International Space Elevator Consortium
December 2024/January 2025 Newsletter

In this Issue:
In Memoriam R. Roy Whitney, PhD
ISEC/NSS Academic Challenge Deadline Update
Editor’s Note
Chief Architect’s Corner
Success at IAC in Milan
Success at ReInventing Space in London
Pete Swan visits the AMRC in the UK
Tether Materials
Solar System Space Elevators
“Space Elevator: Strategies and Status” on YouTube
Social Media Update
Around the Web
Upcoming Events
Contact Us

In Memoriam of R. Roy Whitney, PhD.

by Larry Bartoszek

It is with a heavy heart that I write of the passing of R. Roy Whitney, PhD. Roy had been working with ISEC on the 2024 study about powering the space elevator. He passed away unexpectedly at his home on November 18th, 2024. Roy was one of the founding members of the Thomas Jefferson National Laboratory, (originally known as the Continuous Electron Beam Accelerator Facility, or CEBAF.) Roy was part of the team that built the Free Electron Laser at Jefferson Lab, which achieved first light on June 17, 1998. His experience at accelerator laboratories spanned over 40 years, including Stanford University's High Energy Physics Lab, Berkeley Lab, Los Alamos-LAMPF, MIT-Bates, and Saclay in France. After becoming the first experimentalist awarded Scientist Emeritus at Jefferson Lab, he became President of Boron Nitride Nanotubes, LLC. BNNT is developing boron nitride nanotubes as an alternative to carbon nanotubes, with possible applications as space elevator tether material. You can read about some of Roy's accomplishments at https://www.bnnt.com/leadership/roy-whitney. His obituary page is https://www.bnnt.com/leadership/roy-whitney/memoriam. Roy was very generous with his time and expertise with us. I regret not knowing Roy long enough to absorb his vast knowledge of free electron lasers. All of us at ISEC offer our condolences to his family. He is already missed by the power study group.

Academic Challenge Deadline Update

The ISEC/NSS Academic Challenge deadline for submission has been extended to the 25th of January, 2025.

See more details on our website under: https://www.isec.org/academic-challenge with prize money at the end of the rainbow!

Editor’s Note

Dear Space Elevator Enthusiasts,

I asked Chat GPT to help me write my editorial with the prompt, “Write an editor's note explaining why there will be no January issue of a newsletter” and it came up with this:

We hope this message finds you well and that you are enjoying a wonderful holiday season. We wanted to inform you that there will be no January issue of our newsletter. This decision was made to allow our team to take a well-deserved break and spend quality time with their loved ones during the holidays.

We believe that this pause will enable us to return refreshed and ready to bring you even more engaging and insightful content in the coming months. We appreciate your understanding and continued support.

We look forward to reconnecting with you in February with exciting updates and stories. Until then, we wish you a happy and prosperous New Year!

(That is so fitting that it’s frightening!)

Sandee Schaeffer
Newsletter Editor

Chief Architect’s Corner

by Pete Swan

Translating Modern-Day Space Elevator Benefits to Customer Needs

Over the last several months, results coming from long discussions at the ISEC Space Elevator Conference (2024, Chicago) have led to a summary of the benefits of the Modern-Day Space Elevator. These descriptions are great for “developers” of the future program, but they really need to be translated into terminology that references the needs of the customers. As we found out, identifying early customers at this point is difficult while looking for an “anchor tenant” is especially desirable and hardest yet. In this Chief Architect’s Corner, I will lay out our summary of benefits and then try to do a translation for customers:

Modern Day Space Elevator Benefits: First the benefits (see ISEC website under Chief Architect’s notes 52-62)  https://www.isec.org/architects-notes.

+ The Green Road to Space is the very definition of sustainable space operations.

+ Unmatched efficiency delivers payloads to GEO and beyond -- 70% of ocean surface departure mass by space elevators [remaining 30% is reusable climber] vs. rocket equation at 4% of the pad mass arrives in LEO, 2% to GEO and only 0.5% to Lunar or Martian surfaces.

+ Unmatched lift -- massive payloads daily, cheaply, routinely, and safely on permanent space access transportation infrastructures -- 170,000 tonnes per year to GEO & Beyond at Full Operational Capability.

+ Assembly of large space systems above the gravity well (at GEO and Apex Anchor) resulting in lunar, Martian and solar system missions enabling hundreds of exploration and science missions.

+ Huge velocity releases from Apex Anchor (Mars in 61 days, 14 hours to the Moon).

With a vision of: Space Elevators are the Green Road to Space while they enable humanity's most important missions by moving massive tonnage to GEO and beyond. This is accomplished safely, routinely, inexpensively, daily, and they are environmentally neutral.

Now a look at the customers. We all know that we have tremendous lists of potential customers within current missions -- they just do not project changing their ways into the future. These would include current GEO missions, solar system science flights, and support for the lunar projects. The largest change will come from future demands that have already grown tremendously within the commercial world and the movement off-planet. The new missions (requiring large mass movements) would include Space Solar Power, Mars settlement, Moon Village, Earth Sun Shades, planetary defense, and a massive increase in GEO missions, solar system flights, and military support.

Customer NEEDS: If I were to project their needs, I would use words describing desired support such as daily, routine, safe, green, and inexpensive, which result from permanent infrastructure developments. In addition, I see those future missions as desiring a massive movement of logistics to GEO (Space Solar Power at 2 million tonnes), the Moon (half a million tonnes), Mars (one million tonnes to surface), Earth Sun Shades (10 million tonnes), and L-5 Settlements (20 million tonnes). In addition, they talk about better rocket fuels but do not mention that even those leave harmful ingredients in our atmosphere -- thus helping to ruin it when talking about ramping up to over 3 launches per day. The Green Road to Space would benefit customers by leaning into their needs. If we build it, they will come.

If one were to boil this all down to a simple look at customer needs, one could use the words “permanent space access infrastructure” similar to placing a bridge to space. As such, when talking to customers, we should use words that reflect “their needs”, for example:

The Modern-Day Space Elevator will support your needs to access space and move massive logistics support to GEO and beyond on a permanent space access infrastructure -- or the Green Road to Space.

Success at IAC in Milan

The International Astronautical Federation’s International Astronautical Congress moves from city to city each year with tremendous turnout of the global space experts and all the companies and governments involved inside the global community (with a record this year of over 11,000 participants). This year it was in Milan and two members of our board were there to represent ISEC and its recent research results (Peter Robinson was accepted, but he could not make it). It is critical that ISEC represents the progress in the Modern-Day Space Elevator and investigates the progress from such countries as Japan, India, China, and the UK. The images below show Pete Swan talking about Apex Anchor Missions and the Green Road to Space while John Knapman explained the remarkable opening up of the GEO node and future human habitats. Next year will be in Sydney and we look forward to your submission of ideas for papers -- gentle reminder, abstracts are due end of February.

There were three papers given by our leadership in Milan within the Space Elevator technical session and two by Pete in separate sessions. The following talks will be on our website: https://www.isec.org/recent-publications for download. They are:

+ Peter Swan with Paul Phister, Keynote: “Jerome Pearson Memorial Lecture – Apex Anchor Initial Research” 

+ And Peter Swan with Cathy W. Swan “Green Road to Space Leads to Dual Space Access Strategy” 

+ John Knapman, “Exploiting a Space Elevator at Geosynchronous Altitude” 

+ Peter Swan and Bruce Chesley - “Space Elevators Lifting Extreme Masses to Support Solar Power Satellite Assembly at GEO” 

+ Peter Swan and Cathy Swan, “Massive Velocities for Large Spacecraft towards the Stars” 

The chart below shows the papers within the Space Elevator Technical Session:

Success at ReInventing Space in London

Pete Swan and John Knapman attended ReInventing Space (RISpace) in London. Pete gave two talks and John presented a poster. The day started well when the chairman remarked that the prospects for space elevators are now looking very promising, and they are no longer fictional. Pete presented The Green Road to Space and The Opportunities at the Apex Anchor.

The youngest member of the audience was 12 years old! Alex Rosser was there with his mother and was absolutely fascinated. He will be giving a talk to his school.

Both Pete and John were busy talking to interested people at every break. The poster enabled John to explain many points that Pete didn’t have time to cover in the talks.

Pete Swan visits the AMRC in the UK

by Adrian Nixon

The Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC) is a world-class facility located in the Advanced Manufacturing Park (AMP) in Sheffield, UK. It is part of the University of Sheffield.

The AMRC works with industrial partners with names you will recognise such as Rolls-Royce, Boeing, Airbus, and many others. Pete Swan was here to present to a specially invited audience.

We started the day with a working breakfast where University teams presented their work on space projects. Project Sunride is a student-led rocketry team at the University of Sheffield and was formed in 2017. They hold the UK Open Altitude record at 11,056m (36,274ft), which the team achieved in 2019 with their rocket "Helen".

You can find out more at https://sunride.space/

After breakfast, it was Pete’s turn to do the talking. The organiser, Glenn McCauley of Yorkshire Space Hub, introduced Pete and he presented to a packed room about the space elevator.

Then Pete invited Adrian Nixon to brief the audience about the candidate materials for the space elevator.

Glenn McCauley, of Space Hub Yorkshire, then managed the Q&A session from the audience.

After an engaging question and answer session, Professor Mike Maddock herded the audience to get themselves in the picture with Pete and Adrian for a group photo.

After lunch, we then continued to the AMRC to visit the subtractive and additive manufacturing facilities, then the factory of the future. The Commercial Director of AMRC, Matt Farnsworth led the tour.

Quite a full day! We took good care of Pete and made sure he got back to the rail station in time to catch his train to London and then back home to the USA for a well-earned rest, safe in the knowledge of a job well done.

You are welcome back anytime Pete!

Tether Materials

by Adrian Nixon

How Water Affects the Friction Behaviour of Graphene

“God made the bulk; surfaces were invented by the devil” [1]. My friend and colleague Larry Bartoszek is fond of this quote from the Nobel Prize winning physicist, Wolfgang Pauli. The reason for this statement is that the bulk material is essentially interacting with itself and usually locked in place, whereas surfaces interact with other surfaces and the surrounding environmental conditions. This complicates matters such as friction, where different surfaces interact.

Friction is usually expressed as a coefficient of friction. The lower the number, the more the lubricant behaviour and the higher the number the more the frictant behaviour [2]. Put another way, the lower the coefficient of friction number, the slippier the surface interaction.

Dear Reader, as you will know, at ISEC, we are exploring the limits of known technology. One of the ways we do this is by assembling study groups that work to rigorous standards addressing some of the key challenges we need to solve on the way to making the space elevator a reality.

One of the current study groups is exploring powering the climber and is led by Larry. Part of the power requirements involve knowing how the climber engages with the tether. Our current climber designs involve opposing wheels made of titanium pressed against a flat ribbon tether made from multilayered graphene. We are working on the assumption that the coefficient of friction of the titanium-graphene interface is 0.1. This is a low number and is like ice rubbing against itself [3]. This means that the tether is just climbable with the designs we are developing, providing we cling very tightly to the tether [4].

You will know from reading these newsletter articles over the years that we know a great deal about the bulk materials involved. What we know less about is the way their surfaces interact. We are not alone, hence the quote from Professor Pauli.

In the study group, we were discussing how the tether might behave in the atmosphere compared to the vacuum of space, and this prompted me to take another look at the literature. I found something interesting that we had missed. A team in Canada was exploring the way humidity affects the lubricant performance of some materials. They considered the titanium-multilayer-graphene interface. Even better, this work looked at the effect of varying levels of humidity on the coefficient of friction of the titanium-graphene friction pair [5]. Fig 1 shows what they found.

This paper looked at the friction pair of titanium and graphene (measured using a pin on disc type CSM tribometer). This friction pair had a coefficient of friction of 0.59 when dry and 0.1 when the water humidity was 45%.

The test work showed a steep decline in friction between 0% and 10% relative humidity. We suspect the line will be even steeper than the data shows. This is because water will first adsorb [6] on the surface of the graphene as a monolayer and a tiny amount of water will have a big impact on the surface properties of the graphene.

So, we have discovered new information about the friction pair of titanium and graphene. It is not as slippery as we thought, provided the graphene surface is totally dry. When the surface is wet the coefficient of friction is 0.1 (like ice moving on ice). When the surface is dry the coefficient of friction increases to 0.59 (like a house brick sliding over a wooden table) [7].

The tether just got easier to climb.

References

1. Manfred Robert Schroeder (1991). Fractals, Chaos, Power Laws: Minutes from an Infinite Paradise. New York: W.H. Freeman, p.230.

2. Nixon, A. (2023). Measuring the Friction of Graphene Super Laminate. [online] International Space Elevator Consortium. Available at: https://www.isec.org/space-elevator-newsletter-2023-february/#tether [Accessed 26 Nov. 2024].

3. Anon (2004). Friction and Friction Coefficients. [online] Engineering toolbox. Available at: https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/friction-coefficients-d_778.html [Accessed 26 Nov. 2024].

4. Wright, D.H., Bartoszek, L., Burke, A.J., Dotson, D.L., Hassan El Chab, Knapman, J., Lades, M., Nixon, A., Phister, P.W. and Robinson, P. (2023). Conditions at the interface between the space elevator tether and its climber. Acta Astronautica, 211(211), pp.631–649. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actaastro.2023.06.047.

5. S. Bhowmick, Banerji, A. and A.T. Alpas (2015). Role of humidity in reducing sliding friction of multilayered graphene. Carbon, 87, pp.374–384. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.carbon.2015.01.053.

6. Anupama Sapkota (2023). Absorption vs. Adsorption: 10 Differences, Examples. [online] Microbe Notes. Available at: https://microbenotes.com/absorption-vs-adsorption/ [Accessed 26 Nov. 2024].

7. Erik Gregersen (2019). force | Definition & Formula. In: Encyclopædia Britannica. [online] Available at: https://www.britannica.com/science/force-physics [Accessed 26 Nov. 2024].

Solar System Space Elevators

by Peter Robinson

Part 6: Saturn and the Lesser Saturnian Moons

This is the sixth article of the “Solar System Space Elevators” series. Earlier articles covered Mercury & Venus, the Asteroids, the Moon, Mars, and Jupiter.

1. SATURN

The scale of both Jupiter and Saturn led me not to consider an Elevator to a Gas Giant ‘surface’ until recently, but I decided I should check the numbers after reading Stephen Baxter describe a Saturn elevator in his SF Novel Creation Node (see review in the April-2024 ISEC newsletter [1]). I covered Jupiter in the last article.

Saturn’s nominal equatorial radius is 58,232 km (9.1 x Earth), with a mass of 95.2 x Earth, a rotation period of 10.5 hours and (surprisingly) an equatorial ‘surface’ gravity of just 1.06 x Earth [2]. These combine to yield a stationary altitude of 51,234 km, and any ‘space elevator’ from the surface would need to be far longer depending on the mass of the Apex Anchor.

A major issue with a Saturn Elevator is the lack of any solid surface, meaning that the tether base would need to be a suspended mass with associated stability and dynamic control challenges. The base would also need to be positioned high enough in the atmosphere to reduce the wind loading on the tether to manageable levels.

Another issue is the extent of Saturn’s rings, from 7000 to 80,000 kilometres altitude and averaging approximately 20 metres in thickness [3]. The altitude of the stationary orbit means that any equatorial space elevator tether would extend through a good proportion of the ring system. The relative velocity of the ring particles would be zero at the stationary altitude but would become significant above or below (I will leave it as an exercise for the reader to calculate the precise relative velocity profile).

A strategy to avoid the rings could be to deflect the tether north or south by locating the base station away from the equator, but the base would need to be held in position by thrusters or perhaps some form of ‘sail’ making use of the high winds in Saturn’s upper atmosphere. The thruster method is discussed in the previous article on Jovian Elevators [4]. The winds also mean the base station could not be too low in the atmosphere, perhaps with some form of cable/pulley system minimising tether area and hence wind load forces (as proposed in my 2023 IAC paper for the Earth [5]).

A third issue with building a Saturn space elevator is the required tether material strength. Approximate spreadsheet analysis shows that Graphene Super Laminate (GSL) material with a working specific stress of 38.9 MYuri (88 GPa at 2260 kg/m^3) would require a taper ratio of 76 : 1, meaning that a tether with area 10 mm^2 (1m x 10 micron) at Saturn’s surface would need to have an area of over 760 mm^2 at the stationary altitude, so 1m wide and 0.76 mm thick. This is perhaps feasible, except (for a tether 80,000 km long) it would require a tether mass of over 80,700 tonnes with an Apex Anchor mass of over 16,200 tonnes.

A higher tether working stress would mean a lower taper ratio and lower masses. Figure 2 below shows the effect on increasing the tether strength on the taper ratio, comparing the results for Saturn with those for Jupiter [4] and the Earth.

A taper ratio of less than ten might avoid the total tether mass becoming excessive, meaning a material specific strength of around double that forecast for GSL. I am not aware of any material which could even theoretically approach this strength.

To conclude, the lack of a suitable material and the other major issues mean that a Space Elevator on Saturn is not practical with current technologies.

2. SATURN’S MOONS

Saturn has 146 moons with confirmed orbits, 63 of which are named, and hundreds more km-sized moons and smaller moonlets.

Figure 3 is an annotated image of nine of Saturn's moons captured by the Cassini spacecraft, showing Dione, Enceladus, Epimetheus, Prometheus, Mimas, Rhea, Janus, Tethys and Titan. All are tidally locked to Saturn and so are potential candidates for ‘L1-type’ elevators.

In this article I will discuss just the second largest (Rhea) in any detail, leaving Enceladus and Titan for later. Basic potential elevator parameters for Rhea are as follows.

2.1 RHEA [6]

Orbit Radius (semi-major axis) = 527,040 km
Orbital Period = 4.52 days
Mean Diameter = 1527 km
L1 Altitude = 5,050 km

The length of any L1-type space elevator on Rhea (extending towards Saturn) would need to be considerably in excess of the L1 altitude, perhaps 20,000 km or more depending on the chosen Apex Anchor mass.

As with any moon with no atmosphere, any decision to build an elevator would be difficult to justify. Surface access would be relatively simple using rocket or mass driver technologies due to the low surface gravity and lack of aerodynamic drag.

(In November 2010, NASA announced the discovery of an extremely tenuous atmosphere, an exosphere, but this would be insignificant for any spacecraft during approach or departure from the surface.)

2.2 Other Lesser Moons

Other moons of Saturn (apart from Titan) are smaller than Rhea and also without any substantial atmosphere, so again the construction of a space elevator would be difficult to justify.

Many of the outer moons are likely to be captured asteroids, so (as discussed in my earlier article on ‘Asteroid’ elevators) surface integrity may also be inadequate for retention of an Elevator system.

2.3 Enceladus and Titan

Two more positive exceptions to the above are ENCELADUS and TITAN. Both these moons are thought to be potential habitats for extra-terrestrial life and therefore worthy of extensive exploration, meaning that both are also candidates for simple Space Elevator systems. I will summarise my ideas in later articles, so…

NEXT TIME: ENCELADUS

3. REFERENCES

[1] ISEC April-2024 Newsletter, https://www.isec.org/space-elevator-newsletter-2024-april (Creation Node by Stephen Baxter, published by Gollancz, Sept 2023, ISBN-13: 978-1473228955 )

[2] ‘Saturn’ Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn

[3] ‘Rings of Saturn’ Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rings_of_Saturn

[4] ISEC November-2024 Newsletter, ‘Jupiter’: https://www.isec.org/space-elevator-newsletter-2024-november/#solarsystem

[5] IAC2022 paper “Space Elevator Tether Atmospheric Wind Loading and a Cable Lift Concept”, P.Robinson & J.Knapman, https://www.isec.org/s/ISEC-2022-IAC-space-elevator-tether-atmospheric-wind-loading-paper.pdf

[6] ‘Rhea’ Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhea_(moon)

“Space Elevators: Strategies and Status” on YouTube

by David Brandt-Erichson

Isaac Arthur, President of the National Space Society and creator of the YouTube series Science and Futurism with Isaac Arthur (with 798K followers) has produced a 69-minute program "Space Elevators: Strategies and Status" which will premiere on YouTube on December 19, 2024. You can view it at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0ju74IqW0A.

Credits:
Space Elevators: Strategies & Status
Episode 478; December 19, 2024
Produced, Narrated & Written: Isaac Arthur
Editors: Adrian Nixon, David Brandt-Erichsen, Peter Swan
Graphics: Jarred Eagley, Jeremy Jozwik, International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC), Ketie Byrne, Ken York YD Visual, Phil Swan, The Atlantis Project, Real Courte
Select imagery/video supplied by Getty Images
Music Courtesy of Epidemic Sound http://epidemicsound.com/creator
Stellardrone, "In Time", "Red Giant"
Aerium, featuring Sieger, "Deiljocht"
Miguel Johnson, "So Many Stars"
Kai Engel, "Endless Story About Sun and Moon"

Social Media Update

Our social media presence continues to grow, still primarily on LinkedIn but spreading to other platforms. See the full list in the 'Contact Us' section at the end of this newsletter: whatever your preferred platform, please react ('like', re-post, or comment) to our articles. That really helps raise our profile!

Social media is the PRESENT and often about the FUTURE, but the PAST is also important as we all stand on the shoulders of others. Our website www.isec.org contains a wealth of knowledge and history; for example, under the 'Resources' tab from the home page you can find articles, reports, and more. ISEC members also have access to a library of papers and other material on the Zotero platform, but the written word does not always tell the whole story.

Seeing the people involved can be valuable, and we have an archive of images on the Flickr platform. This includes photographs from events from 2010 to the present day, including albums from London and Sheffield last month (reported above). Flickr also contains the added bonus of albums dedicated to Space Elevator inventors Yuri Artsutanov and Jerome Pearson.

Go to our 'Photographs' webpage to learn more about Flickr and for onward links to the photographs themselves by following this link: https://www.isec.org/photographs. Some of us no longer look the same as we did 10+ years ago!!

ISEC Media Mogul

Around the Web

Space Elevators are the topic of Episode 478 of the series, "Science & Futurism with Isaac Arthur." At one hour and nine minutes, it is the longest space elevator video yet featured in the ISEC newsletter, and it is packed with information about proposed manufacturing materials with help from Adrian Nixon, Pete Swan, and David Brandt-Erichson. Two more mentions for their contributions were Peter Robinson and John Knapman. Pop some popcorn! 

Space Elevators: Strategies & Status https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0ju74IqW0A 

Upcoming Events:

International Space Development Conference 2025
Sponsored by the National Space Society
https://www.isec.org/events/isdc2025
https://isdc.nss.org/
Theme: "Together, Beyond"
Thursday, June 19, through Sunday, June 22, 2025
Space Elevator Session: "Space Elevators Revolutionizing Access to Space"
Rosen Center, Orlando, FL, United States

76th International Astronautical Congress
Sponsored by the International Astronautical Federation (IAF)
https://www.iac2025.org/about/
Monday, September 29th, through Friday, October 3rd, 2025
International Convention Centre, Sydney, Australia

77th International Astronautical Congress
Sponsored by the International Astronautical Federation (IAF)
https://iac2026antalya.com/
Theme: “The World Needs More Space”
Proposed Dates: October 5th through October 9th, 2026
Antalya, Turkey

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