Celebrating 20 years since first hardcopy publication of KESTS to GEO

Celebrating the twenty year anniversary of the first hardcopy published article on my "KESTS to GEO" concept, I have made a web page about it. Although there was clearly ongoing interference with my efforts to communicate my technological conceptual design ideas even back then, as continues even nowadays, as a member of the all-volunteer-published slick magazine "Meditation" staff, there was some consideration of my own efforts at writing and getting published. Thus my article "TreeHouse Haven" ceased to be rejected by the magazine and finally got published, in the Winter 1990 edition.
http://www.kestsgeo.com/1techconcepts/documents/treehousehaven/treehousehaven.html

The "TreeHouse Haven" article was written to an audience not much interested in technology; but who were interested in healthful things like meditation, and in "saving the planet" from the errors of busy goofy tunnel-visioned mankind. That issue of "Meditation Magazine" was dedicated to "Relationships," so this article focused on mankind's relationship with the planetary ecosystem and civilization's wellbeing, as potentially greatly enhanced by this "KESTS to GEO" transportation system concept, opening up civilization to high earth orbit in a very big way, due to its extremely energy efficient, electrically powered, continuous transportation capacity (in great contrast to extraordinarily energy inefficient transportation by the reaction engined vehicles exclusively exclusively used by aerospace at present.) And, it did not require the development of a super high strength material, such as was required by the more familiar anchored tether "Space Elevator" concepts. Thus the applications it would have enabled would have dealt with such problems as the need for abundant clean electrical energy and room to live well and have plentiful food, all made possible due to that very low cost access to GEO from the equatorial ground. If properly built and utilized, of course.

Sure, it got righteously ignored and suppressed by those whose fortunes were tied up in the conventional aerospace business system, who were the only ones who would be able to implement the KESTS to GEO transportation structure and space applications like finally making possible construction of large scale Solar Power Satellites in GEO. But I did my best to let people know of this great opportunity for their near future wellbeing. I had been publicly writing up the idea as as it grew in stages in my mind, such as on the GEnie network (back before the internet was available to the public) and giving talks on it at small groups in the Los Angeles area at the time. But it's principles were just too different from the conventional way of doing things, despite being only a re-configuration of existing technology uses, to apparently be comprehensible by those steeped in conventional aerospace.

And it was not until 2000, ten years later, that I finally got a formal technical article published, in hardcopy form, as a peer reviewed technical article (ASCE Space 2000 conference proceedings.) Although that article had an exclusive copyright on the article, I do have the slides of my presentation that can be seen here: http://www.kestsgeo.com/1techconcepts/documents/space2000slides/reconstructed vg space2000.htm

So this is really the 20th anniversary of the first hardcopy published of a somewhat non-technical article on the "KESTS to GEO" conceptual design, but also the 10th anniversary of the first hardcopy published peer-reviewed technical article on the concept. Considering the extremely difficult struggles I had over those years, living in near poverty much of the time, I think these are achievements worth acknowledging.

Congratulations, "KESTS to GEO" concept, on your 20th and 10th years as published in hardcopy articles.

What happened to the dream

Where did the dream go? Consider this quote from a NASA document, of some 35 years ago:

"We have put men on the Moon. Can people live in space? Can permanent communities be built and inhabited off the Earth? Not long ago these questions would have been dismissed as science fiction, as fantasy or, at best as the wishful thinking of men ahead of their times. Now they are asked seriously not only out of human curiosity, but also because circumstances of the times stimulate the thought that space colonization offers large potential benefits and hopes to an increasingly enclosed and circumscribed humanity.

"Permanent communities can be built and inhabited off the Earth. The following chapters present a detailed description of a system for the colonization of space. It is not the best system that can be devised; nor is it complete. Not all the important questions about how and why to colonize space have been posed. Of those that have, not all have been answered satisfactorily. Nevertheless, the 10-week summer study is the most thorough and comprehensive one made to date. On its basis space colonization appears to be technically feasible, while the obstacles to further expansion of human frontiers in this way are principally philosophical, political, and social rather than technological.

"The focus of the system is a space habitat where 10,000 people work, raise families, and live out normal human lives. Figure 1-1. [ http://settlement.arc.nasa.gov/75SummerStudy/figure1.1.gif ] shows the wheel-like structure in which they live. This structure orbits the Earth in the same orbit as the Moon in a stable position that is equidistant from both Earth and Moon. This is called the Lagrangian libration point, L5. The habitat consists of a tube 130 m (427 ft) in diametral cross section bent into a wheel 1790 m (over 1 mi) in diameter. The people live in the ring-shaped tube which is connected by six large access routes (spokes) to a central hub where incoming spacecraft dock. These spokes are 15 m (48 ft) in diameter and provide entry and exit to the living and agricultural areas in the tubular region. To simulate Earth's normal gravity the entire habitat rotates at one revolution per minute about the central hub.

"Much of the interior of the habitat is illuminated with natural sunshine. The Sun's rays in space are deflected by a large stationary mirror suspended directly over the hub. This mirror is inclined at 45 degrees to the axis of rotation and directs the light onto another set of mirrors which, in turn, reflect it into the interior of the habitat's tube through a set of louvered mirrors designed to admit light to the colony while acting as a baffle to stop cosmic radiation. With the help of abundant natural sunshine and controlled agriculture, the colonists are able to raise enough food for themselves on only 63 ha (156 acres). The large paddle-like structure below the hub is a radiator by which waste heat is carried away from the habitat.

"Abundant solar energy and large amounts of matter from the Moon are keys to successfully establishing a community in space. Not only does the sunshine foster agriculture of unusual productivity, but also it provides energy for industries needed by the colony. Using solar energy to generate electricity and to power solar furnaces the colonists refine aluminum, titanium, and silicon from lunar ores shipped inexpensively into space. With these materials they are able to manufacture satellite solar power stations and new colonies. The power stations are placed in orbit around the Earth to which they deliver copious and valuable electrical energy. The economic value of these power stations will go far to justify the existence of the colony and the construction of more colonies...."

The document from which this is quoted was created some 35 years ago, titled NASA SP-413. (Its soft copy can be found at
http://settlement.arc.nasa.gov/75SummerStudy/Table_of_Contents1.html )

What happened to this dream, created just a couple of years after the last of the Apollo moon adventures had left the Moon? NASA seems obsessed with just using rocketry to put things into space, perhaps because that is what they are familiar with, and is what their current adventures rely upon. Even their sponsorship of space elevator concerns seems just to prove how hard and inefficient that could be, such as the contests for climbing up a tether they have suspended from cranes or helicopters, contests to beam high powered lasers to supply energy for climbers up the dangling tether; but that is not the best way for a space elevator to work. But it does spin our wheels - thus preventing forward motion - regarding any effort in that direction, thus excusing continued total reliance on rocketry, nice familiar rocketry - maybe even forcing nuclear powered launch vehicle rocketry efforts again, who knows, instead of just interplanetary nuclear rocketry efforts.

And righteous disdain for tether space elevators or space hoop escalator concepts, which do have the potential for truly economical large scale movement of construction materials into nearby space, such as for the building of the above-described kind of space colony which they had dreamed of back in 1975, although built in GEO and shielded with ice mass brought up with the very cheap electrical lift from the Earth's surface.

Anyway, when NASA was born it had the mandate to get to the Moon before the Soviets to prevent the Soviets from putting nuke-armed missiles there aimed at America, like so recently (at the time) they had started to do in Cuba, too terrifyingly freshly in mind to say no to the daring and very expensive project. Go for the Moon, at any cost, just do it. And amazingly, NASA managed to do it, and then got out of the game before they lost a vehicle, like almost happened in Apollo 13. That was the cause of us putting men on the Moon for brief times, not the urge to adventure or explore other planets or find sources of raw materials on the Moon. Then the soviets said "OK you win, I give up on that one" and then so did we, game over, we won; back to the burgers and TV sports.

But lots of us continued on in our imagination, space was a place and it had enormous potential for helping mankind's civilization, such as the high capacity solar-derived energy systems called "Solar Power Satellites" which were conceived in basic principle way back in the 1960's.

No, it was not with the purpose of enabling a clean energy powered vigorously expanding civilization, that we went to the Moon and jump-started the space program; it was war fears that got the money coughed up by we Americans. Most of the people and corporations who actually did the stuff to make the Apollo and Space Shuttle happen, would still most likely prefer to sit on the couch with their beer & chips watching football on TV than to do that kind of thing; even now, I think. Resting on ones laurels is indeed tempting.

When someone like me attempts to rattle their cage, me babbling something about making a hoop-configured electrical motor encircling the earth, in an orbital-transfer-trajectory-like shape from the equatorial earth surface, which uses its internal kinetics to support its own mass and that of captive spacecraft the motor would lift up and down itself eccentrically from the equatorial ground up to geostationary earth orbit, where a new level of civilization could thereby be built - and could have been started back in 1988 when I first pointed out that potential, and would most likely have operational systems already working to put solar power plant construction materials in GEO. But it is far easier to sneer and ignore such babble by an "unknown" apparently attempting to horn in their well-earned prosperous peerdom, from their highly esteemed positions of influence. Now, back to their couch and the football, an easier exciting game for them.

And similarly it is easier for me to glower at being left in their pompous dust, than to much about it either. While time is delayed ever making it harder to do anything except by rocket, anything else getting likely to eventually be chopped through by something orbiting below GEO, and the more things put there, the harder it will be to but up the truly efficient space transportation structures so things can be bult up in GEO and further rocket launches be made from up there, already 91% up out of Earth's gravitational well from the start, and beyond the atmosphere's drag.

Surely that would be a prime goal for an agency which had the purpose of managing the expansion of civilization into space to help the earth and its incredible precious living systems.

Thus the logical conclusion is, that that is not what that agency considers its purpose to be. It was born of war fears, and apparently continues mostly to keep the technology alive to stay in the game in case rival nations once again go for nuke platforms on the Moon, Mars moons or elsewhere, period. That kept under control, back to the couch and TV sports, job done.

Well, I too can do that kind of thing. But first I put the space colony, space elevator and hoop space escalator designs to the tune of science fiction adventures, and put them in paperback form at minimum cost, and made them free for all for download on the internet, such as one at smashwords download site "Its Down To Earth" by J E D Cline https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/2459 (which has had over 700 downloads) and "Building Up" at scribd http://www.scribd.com/doc/14776925/Building-Up Thereby I get to live out the doing of the dreams I had for helping NASA and humanity, albeit only in virtual reality, which is slightly better than nothing. It expands the dream a bit.

Well, also I have been putting the concepts out for all to see, even from the beginning in 1988 on the GEnie computer network, then on the internet on my www.home.earthlink.net/~jedcline pages starting in 1996, and more recently on dedicated websites www.kestsgeo.com and www.escalatorhi.com; but, few if any find them and comment back to me. I also endured the writing, camera ready preparation, travel, and formal presentation of some eight technical papers at space conferences, all at my own out-of-pocket expense, telling of these concepts (such as http://www.scribd.com/doc/14090773/The-Space-Escalators-Unique-Potentials and presentations http://www.scribd.com/doc/14091289/efikestspps7n and http://www.escalatorhi.com/techscifi/tupsec_j.swf ), and calculations http://www.scribd.com/doc/14093583/Energy-Given-to-Mass-By-Lifting-From-Ground-Up-Into-GEO to space folks that only considered them rival to their own bread & butter space concepts, their own cherished laboriously created dreams; although most were corporate ventures.

Anyway, I did my best to show them what might could be some even better dreams for them to have too. Naive me, thinking that a more rewarding dream to actualize, could attract them away from what was their games, their very own thing - understandably. ("A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" it is said. Even if that bird in the hand simply cannot do the job nearly enough adequately, it is something they have got.)

Although sometimes I again briefly wake up enough to wonder, what happened to the dream.

Pondering Apollo 11 and the girl

Pondering the Apollo 11 celebration yesterday and the Apollo program, in fact the whole Mercury-Gemni-Apollo program, all with the goal of getting to the Moon before the Russians, who were prone to be setting up nuke rockets aimed at us that are hard to fend off and the Moon would be such a potentially reachable place, so we had to be able to get there and do who knows what to counter Russian setup of missiles on moon aimed at America.

Yet that goal, which I recall being illustrated on the cover of a Sunday newspaper Parade magazine, a graphic of Russian missiles on the moon aimed at the US while the Cuban Missile Crisis was still fresh in our minds, a close scrape with fears of getting nuked in person, drove that space program.

Not by the sci fi buffs who had thought out how such a travel in space might be accomplished. Yet sci fi had to do with being off in some other place not ruled by present reality people and circumstances, often the man was rescuing the reproduction-ready female to get her appreciation, battling powerful inhuman foes to do so, in those sci fi stories.

But the robot telescopes sent to the Moon, Mars, the moons of Jupiter, even the clouds of Venus, found no such females needing rescuing nor their inhuman pursuers there either.

Yet in the pursuit of these things in outer space, we created technologies and found opportunities we could do, that were worthwhile, such as stationary satellites in GEO that send back photos of the weather patterns of the Earth, and of communications satellites that have such far-ranging reach and yet stay in one place so fixed "satellite dishes" on people's homes and businesses can directly communicate with the satellite and thus to all its other communicants, visible to about half the planet's places through each satellite. And the swarms of lower fast-moving satellites that, with fancy rapid electronic calculations, provides personal immediate locations through peoples' GPS devices.

Without the "space race to the Moon" most likely none of that would exist now, although some folks might be futilly writing about how these things could be possibly done and would be of great benefit to people. And those writers would just be frustrated that none of it was happening.

I know, because I have been writing of next similarly non-mainstream opportunities available through space, (like "KESTS to GEO and enabled applications") but no, people are much too busy "doing something else" as led by influence-people.

And, after all, without GPS and communication satellites in GEO, we could still have microwave relay stations and transcontinental cables laid for distant mass communications, and compass and maps would tell people where they are, just like they have done for centuries.

And similarly, without "KESTS to GEO and enabled applications" people can keep on doing just as they have done for centuries. People could have created GEO communication satellites and the rockets to put them there, along with GPS satellites; people could have created the tiny complex integrated circuits, useful not just in space satellites but also in cellular phones and laptops, without the space race stimulus, but would have they done so, I doubt it. Just like KESTS to GEO applications, people are not interested in enabling great opportunities and solving huge problems that way.

People are not as smart as they would like to be seen. People are quite smart in clever conflict with each other, that is about it, in the endless reproductive games down through the generations, being the guy that gets and being the girl that is got. But that works best when Mother Nature supplies endless resources for the games, and the games keep coming full circle around the finite sphere of the planet, using up Mother Nature's resources and spreading non-vanishing litter leftovers along the way, which then become part of that which is stumbled into, increasingly.

When will we get responsible, working with Mother Nature and the greater solar system of vast resources? Probably only when the girl insists upon that happening, before she is got.

Establish no-fly zones around SPS power beams

My sci fi novels (such as "It's Down to Earth" and "Building Up") have stimulated a bit of discussion on old and new topics, some of which can be contentious. A new friend who also is into amateur radio (as I am too) and thus aware of potential problems of high power radio beams could have and need to be made safe for all concerned, surprisingly brought up the old argument against the use of Solar Power Satellites in GEO, that the power beams might be dangerous for aircraft to pass through.

Dealing with the effects of flying through a gigawatt power beam going to a 12 square mile area rectenna (rectifying antenna) with a power density (although at a single frequency) about equal to that of sunlight, that much of the solution seems to just do like in other high energy transmission systems such as high tension high voltage power lines, establish an avoidance zone around them, no-fly zones for those beam areas.

Birds flying through them would probably absorb more energy than already absorbing from the sunlight, and unless there are resonant effects, or effects of doubling the heating from incoming energy that is not bounced off their feathers, so research would be needed re this; as to damage compared to the losses of birds and bats to wind turbine blades, another worst-case factor to be researched.

Even though aluminum-skinned aircraft would simply mostly scatter bounce the energy away from their curved metal surfaces, if they strayed anyway into the "no-fly" zones around space sourced power beams, except possibly for any resonant circuits it could pass to in the vehicle, and so aircraft would eventually need to be designed to avoid this frequency-dependent potential problem, or harden any such circuits to pass the sub-centimeter wavelength energy shorting it out.

As I envision the widespread use of such electric power beams, enabled built there such as by using my proposed economical transportation methods, eventually there might eventually be a hundred such 12 square mile no-fly-zone power beams going down to various places around the world. Additionally probably an equal number of much lower energy density beams serving smaller countries and isolated areas.

Regarding the subject of having an ill-will group take over such a power station and modify its beam to make it much smaller and use it as a weapon, it seems to me that the full sized such GEO-sited gigawatt energy transmitters would need to have their antennas designed and built to prevent such focusing down to smaller than the, say, 12 square mile receiving area on the surface of the earth. Wisely design and build them so they can't be used mischievously by the misguided, instead of attempting to use enforcement schemes, which history shows too often get taken over by the misguided who crave control over other people.

Smaller power energy satellites that would be used to deliver propulsion energy to tracked-position airliners, ships at sea and trains in some places, would need to shrink their power beams down to that which would be received by the much smaller rectennas on those vehicles; but the energy would be a closely controlled factor just as any large fast moving vehicle has much energy density that needs to be controlled so as to not run amok and cause damage, including at the hands of misguided aggressive folks who might attempt to take one of them over and use it to cause deliberate damage (not all humans have grown up yet, unfortunately.)

The way things go slowly in the rivalrous business world where the already existing powerful energy businesses (such as coal, oil, nuclear) and existing rocket-based space access system businesses, would strive to suppress such power sources and the new types of space access transportation structures (such as my proposed KESTS kinetic energy supported space escalator transportation system) needed to build and maintain them up in GEO, just to keep their business profits coming in; so probably by the time such space energy sources were fully in place, the wind turbines will have been worn out, that are needed built at the present time.

Such big business suppression of that which the world needs so desperately now - abundant cheap clean electrical power for the world and solar powered means to economically totally recycle toxic materials our industrial civilization produces, back into useful purified chemical forms - and maybe even huge new living space and easy access to asteroid mining potentials - does not make them evil or of destructive intent; they are just naturally wanting to keep their money rolling in without even a brief interruption to maintain their nice lifestyle they have established along with massive influence to control events; and to gain time to take over any such new power systems that might be built in the future, thus to be controlled by themselves in their own good time. Of course, such existing power corporations are the ones who have the wealth to quickly build such space-based clean power systems, but why bother when they already control as it is, without any more work and risk? Business profit is a hallowed thing in our culture, and most anything goes in that game.

Let's hope humanity can survive by somehow getting out of such narrow-visioned modes; we live in a big-picture wide visioned world, whether we see it or not. We are within reach of the technologies to wisely solve our problems, if we can stop quarreling and get on with solving our mutual problems and enabling efficient fulfillment of all our mutual needs to thrive far better on into the future.