fact it produces so little, it can't even lift itself off the ground probably.
This is assuming that the hurdles of making confinement fusion work in the first place can be solved. Right now, using the fancy Helium-3 fuel, a fusion reactor can just barely make a fraction more power than it consumes. That means you have to "burn" huge amounts of fuel to produce much energy, and the equipment to do so wouldn't fit in the VAB.
Its not the amount of energy in the fuel that is the problem, either fission or fusion make gobs, the problem is using that energy. The equipment to access the energy involved in fusion is extremely heavy, which is precisely the thing it cannot be in a rocket.
___________________________________________________________
Reflectors to an orbiting collector won't do, since their orbits would be to different. Tracking the beam onto the target would be difficult.

I once heard a proposal for an SPS satellite that was essentially a gas filled spherical balloon in space. One hemisphere of the balloon was transparent to let in light, while the other hemisphere's interior was reflective, producing a spherical reflector, that reflector would focus light on one spot with some spherical abberation, but it would get enough of the sunlight in one spot where the solar furnace is situated. The Solar furnace is of course on the opposite hemisphere from the reflective inner surface. The interior gas pressure of the balloon doesn't have to be that great to inflate in into a sphere that is situated in a vacuum, so not a lot of gas is required for this. The entire balloon's surface, whether reflective or transparent is a thin lightweight membrane, the heaviest part of the whole SPS is the Solar furnace, and the microwave transmitter antenna. This SPS comes all in one piece. Sunlight is not reflected down to the earth's surface or redirected to a seperate satellite, so no tracking is involved. Perhaps the opposite hemisphere is at the proper focal length and perhaps the solar furnace has to be situated further away on some framwork attached to the balloon. The balloon is in space by the way, not floating high in the atmosphere. Although I've heard proposals for floater Solar Furnaces high in the atmosphere too.

cjchandler · 2007-01-07 09:51:31

A massive rocket is by no means needed for building that size of a reflector, 20 tons of mylar is a sphere with a 500 m radius. Send up you genorator and transmiter on other rockets and you're set. But why do you want a SPS, weren't you just saying that fusion power was going to produce net gains?

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-07 10:43:35

A massive rocket is by no means needed for building that size of a reflector, 20 tons of mylar is a sphere with a 500 m radius. Send up you genorator and transmiter on other rockets and you're set. But why do you want a SPS, weren't you just saying that fusion power was going to produce net gains?

Solar power might operate more cheaply, and the ability to build a fusion reactor remains to be proven.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-07 11:43:05

A massive rocket is by no means needed for building that size of a reflector, 20 tons of mylar is a sphere with a 500 m radius. Send up you genorator and transmiter on other rockets and you're set. But why do you want a SPS, weren't you just saying that fusion power was going to produce net gains?
Solar power might operate more cheaply, and the ability to build a fusion reactor remains to be proven.

One problem is that meteors might puncture the balloon, but with such a low pressure inside, it will take a while. repleshiing the gases might be a bother, perhaps the sphere might be hardened after inflation, so that it is ridgid.

RobertDyck · 2007-01-07 12:01:59

Before you get ahead of yourself, we don't need solar power satellites to transmit power to Earth. Just put photovoltaic pannels on houses, batteries in the basement to store energy over night, and heat with a ground source heat pump also known as a geothermal heat pump. That heat pump is also a central air conditioner. Such a house doesn't require any enegy at all, and will sell electricity to the grid during the off-season. By "off season" I mean summer for northern states, or winter for southern states. That completely eliminates the need for power for houses, and power sold to the grid will help power apartment buildings, office towers and industry. Suburban malls tend to have a large area and few stories, they can use a photovoltaic roof as well. You'll still need some power generation, but this would greatly reduce it. It's far more practical than a satellite.

GCNRevenger · 2007-01-07 13:42:25

Houses are not the only energy consumers, what of factories, cities, and office towers? I think its doubtful that PV systems which can be placed within a reasonable radius (to minimize transmission loss) would do the job. Also, the kind of power system you outline for a house uses silicon arrays, which are fairly expensive and production of which might not be practical on such a huge scale. Polymeric cells, which are right around the corner, can beat these manufacturing problems but are in turn less efficient. You'd need an awful lot of fairly toxic batteries too. Then you have the problem of cloudy regions like Seattle or the northern end of Great Britain. Plus, hopefully soon with the coming of large Lithium ion batteries in hybrid cars, gasoline demand will fall but electrical demand will increase.

If we are unable to get over our phobia about nuclear energy and we continue to succumb to the environmentalist mental disorder/big lie for political power called "global warming", then what are we supposed to do? SPS should be a possibility I think, in the likelihood that nuclear fusion doesn't pan out or if we are not allowed to burn fossil fuels anymore (esp. sea floor Clathrates).

Edit: Oh! And if every house in those dense suburban subdivisions with so little acreage each used the fancy geothermal air conditioner, I'd be worried it would shift ground temperature.

RobertDyck · 2007-01-07 16:46:37

A vertical ground loop does permit a geothermal system in a house with little land. I visited a display home over the Christmas holiday, they put the ground loop under the driveway. Modern front garage house, no back lane. The salesman said they went 600 feet deep. At that depth I expect the ground can take it.

Seattle doesn't have much demand for heating or cooling. They may be rainy much of the year, but not much power demand. I talked to a co-worker the other week who's in Seattle, he complained about not seeing the sun for weeks. Ah! Too bad. I can't feel sorry for someone who lives where it rains in January. On the other had we are having the mildest winter on record here in Winnipeg. We had a major snow fall just before New Year, but the temperature during the day gets a few degrees above freezing. It was +6°C on January 2nd! Beautiful. I keep saying that Manitoba will benefit from global warming. We have to be careful to do everything to avoid global warming, not to prevent it but merely to cover our ass when others suffer. But in terms of energy use, in winter southern Manitoba has the most hours of sunshine of any location in Canada. Not in summer, but in winter it does. Warm weather causes clouds and snow, so bright sunny days are most frequent and last longest when the demand for heating is greatest. That's a nice mix.

I keep saying the new photovoltaic developed by Los Alamos National Laboratory together with U.C. Berkeley needs to be completed and commercialized. In the year 2000 they published a paper on gallium indium nitride (GaInN) which characterization states will have conversion efficiencies of 56%, 64%, and 72% for 2, 3, and 36 junctions respectively. A later paper calculated 70.2% from 8 junctions; Ok so 8 junctions are optimal for that particular cell. I received a message on an email list from one guy involved with photovoltaic research who emphasized it needs more work, but he also admitted he isn't doing any work on it. It's been over 6 years since the paper was published, that means 6 1/2 years since the work was complete. It's time to get the photovoltaic industry off its ass and build it. And I want it mass produced with no compromise for efficiency, sold at a price per watt that's significantly lower than current silicon cells. And a life span of 65 years (on Earth) with end-of-life power that's 85% that of a new cell. Actually, EOL power is what is achieved now and semiconductors do typically last 50 years if you don't over power them. Over clocking a microprocessor to get more speed will increase power consumption, and thus heat produced causing it to burn out much more quickly. The 65 year life has a very practical reason: a new house purchased by a 25 year old couple will still function when they're 90. My grandparents died of old age between 88 and 92 years of age, so that means a house that lasts a lifetime. A solar cell that lasts 65 years will require some temperature control, so cover with a strong transparent cover that can withstand high wind and hail, and a couple layers of transparent film between the cover and photovoltaic cell. That forms a multi-pane window. Mount the cell on a copper manifold with smooth copper top surface, but water channels pressed into the back side. That can collect heat to warm water, it'll only produce lukewarm water but used as a pre-heater for water heating system it reduces power. The air gap between the last plastic film and the photovoltaic cells can be connected to the forced air heating system, helping to heat the home. Balance heat for air vs. heat for water. To ensure no UV degradation of the plastic, use a fluoropolymer. I have in mind one that's highly transparent, transmitting maximum light to the photovoltaic cell. Insulate the back of the panel with polyurethane foam insulation. The face of the copper manifold will need a coating that's thermally conductive but not electrically conductive to ensure it doesn't short out the cells. Such coatings exist now for computer heat sinks.

I would build these things myself now if I had the GaInN cell available.

As for factories and office towers: you won't find a single solution that solves all problems. This system provides for houses and shopping malls. As for batteries: if the battery lasts 25 years stored in the basement where it's warm, then disposal isn't an issue. It's not toxic if it does it's job as a sealed unit that stays in place. You just have to insulate basement walls and provide heating ducts to the basement. New houses do that anyway. Put the batteries on a plywood and 2x4 platform to keep them off the cold floor. Or OSB, whichever is most cost effective at the time.

As for nuclear power, get over it. Nuclear is a good, clean power source. Coal produces more radiation per kilowatt hour of electricity than nuclear, and that doesn't take into account chemical pollution such as acid rain. Coal is the most polluting form of power generation. In Canada, Ontario Hydro is refitting their old nuclear power plants to get them all working again. They have a growing economy but power generation isn't, so they had to build coal burning power plants. Manitoba Hydro wanted to build a large dam on the Nelson River (called the Conowapa dam) but Ontario Hydro wanted Manitoba to pay for transmission lines, even though most of it is through Ontario. Manitoba said no, Ontario must pay for it. Ontario said no, Manitoba must pay for it. The result is no progress on this dam and Ontario had to build coal plants instead. Stupid! Now the federal government is talking about paying for the transmission lines to get the project moving. The federal government wants those coal plants shut down.

The other nuclear project is tar sands extraction. Currently natural gas from the Mackenzie river is used to produce steam that extracts oil from tar sands. That's consuming natural gas quickly, and driving natural gas prices up. I'm concerned about prices since my home is heated with natural gas, but industry and government types are worried about natural gas running out. They're talking about a nuclear plant to produce steam for tar sands extraction. Ok, sounds good to me. But some anti-nuclear activists want to stop it. I want to go further. Alberta currently generates 90% of its electricity from 2 coal burning power plants. I want one replaced with a nuclear plant. That would make the coal last as well as reducing pollution. Currently Alberta just wants to continue burning coal; they know it's going to run out in about 50 years but just don't care.

How does all this relate to space? Solar power satellites don't make sense.

SpaceNut · 2007-01-07 22:27:14

Boeing Spectrolab Terrestrial Solar Cell Surpasses 40 Percent Efficiency

The trouble is Solar cells are looked at as being a military asset so it will be a while before they will make it into the main stream.

Tom Kalbfus · 2007-01-07 23:34:52

How does all this relate to space? Solar power satellites don't make sense.

Batteries are fairly heavy, and houses aren't the only consumers of energy, there are also vehicles. When was the last battery powered airplane that you saw? One possibility for SPS is to power airplanes, transmitting microwaves to them and powering their engines instead of burning fossil fuels. As for birds getting fried, birds don't fly at jetliner altitudes. All that's required is the ability to track the air planes.

RobertDyck · 2007-01-08 01:02:13

Interesting. Spectrolab previously reported their terrestrial photovoltaic cells at 30% efficiency. Their space based cells have 28.3% beginning of life, 24.3% end of life. A cell with 40.7% efficiency is a significant achievement. However, they again talk about concentrator systems. Last time I asked about pricing for their terrestrial photovoltaic cells, they refused to give me a price and simply stated they're too expensive for my application. A concentrator means a large mirror that focuses on a small area photovoltaic cell. This justifies a high price photovoltaic. However, a concentrator dramatically reduces the life of a photovoltaic cell. There's no way a cell in a concentrator would last the 65 years that I want. Furthermore, a concentrator doesn't work with diffuse light such as an overcast day; an array of photovoltaic cells with a transparency will work with any light, diffuse or not. This means they still have to get the price per unit area down.

Yes, batteries are fairly heavy. The GM EV1 when it was first released used nickel cadmium (NiCd) cells. Later they used nickel metal hydride (NiMH). The EV1 is no longer in production, but now Toyota manufactures the Prius, a hybrid vehicle. It is a gasoline/electric vehicle; it has a 4 cylinder engine which runs a generator to charge the batteries, an electric motor to run the wheels. It uses a NiMH battery. The disclaimer on Toyota's website says "Hybrid vehicle battery expected life is 150,000 miles based on laboratory bench testing." I'm told several people have modified their Prius, although doing so voids the warranty. The modifications are so innovative that Toyota is now considering implementing them in their base design, and said customers can make modifications without voiding their warranty if they get prior permission from Toyota. The modifications are basically to install additional batteries, and support a charging station. These customers have installed a charging station at their home and at work. The result is the batteries have so much power the gasoline engine never turns on, and while at work the battery is recharged to full capacity. So they never buy gas. Effectively, they have an electric car now, and if they want to take a road trip the gasoline engine will automatically kick in as soon as battery power drops low enough.

As for houses, a battery in the basement doesn't have to be light. It only has to have a large capacity, deep charge/discharge cycle, and long life. A lead acid battery will do if it meets these specifications.

Airplanes: uh, stick to jet fuel.

New Mars Forums

Announcement

#51 2007-01-04 12:38:42

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#52 2007-01-04 14:08:10

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#53 2007-01-04 16:34:19

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#54 2007-01-05 10:36:12

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#55 2007-01-05 11:28:03

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#56 2007-01-05 13:52:06

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#57 2007-01-05 19:44:51

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#58 2007-01-05 23:30:31

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#59 2007-01-06 09:02:58

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#60 2007-01-06 10:52:08

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#61 2007-01-06 13:15:14

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#62 2007-01-06 13:34:59

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#63 2007-01-06 19:49:52

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#64 2007-01-06 20:50:40

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#65 2007-01-07 05:36:15

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#66 2007-01-07 09:41:40

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#67 2007-01-07 09:51:31

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#68 2007-01-07 10:43:35

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#69 2007-01-07 11:43:05

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#70 2007-01-07 12:01:59

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#71 2007-01-07 13:42:25

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#72 2007-01-07 16:46:37

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#73 2007-01-07 22:27:14

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#74 2007-01-07 23:34:52

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

#75 2007-01-08 01:02:13

Re: Big Dumb Boosters revisited

Board footer