Space based VLBI - next steps beyond Hubble
Willie...@gmail.com
interstellar distances, and large scale use of solar energy across the
solar system and beyond, all make use of similar technology and skill
sets - as well as the same locations in the solar system. So, as the
interplanetary and later interstellar internet is developed, these
techniques, called very long baseline interferometry, will be further
developed and used with greater and greater interoperability, between
remote sensing, remote communications, and remote power beaming.
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/98/spacevlbi.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_Long_Baseline_Interferometry
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2008A&A...477..781F
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6V1N-3TYMS00-S&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=a27191b9635d52d79a4b55e8e843623d
Imagine a trio of optical and radio telescopes arrayed in GEO above
the Earth with their sensors highly correlated in time - so that they
can synthesize a baseline over 70,000 km across.
Instead of a single telescope at each location looking at a single
spot in the sky, imagine inflatable optics that form a golf-ball like
structure dozens of km in diameter for radio and infrared telescopes,
and hundreds of meters in diameter for optical telescopes. Each
dimple in the sphere thus formed is a large mirror collecting
information from a region of space. Each region overlaps its
neighbor, thus all the entire sky is imaged - simultaneously.
Further, all the detectors in all of the telescopes in each spherical
satellite are highly correlated with the other two detectors by the
exchange of open optical signals between all three satellites. Pulses
exchanged in this way synchronize a femto-second timing laser on board
each satellite - these timing signals are streamed along with precise
position and orientation data from each sensor set - and the resulting
stream is correlated in massive computing platforms on each satellite
to obtain detailed information from each pixel of resolved sky - a
life high resolution version - complete with history of updates of the
entire universe.
and a convenient way to organize all the information published on each
location and object in the sky.
The streaming data set is available via the interplanetary internet
gateway - forming an interstellar internet for points beyond the solar
system as they become available.
These Earth orbiting satellites not only gather scientific quality
data from throughout the universe, they also are capable of sending
out radio pulses and looking at their reflection in real time, forming
an advanced doppler radar - and lidar pulses- as well as an advanced
communications capability with all vehicles within hailing distance of
the network. So, older spacecraft as well as newer spaceraft can be
monitored and even sent messages and messages are received.
In this way, there is a housekeeping function these satellites may
play as a gateway to an interplanetary internet, that pays for their
continued operation and expansion and use as scientific instruments.
Beyond GEO a similar network of three satellites, built as a second
generation, once we cut our teeth on the first generation satellite,
is orbited in the Lagrange Points in Earth Orbit around the sun - 150
million km from the Sun. These satellites are larger more capable and
more sensitive - forming an effective telescope size 300 million km
across - giving increased sensitivity 25 million times as capable - as
well as broadband and navigation throughout the inner solar system.
Beyond Earth's orbit around the sun there is Jupiter's orbit - where 3
third generation VOT/VLBI telescope arrays may be located forming an
effective sensor - 1,500 million km in diameter - further increasing
sensitivity and providing broadband communications throughout the
outer solar system - and 25x the sensitivity.
Beyond the Kuiper Belt - satellites may be located to use the sun's
gravity itself to focus signals arriving from deep space, or focus
signals bound for deep space
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_lensing
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1979Sci...205.1133E
An array of 60 or more satellites 550 astronomical units from the sun,
or more (82,500 million km or more) uses the sun's gravity to gather
or focus information from or to any direction in the sky with a high
degree of precision. This forms the final layer in the interstellar
internet - 6,600x as sensitive as the Jovian Orbital system.
POWER NET
I have developed ultra-low-cost solar panels.
http://www.usoal.com
http://www.mokindustries.com
these panels are best used in sunny locations with little or no
cloud. Such locations are generally far from areas where people use
industry. Despite their low cost, it makes sense to use them where
there is plenty of sun, and send the energy to where its needed, in
places where there is less sun. Methods of transmission include,
hydrogen pipeline, HVDC transmission, and ground based laser or
microwave transmission of energy. These elements form the beginning
of a solar power network, similar to the communications intensive
internet.
http://www1.eere.energy.gov/hydrogenandfuelcells/delivery/current_technology.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HVDC
http://www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/article_display.html?id=245124
Satellites in GEO that gather sunlight 24/7 and beam bandgap matched
laser energy efficiently to terrestrial solar panels - increse the
value and energy level of terrestrial systems 16x their native level,
more than paying for a space based extension of the phase 1 power net
described above.
Cost savings in both systems are achieved by using ultra-high-
intensity PV that operate at 5,000 to 15,000x solar intensity. This
is achieved through a water filled lens in the first case, and a thin
film concentrator in the second case, but may also be achieved by
removing the satellites to within 1.22 million to 2.12 million km from
the solar surface. Since the concentrator is 95% or more of the costs
of terrestrial systems, value of the power net may be increased by
another factor of 20x - or 320x over terrestrial systems, which is 5x
the value of today's primary energy systems - i.e. phase 1 provides 5x
improvement in our energy situation, phase 2 - 80x improvement, phase
3 - 1,600x
Over this development period, learning curve effects provide another
factor of 3x improvement, allowing overall costs to drop to 1/5000th
the cost of today's energy and usage rates to rise 25 million times.
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/7081584.html
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/y2006/0185713.html
Such systems may be used to power the entire worlds as well as provide
broadband communications. They may also be used to power propulsion
systems ranging from laser thermal, laser pulse and laser mirror
technology. These systems are immediately applicable for all manner
of interplanetary and interstellar travel. Including the use of solar
gravity lensing to efficiently project laser energy gathered near the
solar surface, from an emitter beyond 550 AU from the sun.
Similar satellite networks orbiting nearby stars, not only provide
broadband communications capability in remote star systems, but also
provide a means to power arriving starship's propulsion systems to
slow down without staging.
Bob Forward working with others, proposed a multi-stage light sail to
slow an ariving starship with light arriving from Earth
http://www.calphysics.org/articles/merc2000a.html
http://www.springerlink.com/content/m27n87553425u391/
but once a payload is operating in the remote star system, a counter-
propagating beam set may be established to slow arriving payloads, and
return material and payloads to Sol - vastly reducing the size and
complexity of a starship for a given payload mass - or increasing
payload mass for a given sail area.
LINKING IN ROBOT PROBES
I describe in another link, the potential of even near term robotic
explorers of the outer planets. These data streams are easily
detected by any of the satellite networks described above, and even
supplied power from some of the more advanced power beaming systems.
These too, may be extended by use of solar sails to interstellar
ranges.
INTERSTELLAR VLBI
Accurate digital communications from probes between stars provide the
opportunity to correlate observations from different star systems.
Data once exchanged and synchronized, using the gravitational lensing
around other stars, may be analyzed anywhere on the interstellar
internet to provide interstellar VLBI capable of expanding our
capabilities beyond anything possible in the solar system.
SUPERMASSIVE PARTICLE ACCELERATOR
The ability to send objects at 1/3 light speed or more beyond Sol, and
send objects from the stars to Sol at similar speeds, not only opens
up the nearby galactic arm to the possiblity of interstellar commerce,
but also opens up the possibility of a new sort of supermassive
particle accelerator capable of producing on an experimental basis,
black holes.
http://zebu.uoregon.edu/~imamura/122/mar13/bhform.html
http://www.universetoday.com/2008/02/13/synthetic-black-hole-event-horizon-created-in-uk-laboratory/
Imagine a day when interstellar laser light sails support commerce
cheaply between the stars as previously described. Now imagine the
debris field around the sun and other stars is mined for Iron-56.
Large cone-like bodies of iron-56 are formed at a dozen nearby star
systems. These systems are all accelerated using the laser light sail
system - toward a common point in space - near a small Kuiper belt
object - in such a way so as to collide and implode - forming a
macroscopic black hole. Charging the iron-56 charges the resulting
black hole. Changing the timing and center of the collision of parts
- imparts spin to the collapsing dodecahedron.
After a series of experiments, sufficient information may be generated
to allow black hole engineering - which may ultimately lead to further
developments in propulsion, communications, science and engineering.
Martha Adams
<Willie...@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:fa3c9f15-12c6-4ed1...@a70g2000hsh.googlegroups.com...
> Space sensing, long distance communications over interplanetary and
> interstellar distances, and large scale use of solar energy across the
> solar system and beyond, all make use of similar technology and skill
> sets - as well as the same locations in the solar system. So, as the
> interplanetary and later interstellar internet is developed, these
<snip a lot of interesting stuff>
This long piece illustrates why I'm saying, the place to
explore space from, is space. Hence my prioritizing choice
that *settlements now, research later* since we know enough
now to put those settlements out there and to begin building
the commercial networks and knowhow for the settlements to
support themselves *and* Terra back there at the bottom of
its gravity well. And Terra is going to need that support,
for it looks from here very like that without it, Terra is
going to crash hard. If we don't have those settlements
out there before that crash, then we'll never do it. So
my mantra is *Settlements Now, Research Later,* and Mookie
illustrates what some of that research could be.
In my guess of what's the future, I imagine an optical VLB
telescope shows us another blue world somewhere out there
with white clouds, like Terra seen from afar. Then we'll
know where to send that first interstellar probe.
And being out in space, propulsion technology will get an
immense boost. Nothing like practical immediate usefulness
to promote technical evolution. So by the time we can see
which is a blue world to visit, we'll have the technology
to do it. But not until the settlements are out there and
stabilized so eyes can look outward.
Titeotwaki -- mha [sci.space.policy 2008 Apr 18]
Ian Parker
> <Willie.Moo...@gmail.com> wrote in message
>
> news:fa3c9f15-12c6-4ed1...@a70g2000hsh.googlegroups.com...
>
> > Space sensing, long distance communications over interplanetary and
> > interstellar distances, and large scale use of solar energy across the
> > solar system and beyond, all make use of similar technology and skill
> > sets - as well as the same locations in the solar system. So, as the
> > interplanetary and later interstellar internet is developed, these
>
> <snip a lot of interesting stuff>
>
> This long piece illustrates why I'm saying, the place to
> explore space from, is space. Hence my prioritizing choice
> that *settlements now, research later* since we know enough
> now to put those settlements out there and to begin building
> the commercial networks and knowhow for the settlements to
> support themselves *and* Terra back there at the bottom of
> its gravity well. And Terra is going to need that support,
> for it looks from here very like that without it, Terra is
> going to crash hard. If we don't have those settlements
> out there before that crash, then we'll never do it. So
> my mantra is *Settlements Now, Research Later,* and Mookie
> illustrates what some of that research could be.
>
cost effective way of "saving the Earth". The Earth should be "saved"
if you want to put it that way by terrestrially based policies. That
does not mean however that space and its resources are unimportant.
At the back of my mind is the fear that space colonies will induce
politicians and generals to take bigger risks. There is a logical
fallacy here. To "save the Earth" you need a colony which is
completely self supporting. Absolutely nothing made on Earth. I have
called this a "siege" colony. Economists talk about a siege economy as
being one which does not trade. A mining colony for example is a
trading economy and cannot therefore save the world. It will die with
Earth.
Fortunately, or unfortunately, however you look at it siege colonies
are a long way into the future.
> In my guess of what's the future, I imagine an optical VLB
> telescope shows us another blue world somewhere out there
> with white clouds, like Terra seen from afar. Then we'll
> know where to send that first interstellar probe.
>
> And being out in space, propulsion technology will get an
> immense boost. Nothing like practical immediate usefulness
> to promote technical evolution. So by the time we can see
> which is a blue world to visit, we'll have the technology
> to do it. But not until the settlements are out there and
> stabilized so eyes can look outward.
>
> Titeotwaki -- mha [sci.space.policy 2008 Apr 18]
LISA has an interferometer which will measure distances of 5 million
km to within the wavelength of light. There is no doubt about it, the
next telescope will be made in fragments, could be as much as a
kilometer across and each fragment will be positioned to sub
wavelength accuracy. The technology to do this is almost here.
Incidentally none of this will involve a manned presence. Indeed the
rapid development of AI will make a manned presence optional. As I
have stated many times there are reasons for manned space flight based
on adventure etc. There is however no compelling scientific or
commercial reason. Other than tourism of course.
- Ian Parker
Fred J. McCall
:
:At the back of my mind is the fear that space colonies will induce
:politicians and generals to take bigger risks. There is a logical
:fallacy here.
There certainly is! You have to be loony to worry about that.
:
:LISA has an interferometer which will measure distances of 5 million
:km to within the wavelength of light. There is no doubt about it, the
:next telescope will be made in fragments, could be as much as a
:kilometer across and each fragment will be positioned to sub
:wavelength accuracy. The technology to do this is almost here.
:
People have repeatedly pointed out to you why that won't happen, not
the least of which is that you are, as usual, misinterpreting the
present in your extrapolations into the future.
:
:Incidentally none of this will involve a manned presence.
:
Then it won't get funded.
:
:Indeed the
:rapid development of AI will make a manned presence optional.
:
Sure it will.
:
:As I have stated many times ...
:
Your mistake is in thinking that you having stated it many times cuts
any ice at all.
--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn
Ian Parker
> Ian Parker <ianpark...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> :
> :At the back of my mind is the fear that space colonies will induce
> :politicians and generals to take bigger risks. There is a logical
> :fallacy here.
> :
>
> There certainly is! You have to be loony to worry about that.
>
> :
> :LISA has an interferometer which will measure distances of 5 million
> :km to within the wavelength of light. There is no doubt about it, the
> :next telescope will be made in fragments, could be as much as a
> :kilometer across and each fragment will be positioned to sub
> :wavelength accuracy. The technology to do this is almost here.
> :
>
> People have repeatedly pointed out to you why that won't happen, not
> the least of which is that you are, as usual, misinterpreting the
> present in your extrapolations into the future.
>
military. You are right in saying that the dangers are going to be
different in the future. If we had a world that was united in its aims
then talk about catastophes would be nonsense.
Is there any evidence that the world of the future is going to be more
peaceful? Evidence is ambiguous, there is less threat of a war between
major powers than was the case in the past, yet violence from sub
national groups has increased enormously. What is worrying me is the
way in which colonists would be selected. Einar seems to be thinking
of religious groups. This would really be the ultimate nightmare.
> :
> :Incidentally none of this will involve a manned presence.
> :
>
> Then it won't get funded.
I don't know. You may well be ma\king the same mistake you accuse me
of making. AI now appers to be a lot "sexier" than a manned presence
in space. Perhaps if David Levy is right about making love to robots,
literally as well! SF which is perhaps a fair barometer has AI as its
subject much more frequently than space.
>
> :
> :Indeed the
> :rapid development of AI will make a manned presence optional.
> :
>
> Sure it will.
>
Of cource.
> :
> :As I have stated many times ...
> :
>
- Ian Parker
Willie...@gmail.com
Earth in the short term. The same technology that allows us to
support large numbers of people off-world, will allow us to support
large numbers of people on THIS world, without destroying our
environment.
I tried to show that with the shipping numbers culled from the world's
trading system. Our industry currently ships about 1 on per person
per year on this planet over the oceans - not including oil and coal.
Americans use about 4 tons per person per year not including oil and
coal. Millionaires use about 20tons per person per year not including
oil and coal.
Our experience with nuclear submarines, and antarctica, ISS, the space
shuttle, and Mir, as well as Skylab, suggest that off-world you add
air and water and food to these totals, and add one ton per person per
year.
Now Peter Glaser first proposed solar power satellites to provide
energy on Earth back in 1968.
Glaser, Peter E.. "Power from the Sun: Its Future". Science Magazine,
22 November 1968 Vol 162, Issue 3856, Pages 857-861.
Glaser, Peter E.. "METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR CONVERTING SOLAR RADIATION
TO ELECTRICAL POWER". United States Patent 3,781,647 December 25,
1973.
I have developed this concept a little further using some of my own
innovations to reduce terrestrial reciever costs by adapting solar
panel arrays to work as recievers, by reducing total mass on orbit
using thin film concentrators, and increasing system utility by
creating synthetic hydrocarbons, and hydrogen fuel from water as well
as electricity using the energy captured.
To those who say this undercuts the need to build a large human
presence beyond Earth, I reply this makes it economical for private
sector to invest heavily in post-Nova class (1,000 ton to LEO) fully
reusable multi-stage launchers. It also taps into the $4 trillion and
growing energy market for planet Earth while reducing and eventually
eliminating air pollution, and creating a strong basis for industrial
growth worldwide.
Even so we can do far far more than merely gather solar energy in
space.
In 1969 Gerard O'Neill taught a course in large vacuum chamber
design. O'Neill designed vacuum chambers that were miles in extent
for FermiLab, CERN and SSC. To make things interesting for his
students, following the moon landing, O'Neill reversed the signs on
the pressure equations and asked his students to solve the structural
requirements for large pressure vessels in space. Several
architectures were proposed by his students, and many felt that living
in space would be desireable. He created a continuing study group and
first published his findings in Physics Today in 1974, which created
quite a stir. He eventually wrote a book on the subject High
Frontiers.
Residential use of large pressure vessels on orbit is a low value
application. Higher value applications exist. These include,
encasing asteroids to assist in easy mining of materials in bulk,
processing materials in bulk on orbit in zero or micro gravity (little
or no spin) as well as growing food fiber and medicines on orbit in
quite modest pressure vessels built in large number from materials on
orbit.
In 1968, again during the Apollo era, MIT professor, L.A. Klieman led
a group of aerospace engineering students in the study of deflecting
the asteroid Icarus.
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/1969Icar...10..447T
The group showed that it was possible to impart significant and highly
controllable velocity inputs to the asteroid using a variation of the
nuclear pulse technique - i.e. evaporating a well defined layer of
asteroidal material causing it to be deflagrated and ejected in a well
defined direction at high speed.
While most of the application of this technique in the modern context
has focused on avoiding another KT boundary event for humans, a more
interesting, compelling and near term use for this technology is to
CAPTURE rich asteroids and bring them into orbit around Earth.
Why bring them into Earth orbit. Two reasons;
proximity to market
proximity to labor
Within 1/5th light second of Earth, real time telerobotics is
feasible.
http://robonaut.jsc.nasa.gov/
http://www.honda.com/asimo/?ef_id=1097:3:s_9790a13693414ec32f4f3d99a8976d9c_841609828:EwRz7tB6B2YAAE59EYUAAAAE:20080419160816
For less cost than a space suit, and with Honda's Asimo, for less cost
than an automobile, a human being living anywhere on Earth may work
anywhere else at any job.
This includes MEO.
We are all familiar with GPS missile and bomb guidance technology that
can bring a warhead within inches of its desired target even JDAM
enabled dumb bombs. A variant of this same technology may be used to
precisely deliver to customers worldwide, products made on orbit and
launched by solar powered electromagnetic cannon or rail gun from an
orbiting satellite.
Finally in 1957 Stanislaw Ulam developed the idea of nuclear pulse
propulsion. Modern versions can be entirely free of fissionable
materials according to a now declassified 1968 air-force study. Even
so, I can imagine no higher better use for our weapons grade uranium
and plutonium than to enact an enhanced nuclear non proliferation
treaty, and convert all our inventory of nuclear weapons and nuclear
weapons stockpiles, into non-threatening fusion impulse unit triggers
to sustain an intense period of interplanetary expansion - sustained
by more advanced fission free units flying the same spacecraft.
The important thing to realize, is that;
these technologies are well defined and within our grasp today
they have immediate economic benefit
they have immediate environmental benefit
they have immediate geopolitical benefit.
So, with these ideas in mind, I submit that its not colonies on Mars
or the Moon that will save Earth short term, but it is moving our
industrial base off world and supporting Earth's burgeoning population
with off-world resources that will save Earth short term.
Here is a program that I am working on;
1) develop low-cost solar panel technology and use it to make
synthetic hydrocarbons.
2) build a nova-class reusable launcher to orbit a comsat network
providing global wireless internet
3) establish banking and telerobotic services for US based factorie
and mines
4) build 'super' nova-class reusable launcher to orbit powersat
network creating wireless powernet
5) beam bandgap matched laser energy to existing solar panel arrays
increasing output 16x
6) use spare capacity to put city on the moon and mars, and explore
outer solar system
7) develop nuclear pulse spacecraft to expand moon and mars
population
8) adapt nuclear pulse technology to capture rich small bodies,
bringing them to MEO
9) use nuclear pulse spacecraft to loft telerobotic factories to
captured small bodies
10) build up space based infrastructure
a) mines
b) smelting/processing
c) industrial goods
d) products
e) farms (food)
f) forests (fiber)
g) space homes
h) mobile space homes
i) grounded space homes (moon and mars)
11) adapt powersats for near solar surface operation
beam energy across the solar system to where its needed
12) laser powered MEMs based propulsive skins (spaceship in every
garage)
and so on and so forth..
At the point the mass flow rates increase to about 1% of the Earth's
atmosphere, the clear development arc breaks up into multiple flows of
equal value, as off-world development becomes as complex logistically
as any development on Earth.
The point is, that within 15 years - if we had the will to do so -we
could transform life on Earth creating on this world two billion high
quality homes spread across the Earth's entire surface wherever people
wanted to live, supported and connected by personal ballistic
transport, and off world infrastructure - all within a vast nature
preserve.
My game plan is to get this all done before I turn 75.
After that, who knows what we might do next?
The sad thing is, we could have done this already, and avoided much of
the turmoil and strife of the past 40 years.
Willie...@gmail.com
vessels on Earth that are kilometers in size
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tevatron
the engineering these large vacuum chambers, use the same technology
needed to build large pressure vessels in vacuo.
Willie...@gmail.com
People don't generally realize, we've already contained nuclear
explosions
Fred J. McCall
:On 19 Apr, 14:50, Fred J. McCall <fmcc...@earthlink.net> wrote:
:> Ian Parker <ianpark...@gmail.com> wrote:
:>
:> :
:> :At the back of my mind is the fear that space colonies will induce
:> :politicians and generals to take bigger risks. There is a logical
:> :fallacy here.
:> :
:>
:> There certainly is! You have to be loony to worry about that.
:>
:> :
:> :LISA has an interferometer which will measure distances of 5 million
:> :km to within the wavelength of light. There is no doubt about it, the
:> :next telescope will be made in fragments, could be as much as a
:> :kilometer across and each fragment will be positioned to sub
:> :wavelength accuracy. The technology to do this is almost here.
:> :
:>
:> People have repeatedly pointed out to you why that won't happen, not
:> the least of which is that you are, as usual, misinterpreting the
:> present in your extrapolations into the future.
:>
:
:At present the main danger to the world is antropogenic, particularly
:military. You are right in saying that the dangers are going to be
:different in the future.
:
I never said that.
:
:If we had a world that was united in its aims
:then talk about catastophes would be nonsense.
:
And if cows could fly we'd all carry umbrellas when we went out of
doors.
:
:Is there any evidence that the world of the future is going to be more
:peaceful? Evidence is ambiguous, there is less threat of a war between
:major powers than was the case in the past, yet violence from sub
:national groups has increased enormously. What is worrying me is the
:way in which colonists would be selected. Einar seems to be thinking
:of religious groups. This would really be the ultimate nightmare.
:
It's not 'selection', you git. Who's going to want to find someplace
away from everyone else?
:> :
:> :Incidentally none of this will involve a manned presence.
:> :
:>
:> Then it won't get funded.
:
:I don't know.
:
I do.
:
:You may well be ma\king the same mistake you accuse me
:of making. AI now appers to be a lot "sexier" than a manned presence
:in space.
:
Not to anyone who controls money or votes, it doesn't.
:
:Perhaps if David Levy is right about making love to robots,
:literally as well! SF which is perhaps a fair barometer has AI as its
:subject much more frequently than space.
:>
:> :
:> :Indeed the
:> :rapid development of AI will make a manned presence optional.
:> :
:>
:> Sure it will.
:>
:
:Of cource.
:
Yes, and everyone will live in peace and plenty...
--
"Ordinarily he is insane. But he has lucid moments when he is
only stupid."
-- Heinrich Heine
Ian Parker
> I disagree with the comment that space colonization will not save
> Earth in the short term. The same technology that allows us to
> support large numbers of people off-world, will allow us to support
> large numbers of people on THIS world, without destroying our
> environment.
I think we should distinguish between space technology and
specifically space colonies. Technology of all descriptions will "save
the world" and space is included in this.
My argument about colonies in particular is that you do not work on
the assumption that colonists will survive with all the inhabitants of
Earth perishing. Cerainly the inhabitants of Earth need the resources
of space AND new technology. That is a completely different argument
though.
> http://robonaut.jsc.nasa.gov/http://www.honda.com/asimo/?ef_id=1097:3:s_9790a13693414ec32f4f3d99a8...
>
> For less cost than a space suit, and with Honda's Asimo, for less cost
> than an automobile, a human being living anywhere on Earth may work
> anywhere else at any job.
>
> This includes MEO.
This is exactly what I have always said. N&M EO can have telepresence
provided quite cheap;y.
>
> We are all familiar with GPS missile and bomb guidance technology that
> can bring a warhead within inches of its desired target even JDAM
> enabled dumb bombs. A variant of this same technology may be used to
> precisely deliver to customers worldwide, products made on orbit and
> launched by solar powered electromagnetic cannon or rail gun from an
> orbiting satellite.
>
> Finally in 1957 Stanislaw Ulam developed the idea of nuclear pulse
> propulsion. Modern versions can be entirely free of fissionable
> materials according to a now declassified 1968 air-force study. Even
> so, I can imagine no higher better use for our weapons grade uranium
> and plutonium than to enact an enhanced nuclear non proliferation
> treaty, and convert all our inventory of nuclear weapons and nuclear
> weapons stockpiles, into non-threatening fusion impulse unit triggers
> to sustain an intense period of interplanetary expansion - sustained
> by more advanced fission free units flying the same spacecraft.
>
> The important thing to realize, is that;
>
> these technologies are well defined and within our grasp today
> they have immediate economic benefit
> they have immediate environmental benefit
> they have immediate geopolitical benefit.
>
I don't really think nuclear pulses are the way to go. A spacecraft of
the size envisaged is better propelled by a closed cycle nuclear
reactor giving an ion drive, or even better by thermonuclear
proplusion.
Yes but this does not involve colonies.
- Ian Parker
Willie...@gmail.com
Why?
> A spacecraft of
> the size envisaged is better propelled by a closed cycle nuclear
> reactor giving an ion drive,
This is a clueless statement on two counts;
1) a closed cycle nuclear reactor cannot be as hot a nuclear pulse
rocket
remember that heat transfer operates by diffusion, momentum
transfer
does not. So, a nuclear pulse rocket can be simultaneously
very
high specific impulse and very high power levels meaning very
high
thrust. No closed cycle system we know how to build today is
capable
of this type of perofrmance.
2) even if you have zero mass power plant for your ion drive, you
could
not lift it off the surface of the Earth. So, you're stuck with
something
else doing the heavy lifting.
Obviously fission free nuclear pulse, which classified documents show
were feasible back in 1968 based on the result of classified R&D at
that time, are the way to go TODAY to build very large very capable
and very cheap space freighters. We can go right into production
TODAY with these units and transform LIFE ON EARTH. Not by shipping
people off-world (though that will occur) but by shipping energy and
materiel TO Earth.
> or even better by thermonuclear
> proplusion.
triply cluless. Fission free nuclear pulse, that uses an HF chemical
laser to initiate a fusion pulse in a D+T micropellet, that sets of a
Li6D main pulse *IS* thernonuclear fusion propulsion.
What would you call cities on the Moon and Mars and outposts in the
outer solar system sending rich materials back to Earth? What would
you call teleoperated factory networks on Earth orbit sending
materials to people on Earth? What would you call massive power
plants that beam laser energy to panel arrays throughout the world to
power homes and industry? OBVIOUSLY these cities, these towns, these
mines, these smeliting plants, these installations, these factories,
and systems, all have people around them and are colonies of Earth.
> - Ian Parker- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Ian Parker
>
> > I don't really think nuclear pulses are the way to go.
>
> Why?
>
> > A spacecraft of
> > the size envisaged is better propelled by a closed cycle nuclear
> > reactor giving an ion drive,
>
> This is a clueless statement on two counts;
>
> 1) a closed cycle nuclear reactor cannot be as hot a nuclear pulse
> rocket
> remember that heat transfer operates by diffusion, momentum
> transfer
> does not. So, a nuclear pulse rocket can be simultaneously
> very
> high specific impulse and very high power levels meaning very
> high
> thrust. No closed cycle system we know how to build today is
> capable
> of this type of perofrmance.
A fission bomb has got certain minimum requirements. The low yeild
"tacticals" are of the order of 1 kiloton+. < 1 kiloton is achievable,
but only by deliberately limiting the proprtion of fissile material
used. "Davy Crockett" is tunable is just this way. BTW - They do dream
up some names, my sympaties are with the Mexicans anyway.
With laser induced fusion you have small explosions that could
conceivably propel a spacecraft. More about this later. You have got
the problem of charging up the laser each time.
>
> 2) even if you have zero mass power plant for your ion drive, you
> could
> not lift it off the surface of the Earth. So, you're stuck with
> something
> else doing the heavy lifting.
>
> Obviously fission free nuclear pulse, which classified documents show
> were feasible back in 1968 based on the result of classified R&D at
> that time, are the way to go TODAY to build very large very capable
> and very cheap space freighters. We can go right into production
> TODAY with these units and transform LIFE ON EARTH. Not by shipping
> people off-world (though that will occur) but by shipping energy and
> materiel TO Earth.
>
> > or even better by thermonuclear
> > proplusion.
>
> triply cluless. Fission free nuclear pulse, that uses an HF chemical
> laser to initiate a fusion pulse in a D+T micropellet, that sets of a
> Li6D main pulse *IS* thernonuclear fusion propulsion.
>
>
Problem is the laser. Inertial comtainment is being worked on
alongside Tokomak type solutions. There are hybrids. A plasma can be
heated inertially. BTW I know lasers are used for research but even if
inertial containment is the answer a laser might still not be the best
answer. Suppose, for example, we had high energy beams of electrons
and protons directed onto a point.
At this point in time most thermonuclear researchers believe the
Tokomak to be the solution. An alternative, semi inertial system,
could be "warm" plasma accelerated by a linear induction motor and
forced by a magnetic field to stop suddenly. This would give a kind of
thermonuclear ramjet.
- Ian Parker
Willie...@gmail.com
> On 21 Apr, 01:02, Willie.Moo...@gmail.com wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > > I don't really think nuclear pulses are the way to go.
>
> > Why?
>
> > > A spacecraft of
> > > the size envisaged is better propelled by a closed cycle nuclear
> > > reactor giving an ion drive,
>
> > This is a clueless statement on two counts;
>
> > 1) a closed cycle nuclear reactor cannot be as hot a nuclear pulse
> > rocket
> > remember that heat transfer operates by diffusion, momentum
> > transfer
> > does not. So, a nuclear pulse rocket can be simultaneously
> > very
> > high specific impulse and very high power levels meaning very
> > high
> > thrust. No closed cycle system we know how to build today is
> > capable
> > of this type of perofrmance.
>
> A fission bomb has got certain minimum requirements.
You did read the part where I called for a fission free blast? Then
why are you trotting out supposed limitations on fission?
Check out this fusion pellet they're using in a research reactor.
Notice anything about it? Yeah - its freaking tiny dude! So, I'd
rethink your bogus statement inlight of this fact
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Fusion_microcapsule.jpg
Now,don't get all pissy on me cause you were wrong. Even if you were
right generally, which you aren't - I'll go into this a little more
detail below why - it has nothing to do with the tiny fusion devices
I'm talking about. I mean, look at the tiny pellets people are using
for inertial confinement fusion. Its the same damn thing - except in
a rocket application, the laser system is disposable like an inkjet
cartridge, and adds to the propellant mass as its vaporized by the
tiny explosion. It can als shape the plasma charge as it expands by
shaping the inert material around the tiny fusion pellet.
.Now ask yourself this question. Do you know why specifically what you
say is so?
You are right about the size of nuclear fissoin weapons. WHY is that?
> The low yeild
> "tacticals" are of the order of 1 kiloton+. < 1 kiloton is achievable,
> but only by deliberately limiting the proprtion of fissile material
> used. "Davy Crockett" is tunable is just this way. BTW - They do dream
> up some names, my sympaties are with the Mexicans anyway.
All this histrionics while true, has nothing to do with fundamental
physics involved.
Obviously you need a course on nuclear physics and specifically the
physics of nuclear detonations. Plainly you are arguing by applying
faulty logic to an inappropriate database.
My concern is that you don't seem to be aware of the deep seated
logical disconnect. Someone like OM would just say you were an idiot
and it wasn't worth his trouble to educate. Surely I may be forgiven
for wondering the ultimate usefulness of this exchange of
information. haha.. But I'll try lol.
Here goes...
A fission blast is mediated by the production and diffusion of
neutrons through a fissile material.
A fusion blast is mediated by the production and diffusion of heat
through a fusor material - the conditoins for fusion are called the
Lawson criterion.
A comparable easy to understand, simple relationship for fission
detonations isn't known - if such a name does exist it is likely
classified.
Now the Lawson criterion gives a product of time temperature and
pressure.in relation to the heat diffusion through the fusor
materials. Heat is applied at a certain temperature and pressure,
and more heat is evolved, which maintains that temperature and
pressure until the pellet is burned up.
Lasers and electron beams anti-matter and even collidiing shaped
pellets have been proposed for igniting tiny pellets of fusor
materials. Theta pinch devices wires that squeeze into compact
plasmas when a lot of current flows through the wires - to drive tiny
pellets of fusor materials to reach the lawson criterion needed for
good burn up have been use.
One can see that a similar product relating time, neutron flux and
pressure to neutron cross section - is also possible. Here a source
of neutrons is applied at a certain pressure in the fissile material
and the material evolves more neutrons, which tries to reduce the
pressure by blowing it apart - so burning up the whole pellet is an
issue. C4 or other shaped explosives have been use tor compressing
shells of fissile material around compact neutron sources like
Polonium. The limits of explosive compression fix the lower end of a
FISSION detonation produced in this way.
Any method of increasing the pressure of the fissile material reduces
the minimum critical mass dramatically.
Thie same techniques used in inertial confinement fusion may be
adapted to reduce the critical mass of fission detonators. So,
lasers, electron beams, high speed particle collision, and even theta
pinch of a plutonium wire, is possible to produce very tiny critical
masses (milligram quantities)
Also, increasing the neutron yeild per fission reduces the minimum
critical mass - anti-protons and anti-neutrons mixed with plutonium
and other fissile material increase neutron yeilds from 2 to 11 -
further reducing critical mass.
This is called anti-proton catalyzed microfission
http://www.engr.psu.edu/antimatter/Papers/ICAN.pdf
So, one can imagine a tiny fiber of plutonium formed into the shape of
a seam on a baseball, surrounding a MEMs penning trap containing a
small number of anti-protons - or even positrons. - the fiber
connected to a big ass capactor. Current flows through the
capacitor, squeezing the plutonium into a tiny dot of very dense
plasma, vaporizing the penning trap, and releasing the anti-matter at
peak density - *pop!* - a few micrograms or miligrams of plutonium
detonate with the force of a few kilograms of TNT. Sweet. THAT
blast sets off a Li6D fusor that can be ANY size.
. .
Fission bombs have successfully been used to set off fusior materials
with good burn up. These are commonly called hydrogen bombs.
Given the neutron cross section and the neutron production of
plutonium say,and the pressure one can achieve with C4 or any chemical
explosive,it is easy to see that you need at least a kg of material to
create a fission blast with good yeild or burnup. Which is why the
bomb systems you describe next are the size and yeild they are. There
is nothing fundamental about fissoin or fusion that says you can't
have substantially smaller bombs. One trouble with a nuclear hand
grenade though, is the same trouble you have with small caliber
firearms - there isn't enough mass to do a lot of damage. That's why
I have always said converting our nuclear arsenals to impulse units
removes that material from being a threat to being harmless.
So get this if you don't get anything - Increase the pressure or
neutron yeild in a fissile material and you reduce the critical mass
for efficient fission burnup.
> With laser induced fusion you have small explosions that could
> conceivably propel a spacecraft.
Yes, the Air Force had a secret research program on this in 1968 - and
wrote a final report on it in 1972 - I created a thread about that.
> More about this later.
Why? You got the damn thing wrong - microfission is every bit as
feasible as micro fusion. When I was a graduate student at Ohio
State, I worked with Penn STate and USAF Phillps lab in New Mexico to
characterise depleted uranium plasmas - and then we went to CERN to
look at neutron yeild. ICAN was one of the few published results.
Most of the folks disappeared - likely into black programs.
Even so, its clear to any weaponeer that tiny nuclear hand grenades
while intersting, are strategically useless - if you're going to
detonate something the size of a stick of dynamite, you really can't
do any damage if its the size of a match head!
You can however, by detonating a series of them in a thrust chamber,
produce significant thrust.
You can also use them as triggers for larger fusion blasts - which can
be prolematical - but they fail as weapons systems because they're so
sophisticated. Why carry troops in Ferrari's when Jeeps will do a
better job? Save the Ferrari for the racing circuit.
> You have got
> the problem of charging up the laser each time.
The laser is a hydrogen flouride chemcial laser whose optics and
everything are treated like an inkjet print cartridge. The whole
thing flashes like a flash bulb and detonates a deuterium-tritium
initiator, which then propagates the Lawson condition to a Lithium-6
deuterium plug - sweet. While the pellet it about 10x the size of the
pellet shown in the first photo above, still smaller than a pea - the
laser system with optics and all, is about the size of an inkjet print
cartridge. It takes LESS hydrogen/flouride gas to initiate this unit
than it takes C4 to initiate a fission bomb. The whole thing masses
less than 100 grams - you can hold it in the palm of your hand - just
don't set it off there! lol. The parts, including the hydrogen
flourine - are all stored separately and assembled automatically
before theyre fired with a low velocity gun into the electromagnetic
chamber - or if you're using a mechanical driver - behind the pusher
plate.
> > 2) even if you have zero mass power plant for your ion drive, you
> > could
> > not lift it off the surface of the Earth. So, you're stuck with
> > something
> > else doing the heavy lifting.
>
> > Obviously fission free nuclear pulse, which classified documents show
> > were feasible back in 1968 based on the result of classified R&D at
> > that time, are the way to go TODAY to build very large very capable
> > and very cheap space freighters. We can go right into production
> > TODAY with these units and transform LIFE ON EARTH. Not by shipping
> > people off-world (though that will occur) but by shipping energy and
> > materiel TO Earth.
>
> > > or even better by thermonuclear
> > > proplusion.
>
> > triply cluless. Fission free nuclear pulse, that uses an HF chemical
> > laser to initiate a fusion pulse in a D+T micropellet, that sets of a
> > Li6D main pulse *IS* thernonuclear fusion propulsion.
>
> Problem is the laser.
No it isn't. That's what the classified research showed. If you make
a disposable chemical laser you use it only once and it becomes part
of the propellant mass that shapes the plasma and is ejected along
with the helium.
> Inertial comtainment is being worked on
Nuclear weapons are inertial confinement systems. People rightly
worry about it being too easy to build these things. So, don't expect
good information to be commonly available. In fact, expect dis-
information. which is PRECISELY what happened in the late 60s and
70s. The same time the Air force was blowing up deuterium and tritium
pellets with disposable shortwave chemical lasers, we had a big
publicly funded program using long wave CO2 lasers that were the size
of a football field. The feeling was, yeah you can do it, but damn,
it doesn't seem practical. Well, that's what we want people to think
isn't it?
Suffice to say, until I read the report, I thought as you do. That's
why I favored tiny little fissile bombs using theta pinch and a tiny
spot of anti-matter to get the neutron flux started - but when that
report was recently declassified - I saw the light - figuratively and
literally! lol.
> alongside Tokomak type solutions.
Plasma power densities are way too low for practical levels of thrust
at reasonable weights. That means you'll never be able to lift
yourself off Earth with this system - which is what you need for
practical space transport.
> There are hybrids.
Yes, an inertial confinement system, with a very light weight magnetic
blanket, was mentioned in the rerport I cite a few weeks ago.
> A plasma can be
> heated inertially.
Yes - but if you already have a plasma to start with you're working
against yourself. better to detonate a ICF pellet INSIDE a field that
shapes the plasma stream. Lot simpler, lot lighter, more power, less
weight - higher thrust to weight.
.
> BTW I know lasers are used for research but even if
> inertial containment is the answer a laser might still not be the best
> answer.
You make these bogus statements with a total absence of any rationale
or reason. Lasers ALL BY THEMSELVES have been proposed in a wide
range of application. You *are* familiar with the fundamental physics
involved right?
haha.. no, obviously not, that's a whole OTHER topic - lets get
through this first opint first - you can have very tiny (and
strategically useless) fission detonations that can be used to ignite
fusion blasts, or used directly in a tiny nuclear pulse system
operating at high frequency. (think RPMs in a car and how it
increases horsepower as RPMs increase)
> Suppose, for example, we had high energy beams of electrons
> and protons directed onto a point.
Unlike photons they have a charge, and so repel one another. You
don't need to imagine anything - the physics of all this is worked out
- and calculable. imagine understanding the math and being able to
visualize what the math is telling you - that is how you come to a
good engineering solution. Not trying to feel your way through it in
total absence of adequate knowledge. Sheez.
> At this point in time most thermonuclear researchers believe the
> Tokomak to be the solution.
Researchers working on the tokamak believe the tokamak is the soution
for generating low cost fusion power. tokamak researchers are not
generally working on fusion rockets. If you look at the power density
in the plasma generated by the tokamak, and from that CALCULATE
optimal thrust from directing the plasma into a jet of material - and
then compare that thrust to the WEIGHT of the tokamak - you can EASILY
see that you won't be flying tokamaks off the surface of the Earth.
So, that's out as a replacement for chemical rockets.
> An alternative, semi inertial system,
> could be "warm" plasma accelerated by a linear induction motor and
> forced by a magnetic field to stop suddenly.
This is the Farnsworth Fusor. For fundamental physical reasons - if
you would look at the math - when you have a really hot low density
plasma, you add a lot of weight, and lose a lot of power (thrust) when
you try to sqeeze it electromagnetically. That's why a hybrid system
- like the magnetic blanket described in the declassified report - got
really good thrust to weight, it started with a tiny dense pellet, and
detonated it - and burned it up while it was still very very dense -
and then directed the expanding plasma in the desired direction.
.
> This would give a kind of
> thermonuclear ramjet.
A ramjet has material coming in the front. What is feeding that
material? If you can add a lot of energy to the incomgin material,
why wait and do it as a second step? Bussard postulated a ramjet
back in the day for interstellar travel, it scooped up hot plasma from
interstellar space. If you're carrying along the material and heating
it - and then detonating somehow with some sort of pressure wave -
that's not a ramjet - that a two chambered rocket engine - that has
the complexity and weight of two chambers. What is the fundamental
reason this is better than one chamber? Fact is, it isn't. You just
can't see it because you don't understand the math or physics.
I'm glad you responded to me because i came up with a little thought
experiment I wanted you to do to get a clearer idea of what the heck
is going on. You said at the outset that you don't use pumps or jets
and so the analysis of pump energy and jet energy is useless with your
system. I told you you were wrong. Its not clear to me that you
understand WHY you were wrong. Merely calling your pump an injector,
or calling your jet a hemispherical plasma front or something doesn't
change the physics.
Lets look at a phton rocket heated by a magnetically confined
fissioning plasma. A sort of long slow detonation of plutonium held
in a magnetic field. This was proposed back in the 40s for space
travel - not much has been heard of it. Probably because the
engineers who really understand the processes no longer work in the
field. Everything is so specialized today - people make stupid
decisions sometimes. lol.
Alright - lets just imagine that we can set off a fission plasma and
contain it using a magnetic bottle of some sort. We have a tiny
star. By controlling neutron flux and pressure and temperature we can
control reaction rate over a wide range.
What I would like you to think about is the 'jet' of photons coming
out of the tiny ball of material.
Lets imagine the plasma core is about the size of a basketball, and
its at the focal point of a big parabolic mirror - about the size of
grain silo - or lets say the diameter of an External Tank. Say 10
meters.
So, we have a ball that has a total surface area of 1 square meter and
a paraboloid of revolution that has a projected area (disk area) of
about 75 square meters. Total mirro area is of course larger,
depending on the height of the mirror.
The ball radiates all its energy into the vacuum as heat and that heat
is reflected into a beam to produce thrust. Got it?
Okay, now lets look at thrust,weight and power - and from that the
temperature of the various parts.
The power radiated as photons is given by Stephan-Boltzman
P = 5.67e-8 * Area * Temperature ^4
The area = 1 in this case, and the thrust is propotional to the power
There's a lot of bullshit and pesudo science written about photon
drives and all that - but here is the real deal
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poynting_vector
What we're after is straight radiation pressure...
F = .P / c
so total thrust is
F = 5.67e-8 * Area * T^4 / 3e+8
in Newtons
Basically 1.9e-16 x Temp ^4
Here's a table of thrusts and the temperatures and power levels needed
to attain them with the system we've desscribed.
NEWTN KGf LBSf POWER TEMP K
1.00E+00 1.02E-01 2.24E-01 3.00E+08 8,528.73
1.00E+01 1.02E+00 2.24E+00 3.00E+09 15,166.47
1.00E+02 1.02E+01 2.24E+01 3.00E+10 26,970.22
1.00E+03 1.02E+02 2.24E+02 3.00E+11 47,960.59
1.00E+04 1.02E+03 2.24E+03 3.00E+12 85,287.34
1.00E+05 1.02E+04 2.24E+04 3.00E+13 151,664.71
1.00E+06 1.02E+05 2.24E+05 3.00E+14 269,702.24
1.00E+07 1.02E+06 2.24E+06 3.00E+15 479,605.94
1.00E+08 1.02E+07 2.24E+07 3.00E+16 852,873.36
The temperature of the magnetically levitated ball doesn't matter,
because its being held in place by fields generated by magnets behind
the parabolic reflector. The third from the last entry 1 million
newtons, is about equal to the thrust of an SSME - 224,000 lbf.
requires 30 trillion watts of power - about double the power usage of
the ENTIRE human race and requires a temperature of about 1% of that
at the interior of the sun.
Which means that its a lot less pressure and temperature than needed
for a sustained nuclear fusion reaction like you're talking about.
Of course inertial confinement systems are not steady state - this is
just a thought experiment to see what sort of system we're talking
about.
to maintain a plasma at that temperature continuously requires fuel be
injected or pumped in against the pressure. So that'll take energy.
Of course, spent fuel will be disposed of or allowed to accumulate and
cleaned out later.
I've looked at 3 different fuel sources;
TEMP K kg/s AM kg/s Li6/D kg/s U235 lambda max
8,528 3.33E-09 1.30E-07 3.90E-06 339.79 - blue
15,166 3.33E-08 1.30E-06 3.90E-05 191.08
26,970 3.33E-07 1.30E-05 3.90E-04 107.45 - UV
47,960 3.33E-06 1.30E-04 3.90E-03 60.42
85,287 3.33E-05 1.30E-03 3.90E-02 33.98
151,664 3.33E-04 1.30E-02 3.90E-01 19.11 - X-ray
269,702 3.33E-03 1.30E-01 3.90E+00 10.75
479,605 3.33E-02 1.30E+00 3.90E+01 6.04
852,873 3.33E-01 1.30E+01 3.90E+02 3.40
Anti Matter, Li6D and U235. To maintain the SSME level thrust
requires 3.3 grams of anti-matter per second, 130 grams of Li6D per
second or 3.9 kg of Uranium 235 per second.
Interesting to note that about 14 tons per hour of Uranium is needed
to drive this engine. Since it produces about 100 tons of thrust, and
an efficient vehicle would be between 50 and 75 tons - we can see that
due to the low energy of fission relative to the other products, means
that even with no exhaust, you're using quite a bit of fuel - even
when not using it as propellant. Even the fusion system uses half a
ton per hour - and can't run more than a few days with reasonable fuel
levels.
The point is, with fission definitely, and even with fusion to a large
extent, you don't gain a lot even if you don't use the fuel as
propellant. In fact you lose, because by energizing the plasma and
creating a jet of plasma, you increase the thrust while reducing the
power level, and your overall system efficiency goes up.
That is, an ideal system -even with anti matter - starts to look more
and more like a nuclear pulse system.
The last column - called lambda max - is calculated using Weins
Displacement Law - at these temperatures most of the radiation comes
off in blue, UV, or X-ray form. This has a practical effect in that
you have to find mirror materials that can reflect these short
wavelengths.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:EM_Spectrum_Properties_edit.svg
You can beam fuel into the glowing magnetic reactor using some sort of
laser accelerator - but that takes energy LIKE ANY OTHER PUMP! The
kinetic energy is such that speeds are far less than 0.1% the speed of
light, which is good, because that energy comes from somewhere - and
the simpliest thing is to use the photons themselves to power the
laser - so you'll take a portion of the stream reflect it in an
appropriate fabrey perot cell to create a beam that vaporizes an inert
material to drive a fuel pellet into the magnetic confinement region
against the radiation pressure.
Any light NOT reflected by the mirror - heats the mirror - and that
power level is then radiated over the entire mirror area. So, for 99%
reflection effciency we have the following temps needed to radiate
that heat away in a vacuum.
NEWTS TEMP K
1.00E+00 7
1.00E+01 12
1.00E+02 22
1.00E+03 39
1.00E+04 69
1.00E+05 122
1.00E+06 217
1.00E+07 386
1.00E+08 687
So, the radiation rocket temps work like this...
Now, if we were to create a 'leaky' bottle - using themonuclear power
source - to produce a jet of plasma zipping out of the system - we'd
have pretty much the same system, except that we'd have to add the
thrust of the jet energy out of the system. We know the power level,
and we know the mass flow rate from the fuel flow rate - to create a
steady state system - so, we can estimate jet thrust to be - 9.82 x as
great using photon thrust AND helium jet released at the same rate as
the hydrogen coming in - at a given power level - and 256.6 x more
thrust than the photons alone - using the fissionable materials as an
exhaust - for a given power level.
For the anti-matter there is no change - since ALL the anti-matter is
converted to photons .. and leaves the system.
So we back off in terms of power level, 1 row when using a fusion
exhaust, and 2 rows when using a fission exhaust - roughly speaking.
But the stead state system doesn't reeally change heat and temperature
wise
You've got a hot magnetically confined plasma - that's radiating away
a helluva lot of heat at photons into the vacuum using stephan
boltzman. You've got to replace the fuel you're using - no matter
what it is. You've got to control the heat - and might as well
reflect it and add to the thrust - and then, you've got to direct the
plasma to get thrust from that. Basically you've got a heat lamp with
a nuclear filament.
A lower temperature system - say around the temperature of tungsten -
you can have a solid nuclear fissionable filament like a light bulb -
surround it with a glass bulb to keep it from burning up - and then,
use the intense light to heat stuff up to use as exhaust. .Since the
temps are so low, relative to the photon rocket, mass flows are low,
so a solid filament can work for days and months before recharging so
you don't need an injector or pump.
A nuclear pulse achieves a lot of the benefits of these highly
efficient rockets without a lot of the engineering difficulties - and
since the pellets aren't operating when they're placed in the engine,
the pump or injector energies are very very modest. A small mortar
round is sufficient for even big rockets the size of cruise ships.
Ian Parker
this is the nature of the thermonuclear reaction. 80% of the energy of
fusion goes into neutrons in the case of Tritium and protons in the
case of He3. A pellet is much too small to hold this energy. If we are
using magnetic containment protons will spiral in the magnetic field
and contribute to plasma heating.
To get He3/D to fuse requires twice the temperature of T/D but is
gives off protons not neutrons. To use a tritium reaction you need a
heavy blanket of material which is heated/transmuted by neutrons. This
is why I spole of He3 as the fuel of space. He3/D will if magnetically
contained produce a self sustaining reaction. Hot He4/H which is what
we have is the final and only product. It may well be eaasier to
SUSTAIN He3/D than T/D for this reason.
As I have said inertial containment of a pellet loses 80% of the
energy. This is true of both He3 and Tritium.
- Ian Parker
Willie...@gmail.com
I see. Well, power to weight and thrust to weight are what you want
to optimize. Using an aneutronic fusor makes things rather efficient
with respect to neutron loss. You seem to be generally knowledgeable
about what's going on around you, you are still clueless about rocket
design however. Consider that as long as 80% of the energy is
directed into a jet producing thrust - it doesn't matter for rocket
applications if its lost to the reaction..
Ian Parker
>
> - Show quoted text -
Protons and neutrons are omnidirectional. To have a rocket you need to
use something like liquid hydrogen as a working fluid. Doing this you
will get 10km/s approx. The Nerva SI if I recall was about 900secs.
BTW - I prefer km/s to secs as a SI has gravity as one of its units.
10km/s is set roughly by the temperature structures can withstand.
My query is can an implosion thermonuclear reaction ever be self
sustaining, bearing in mind that you have to charge your lasers up
again. Implosions are viiewed not as thermonuclear solutions but as
research tools. The question of heat loss is relevant in terms of
sustainability, as well as everything else.
- Ian Parker
Willie...@gmail.com
That's why you use aneutronic reactions - reactions that do not have
neutrons (even though they may be initiated with neutrons)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneutronic_fusion
Please note that Li6D produces alpha particles only.
> To have a rocket you need to
> use something like liquid hydrogen as a working fluid.
Well, you can heat liquid hydrogen to produce a jet of hot hydrogen
certainly. Obviously, you can make a directed jet of any substance.
The speed of a jet under ideal conditions is given by;
V = sqrt( 2* power / mass flow rate)
for non-relativistic velocities (less than 150,000,000 m/sec)
V is in meters per second
power is in watts
mass flow rate is in kg per second.
So, if you mix in hydrogen, you can estimate how that effects your
exhaust velocity.
Since power level and thrust are related by exhaust velocity; you can
increase mass flow to get more thrust out of a power limited system -
at cost of carrying around larger amounts of propellant.
> Doing this you
> will get 10km/s approx. The Nerva SI if I recall was about 900secs.
Yes, this is true about Nerva it is a temperature limited system -
which limits the energy which limits the velocity - which means you
want a low molecular weight propellant - hydrogen - but do you
understand the fundamentals? Increase the temperature by using liquid
core or gas core reactions - contained by non-material means - and you
have far superior performances possible.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_core_reactor_rocket
PULSED operation - circumvents many of the difficulties of a
CONTINUOUS system at the cost of reducing thrust to weight and
requiring a way to smooth out the pulses - but still, pulsed systems
are doable TODAY
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_pulse_propulsion
> BTW - I prefer km/s to secs as a SI has gravity as one of its units.
> 10km/s is set roughly by the temperature structures can withstand.
Yes - if you place the requirement that the structures remain solid.
However if you remove that constraint either by going with a pulsed
system, or by using some sort of magnetic containment - which is about
1/20th the requirement of a magnetic containment for a fusion system -
then, you don't have those limits.
Looking at the specific energy density of Li6D and U235 you can see
what the upper limit of a rocket built around these fuels can be..
and from that determine what's the best way to proceed.
Look at this 1964 study -
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19760065935_1976065935.pdf
and realize that by 1968 the USAF already had determined that a
fission free thernonuclear aneutronic blast was possible.
> My query is can an implosion thermonuclear reaction ever be self
> sustaining,
In a pulse system you are interested in how much energy does it take
to initiate a reaction (about 10 kJ using a HF laser - built into the
pulse unit - used only once) and how much energy do you get out
(unlimited since limited by size of Li6D pellet which can be any size)
- and what is the burnup fraction (100%)
The chemical laser initiator ignites a deuterium-tritium primary that
then causes a burnup of the Li6D secondary very similar to the
original Teller-Ulam design.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teller-Ulam_design
> bearing in mind that you have to charge your lasers up
> again.
You are not getting what I'm saying. The laser is disposable - think
inkjet print cartridge.
A chemical laser operates by mixing two chemicals that produce light
when they react. Hydrogen and Flourine for example,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_laser
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulsed_Energy_Projectile
The hydrogen fluoride laser resembles a MEMS rocket engine array.
http://www.me.berkeley.edu/mrcl/rockets.html
http://sciencelinks.jp/j-east/article/200617/000020061706A0418442.php
The chemicals mix in the combustion chamber. The reaction produces
free excited fluorine radicals. Just after the nozzle, the mixture is
injected to the exhaust stream; the hydrogen reacts with the fluorine
radicals, producing excited molecules of hydrogen fluoride. Think of
an old timey flashbulb
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_photography#Flash_bulbs
But tinier and faster.
The excited molecules then undergo stimulated emission in the optical
resonator region of the laser.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabry_perot_etalon
The whole thing releases 10,000 Joules of optical energy in about 1
nano-second creating a 10 terawatt pulse.
Hydrogen/flouride material is about 3% efficient so you'll need 340 kJ
of reactants to produce 10 kJ of laser photons. With 150 kJ per gram
of material, that's about 2.25 grams of hydrogen and flourine
materials.
Think about metal hydride storage of hydrogen. Now, think about
silicon hydride storage of hydrogen.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_hydride
Now consider silicon flouride storage of flourine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silicon_tetrafluoride
Now think about a MEMs based layer between these two surfaces - that
cause them to combine - and concentric rings of Fabrey Perot etalons
focusing the laser energy to a central 'dot' of deuterium and tritium.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b8/Fusion_microcapsule.jpg
The whole thing is about 3/4 inch in diameter and weighs as much as 3
pennies -and costs less than $1.32 each.
There is a mechansim surrounding the whole primary that focuses the
blast along a tube-like Li6D secondary - located in a tube-like
tamper. This system masses 5 pennies. A penny weighs about a gram.
See the Teller-Ulam article to get an idea of this.
So, a capacitor bank is charged up while the device is accelerated
electromagnetically into the reaction chamber. The capacitor bank
discharges driving electrical heating elements across the two 'storage
surfaces' hydrogen and flourine pour out of the surfaces into the
porelike MEMS rocket nozzle array and exhaust into the etalon region.
Light energy is processed by the optical cavities and focused radially
inward to the pellet - while a theta-pinch fiber - energized by the
current flowing to the heating elements squeezes the expanding
deuterium-tritium plasma ball.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinch_%28plasma_physics%29
This detonates the primary which then flashes through the secondary
setting it off.
4.6 grams of Li6D in this system - are detonated, releasing the
equivalent of exploding 27.6 tons of TNT - nearly ALL the resulting
energy is in the form of helium nuclei - which are easily deflected -
despite their high energy - by a magnetic containment and magnetic
nozzle.
The entire thing is about the size of a small arms round
> Implosions are viiewed not as thermonuclear solutions but as
> research tools.
This is meaningless. I've given this subject a lot of thought, based
on my training and deep study - you have said nothing that indicates
you understand the subject let alone saying anything that suggests
I've made any mistakes or errors in my research and design.
> The question of heat loss is relevant in terms of
> sustainability, as well as everything else.
This too is meaningless. The plasma will lose a specific amount of
energy in the form of radiation due to Stephan Boltzmann - that's
calculable given the reaction conditions. This radiation - mostly UV
and gamma rays - will be less than 0.01% of the total - frozen flow
losses in the plasma account for 10% which is radiated by the cooling
jet behind the spacecraft - but this is not a problem given the
wavelength and diffuse nature of the light.
The 'flash' loss of detonation will require a rather massive radiation
reflector pointing those flashes away from the cabin if we are to have
continuous operation of the ship. Absorbing even 0.1% - would
overheat most systems - so, that's not even attempted.
This sheild, can also be used to sheild against space and solar
radiation, and is where the cabin level is where passengers and crew
sleep and spend most of their time.
Willie...@gmail.com
second. $7,200 per minute, $432,000 per flight hour. For a 3.6 hour
flight this is $1.55 million for a flight to the moon at constant
gee. 180 passgeners - $8,640. 200 tons $7,750 per ton.
Of course, increase the Li6D by a factor of 100 - 4.5 grams to 450
grams - and the cost is the same per unit (being the cost of the wafer
area processed into MEMs units) and the size of the spacecraft rises
to 20,000 tons - the next step up - a sphere 55.7 meters (185.7 ft) in
diameter - and the price drops to $77.50 per ton and $86.40 per
passenger - for the moon.
Increase the pulse units (with the same trigger) to support a 400,000
ton payload - and costs drop to $3.50 per ton (for a 3.5 hour flight)
and $4.30 per passenger - which is $24 per day - (2.4x the cost of
freight on Earth's oceans) - increase to 1,000,000 payload - and we're
competitive with the world's ocean shipping.
The MEMs based HF laser and D+T pellet initiator - can be dropped by a
factor of 10 in a second generation system. Increasing laser
efficiency from 3% to 30% reduces things by another factor of 10 - so,
our R&D goal for our initiator plants will be to build the initiators
for less than $1.40 first generation - dropping to $0.14 second
generation - in 3 years - and thence to $0.02 for 3rd generation in 6
years.
Increasing ship sizes reduce things by another factor of 100 and 2,000
resptively.
So flight rates drop from $432,000 per flight hour, to $43,200 per
fligh thour, to $4,320 per flight hour - which are constant across all
shipping sizes - and costs per day drop as follows
200 ton 20,000 t
400,000t
generation hourly cost cost/ton cost/ton cost/ton
1st $432,000 $7,750 $77.50 $3.50
2nd $43,200 $775 $7.75 $0.35
3rd $4,320 $77.50 $0.78 $0.04
A ton of Li6D has the equivalent of 60 million tons of TNT. Deuterium
is easily extracted from seawater by centrifuge. Deuterium gas costs
$6 per kg. Lithium-6 is 7.5% of the total lithium. Lithium costs
$2.32 per kg. Lithium-6 isotope in quantity would cost around $4 per
kg. The world produces about 21,000 tons of Lithium, 525 tons of
Lithium-6 could be extracted from current supplies each year. Each kg
of of Li6-D contains 750 grams of Lithium-6 and 250 grams of
deuterium. So, in quantity a kg of Li-6 D costs $3.24. So, a 4.6
gram pellet costs 1.5 cents, and a 460 gram pellet costs $1.49, and a
9.2 kg unit costs $29.80
So in addition to hourly generator costs, there is an hourly Li-6 D
cost
200 ton 20,000 t 400,000 t
hourly $3,218.40 $3,218,400 $64,368,000
adv hrly $330.00 $33,000 $6,600,000
3d gen $40.00 $4,000 $40,000
These start to dominate in the larger forms. They may be mitgated by
buying mines rather than buying metal on the open market, and then by
advanced mining, including mining off world -
We can see that the 40 ft diameter space cruiser could be refilled 5
times per year with the current availability of lithium-6. So,
finding new resources off-world, is of paramount importance. With the
ability to have 35 flights per refueling, and only 5.25 refuelings
available per year, we can only fly to the moon every other day - due
to lithium-6 limitations.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneutronic_fusion
Proton plus lithium 7 is an interesting reaction - which increases the
availability beyond Lithium-6
the energy released is 2/3 that of lithium-6
Boron is another interesting aneutronic fuel.
the energy releaased is 1/3 that of lithium-6
The world produces about 1.34 million metric tons of Boron per year.
251,000 tons per year is Boron 10 and
1,085,000 tons per year is Boron 11.
http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/boron/mcs-2008-boron.pdf
Boron costs about $0.50 per kg - so a 15 gram pellet of Boro-hydride
in the smaller ship (to replace the 4.6 gram pellet of LiD) would be
3/4 cent. So,
200 tons 20,000 tons 400,000 tons
$1,620 per hour $162,000 per hour $3,240,000 per hour
$162 per hour $16,200 per hour $324,000 per hour
$20 per hour $2,000 per hour $40,000 per
hour
Would be the price points for the three phases mentioned above - taken
for Boron. Sea salts are a resource for Boron - so in principal,
costs would be very inexpensive as energy costs plummeted.
Producing an improved initiator that had costs of 1% of the 3rd
generation unit above, combined with a boron secondary, would reduce
fuel costs of vehicles to that of automobiles - so, in principle,
folks could own personal fusion powered spaceships and fly routinely
around the solar system.
1 ton of boron has the same content as 20 million barrels of oil. So,
1,500 tons of boron per year would meet all our energy needs at
present. 1,000,000 tons per year would fuel a fleet of 2,000 of the
largest freighters - which would basically allow us to industrialize
the solar system.
Ian Parker
>
> Boron costs about $0.50 per kg - so a 15 gram pellet of Boro-hydride
> in the smaller ship (to replace the 4.6 gram pellet of LiD) would be
> 3/4 cent. So,
>
> 200 tons 20,000 tons 400,000 tons
> $1,620 per hour $162,000 per hour $3,240,000 per hour
> $162 per hour $16,200 per hour $324,000 per hour
> $20 per hour $2,000 per hour $40,000 per
> hour
>
> Would be the price points for the three phases mentioned above - taken
> for Boron. Sea salts are a resource for Boron - so in principal,
> costs would be very inexpensive as energy costs plummeted.
>
> Producing an improved initiator that had costs of 1% of the 3rd
> generation unit above, combined with a boron secondary, would reduce
> fuel costs of vehicles to that of automobiles - so, in principle,
> folks could own personal fusion powered spaceships and fly routinely
> around the solar system.
>
> 1 ton of boron has the same content as 20 million barrels of oil. So,
> 1,500 tons of boron per year would meet all our energy needs at
> present. 1,000,000 tons per year would fuel a fleet of 2,000 of the
> largest freighters - which would basically allow us to industrialize
> the solar system.
There is one point here about nuclear reactions in general. The
nuclear force is a short range force and in order to fuse two nucei
have to overcome the electrostaic repulsion first. That is why He3/D
has roughly twice the fusion temperature of T/D. Li has a temperature
50% greater than He3 and 3 times Tritium. Li/D will indeed produce 2
alpha particles and 1 neutron, with most of the energy being in the
alpha particles. Good reaction? Questionable, I still say He3/D is the
best.
- Ian Parker
Willie...@gmail.com
>
> - Show quoted text -
You can say it all you want, but you must explain what your criterion
is for saying so. I will explain my.
There are two aspects -
1) reaction yeild
2) specific energy of reactants
Aneutronic reactions - that is fusion reactions that DO NOT produce
neutrons, are favored over reactions that do. The reason should be
obvious, neutrons do not contribute to thrust and are a radiation
hazard. Ions can be directed and thus contribute to thrust while not
forming a strong radiation hazard
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aneutronic_fusion
In an inertial confinement system, the amount of energy it takes to
ignite a blast is immaterial. That's because you can ignite a low
energy primary and use the gamma ray burst from that to ignite a high-
energy secondary. This is the basic teller ulam design.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teller-Ulam_design
Instead of a fission bomb as the primary, you have a chemical laser
igniting a deuterium-tritium pellet. The pellet ignites the
secondary.
What it takes to ignite various fusable materials is given by the
Lawson criterion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawson_criterion
http://www.jet.efda.org/pages/publications/yop/dec05-aere-gpr1807.pdf
25 keV is the minimum energy for Deuterium-Tritium. A small pellet of
D+T mixture compressed by a hydrogen flouride laser beam, large enough
to ignite any sort of secondary can be made to ignite with no less
than 10 kilojoules of laser energy.
http://www.jet.efda.org/pages/publications/yop/dec05-aere-gpr1807.pdf
Five thin film silicon MEMs based devices are bonded together to form
the disposable laser system. The base layer contains a resistive
heating element beneath a silicon hydride hydrogen storage surface
that contain a gram of hydrogen gas that is evolved very quickly when
heated. This feeds into an array of small reaction chambers. The top
layer contains a similar arrangement for silicon flouride storage -
storing about a gram of the gas in the silicon structure. It too is
evolved when the resistive heating element is switched on and directed
through rocket nozzle type arrangements. The hot hydrogen and
flourine react in an optical cavity - the central layer of the five
layers. This layer possesses hundreds of concentric fabrey perot
etalons that take the photon flash from the reacting gases and
converts a small portion of the total optical energy to a powerful
very short laser pulse directed centrally toward a small deuterium-
tritium pellet
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b8/Fusion_microcapsule.jpg
The resistive heating elements on the two outer surfaces, that drive
the gases through the inkjet like openings, are powered by a
capacitor. That capacitor is connected to these resistive loads
through an inductive loop - which forms a powerful magnetic pinch to
the microcapsule being heated and compressed by the laser system.
In this way 340 kilojoules of chemical energy contained in the 2.2
grams of hydrogen and flourine gas are converted to 10 kilojoules of
laser energy which detonates 100 micrograms of deuterium/tritium
mixture releasing 25 megajoules of gamma rays - which detonate any
sized fusion secondary.
16 electromagnetic detonation chambers operating in pairs - 60x per
second per pair - 450 detonations per minute for each chamber -
produce 1,130 metric tons of force forming a jet using a common
magnetic nozzle fto all 16 detonation chambers
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?tp=&arnumber=1706964&isnumber=36024
The spacecraft consists of a 100 ft diameter disk with a draft of
about 32 feet at the center and 10 feet at the rim. A central dome
atop the main disk houses the flight deck and crew quarters. The main
deck may be configured for freight or passenger service, and is
accessed through doors located around the rim, via fold down ramps. A
central cylinder 20 feet wide and up to 16 feet tall supports the disk
when it is grounded. This is the primary deflection point for the MHD
based thrust nozzle. A pinch ring surrounds this 'plug' - the 16
reaction chambers ring this primary above the pinch ring.
The landing ramps stabilize the vehicle upon landing.
An idea of this vehicle configuration is given by the C-57D United
Planets Cruiser in the science fiction film Forbidden Planet
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/4d/FPcapSaucer.jpg
Maximum thrust occurs with 120 hz detonation rate - which produces
2,260 metric tons of force. The vehicle fully loaded masses 1,130
metric tons. Payload is 565 tons, and propellant - consisting of
pulse units just described - 300 tons. Vehicle mass is 265 tons
empty. Top speed is 6,170 km/sec The system easily cruises around
the inner solar system at one gee - and around the outer solar system
at 1/5th gee, and the Kuiper Belt 1/100th gee.
A 50 ft spherical configuation is also possible - with similar mass
fractions and performance - with a slight variation in the MHD nozzle
design - and the addition of purpose built landing gear. Think of the
Aires 1B lunar shuttle, but twice the volume -
http://davidszondy.com/future/space/Aries%2002.jpg
A more 'rocket-like' shape is also possible, by positioning the
detonation chambers around the nozzle, pointing straight down - along
a narrowed and lengthened MHD plug, putting several pinch rings at the
base of the lengthened MHD nozzle to make up for their narrowness.
Propellant is placed above the reaction chambers, and cargo above
that, and above that crew quarters and flight deck.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8dgPClU57o
This 25 ft diameter rocket (on average) is 135 feet tall - again the
structural, payload and propellant masses, along with the performance
is the same. Unlike the Destination Moon rocket, you blast to you
destination all the way out and all the way back - so the wings are
largely superfluous - as are thermal protection or heat sheilds.
The key to this performance is the specific energy of the Li6-D which
produces alpha particles which are easily deflected by the MHD system
given. Since the magnetic deflector doesn't need to initate the
fusion blast, the pressures and temperatures it must handle are far
less than required by a non ICF fusor. This improves power to weight
to allow take off from Earth with full load and maintaining a one gee
thrust throughout the flight.
There are a few fusion reactions that have no neutrons as products on
any of their branches. Those with the largest cross sections are
these:
************************************
D + 3He → 4He (3.6 MeV) + p (14.7 MeV)
0.9 14.7
56,000 km/sec
************************************
D + 6Li → 2 4He + 22.4 MeV
1.83
20,000 km/sec
************************************
p + 6Li → 4He (1.7 MeV) + 3He (2.3 MeV)
0.425 0.767
14,000 km/sec
************************************
3He + 6Li → 2 4He + p + 16.9 MeV
0.45 14.7
56,000 km/sec
************************************
p + 7Li → 2 4He + 17.2 MeV
2.15
22,000 km/sec
************************************
p + 11B → 3 4He + 8.7 MeV
0.725
12,500 km/sec
************************************
MeV is a measure of energy, dividing that by mass gives you specific
energy;
MeV per amu
Helium 3 plus deuterium, DOES produce a very very energetic proton.
No doubt about it, but there isn't a whole lot of Helium 3 on
Earth. Exhaust velocities of about 56,000 km/sec are possible.
So, this is a non-starter until we can get helium 3
0.000137% of naturally occuring helium is helium 3 on Earth. 0.075%
of all natural gas production is helium. There is 2.2 billion metric
tons of natural gas produced worldwide. This means that a dedicated
effort to produce helium and helium 3 would yeild 1.65 million metric
tons of helium, of which 2.26 tons per year would be helium 3.
This is enough to experiment with, and develop techniques. It would
be a $10 billion program - and would most likely be paid for by the
sale of normal helium along with neon and other rare gases.
The world produces about 525 tons of Li6 per year - if we extracted
the 2.5% of the isotope from the 21,000 tons of lithium metal each
year. Li7 also has about the same performance as well and is
aneutronic, but is harder to ignite. So, all the lithium potentially
could be used as fuel.
A ton of Lithium releases about 40 million barrels of oil equivalent
energy. That means 750 tons per year could power our industrial world
replacing all fossil fuels.
This rocket described here at low thrust firing into an MHD generator
could power the entire world! lol.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MHD_generator
A ton of boron 11 releases about 16 million barrels of oil equivalent
energy. The world produces about 251,000 tons of boron 11. Exhaust
speeds are 12,500 km/sec for this type of rocket. About 2,000 tons
per year of Boron 11 would power the world again.
Three satellites in GEO each equipped with two low thrust engines,
powered by Boron 11 and protium - reaction..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diborane
set off with a hydrogen flouride laser/deuterium+tritium primary.
Here the ion beam flies through a resonator to form a free-ion
laser.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ion_laser
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_electron_laser
to beam energy to terrestrial panel arrays near silicon bandgap energy
- 1,100 nm.
These augment earlier experiments with solar power satellites - and
build on that experience, while building up high performance reactor
and rocket experience.