SpaceElevatorEnvironment
From SpaceElevatorWiki.com
The Environment
The elevator stretches from the Earth to high orbit - passing through Earth weather, the ionosphere, radiation belts and out beyond the Earth's magnetosphere. In each of these environments there are concerns and hazards for the space elevator and a complete understanding is required to be able to produce a viable design.
| Hazard | Impact | Details / Solutions |
| Lightning | Severed ribbon | Anchor location in lightning-free zone |
| Wind | dynamic destruction of the ribbon | Location where limited wind, ribbon design |
| Radiation 1 | ribbon degradation | material selection |
| Radiation 2 | hazard to electronics and cargo | higher speed and shielding |
| Debris | ribbon destruction | Ribbon design with a width larger than a meter insures only a small part of the ribbon will be damaged by any impact. The ribbon design also isolates damage along the length of the ribbon. Active avoidance limits impacts larger than 1 cm. |
| Meteors | ribbon destruction | Same as for debris though lower flux and active avoidance can not be used. |
| Earth's magnetic field | Current generation in ribbon | Ribbon is geosynchronous so only flucuations in the magnet field will create any current and this is small |
| Interplanetary magnet field | Current generation | The ribbon travels quickly through the interplanetary magnetic field but the field is too weak to generate and substantial current. |
| Solar wind/particles | ribbon degradation | same as radiation above |
| Gravitational influence | ribbon oscillation | The Moon and sun will both exert a gravitational pull on the ribbon at a roughly 24 hour period. The natural frequency of the ribbon is about 7.2 hours and there will be little coupling |
| Thermal cycling | ribbon wear and oscillation | Each day the lower end of the ribbon will go in and out of the Earth's shadow. This will change the temperature and length of the ribbon |
| Atomic oxygen | ribbon destruction | coating of ribbon |
Basic Work Required
- Full characterization of environmental effects starting from "The Space Elevator" book and studies done by others
- Detailed model of ribbon magnetic field interactions
- Detailed model of damage extent and flux due to meteors ( Leonids ) and debris. Include the expected increase in orbital debrisover the next couple decades.
- Thermal modeling of the ribbon during transition between sun and shadow
