[ExI] pentagon wants orbiting solar power stations

[Samantha Atkins]

What of the possibility of autonomous and tele-operated robotic mining  
of near-earth asteroids and space manufacture of some of the larger  
solar sat components?  If possible it would help avoid having to drag  
so much out of the gravity well.   Not to mention that extraction of  
bullion (!), metals and combustibles is space could generally greatly  
enhance space opportunities.    I heard about such things ages ago but  
haven't seen a lot since.

- samantha

On Oct 14, 2007, at 11:59 PM, Eugen Leitl wrote:

> On Sun, Oct 14, 2007 at 06:55:46PM -0400, Brent Neal wrote:
>
>> I'd guess they'd try to piggyback slots - i.e. replace communication
>> satellites with power satellites with communications relays on them.
>> Not like powering the relays would be a problem. :)
>
> There are advantages in dynamic LEO satellite configurations.
> You have to maintain a critical density (depends on orbit height)
> in order to achieve a smooth handover for Earth-side rectenna
> arrays.
>
> There are multiple technologies which allow you to dramatically
> reduce launch costs (high accelerations/small packages, so unsuitable
> for large payloads and people), and which get you to LEO.
>
> -- 
> Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
> ______________________________________________________________
> ICBM: 48.07100, 11.36820 http://www.ativel.com http://postbiota.org
> 8B29F6BE: 099D 78BA 2FD3 B014 B08A  7779 75B0 2443 8B29 F6BE
> _______________________________________________
> extropy-chat mailing list
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
> http://lists.extropy.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/extropy-chat