Space Elevator Contest to Begin

The news keeps getting better by the day for those of us with an interest in space exploration and commercialization. I just told you about America's Space Prize, a contest which will give $50 million to the first non-government-funded group to reach Earth orbit. Of course, that follows Burt Rutan's recent accomplishment of building the first private vehicle to leave Earth's atmosphere (note the difference.)

Now, yet another contest is about to begin. According to the British paper The Telegraph, Elevator 2010 is a contest to see who can first design a system of satellites, tethers, and elevators (or "climbers") to lift people and payloads into Earth orbit.

If successful, payloads could be delivered into orbit for a mere 2% of current costs, since the incredible amount of fuel needed to propel rockets would no longer be needed and, consequently, space vehicles would not have to reserve over 3/4 of their mass for fuel.

This has long been an idea of sci-fi writers, but has only become a possibility in real science recently with the development of carbon nanotubes, which will provide the strength and endurance needed to create the type of tether necessary to carry out such a project.

Insiders believe such a system could be built in the next 15 years.