[ExI] Low energy payback time
Keith Henson
hkeithhenson at gmail.com
Mon May 23 14:49:23 UTC 2011
The Skylon/laser combination gets the energy payback time for power
satellites down to about 53 days at ~6% energy efficient getting parts
to GEO. (Rockets are ~2.5% efficient.)
This is from a preliminary look at a system that uses a cargo plane
for the first ten km, microwave heating and burning methane to 25-30
km and mach 5-6, microwaves alone heating methane to around 7 km/s,
then hydrogen heated with a laser from there on out to GEO. 60 t/h to
GEO with expansion to 360 t/h at somewhat lower cost.
It looks like ~11 percent energy efficient, which gives an energy
payback time of under a month.
This is made possible by recent cuts in the cost of microwave and
laser beamed energy.
Keith
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