1. Chris Biedrzycki Ned Cameron Mike Gruener Erick Haro
Space Elevator
Chris Biedrzycki
Ned Cameron
Mike Gruener
Erick Haro

2. What is a Space Elevator?

3. What is a Carbon Nanotube?
Can be thought of as a sheet of graphite (a hexagonal lattice of carbon) rolled into a cylinder.

4. Why CNTs? Young's modulus is over 1 Tera Pascal
Strength 100x that of steel at 1/6 the weight (estimated tensile strength is 200 Giga Pascal)

5. Categories of CNTs
Multi-walled nanotubes characterized by formation of nanotubes within nanotubes
Single-walled nanotubes

6. Growing CNTs

7. CNT Fabrication

8. Chemical Vapor Deposition
• Involves heating a catalyst material to high temperatures in a tube furnace and flowing hydrocarbon gas through the tube reactor
• The materials are grown over the catalyst and are collected when the system is cooled to room temperature
• Key parameters are:
– Hydrocarbons
– Catalysts
– Growth Temperature
• CVD process involves the dissociation of hydrocarbon molecules catalyzed by the transition metal, and the dissolution and saturation of carbon atoms in the metal nanoparticle
• Both MWNT and SWNT can be grown by CVD methods
– MWNTs use acetylene gas for the carbon source and a growth temperature between 600 – 800°C
– SWNTs use carbon monoxide or methane for a carbon source and a much higher growth temperature (900 –1200°C)

9. CNT Fabrication

10. Arc Method • Carbon Atoms are evaporated by a plasma of Helium
gas that is ignited by high currents passed through
opposing carbon anode and cathode.
He Arc-Discharge
• Excellent Method for the production of both MWNT and SWNT
• CNTs are obtained by controlling growth conditions
– Pressure of gas in discharge chamber
– Arcing Current on a collector outside the furnace zone

11. CNT Manufacturers Carbon Solutions CarboLex
Carbon Nanotechnologies, Inc.
Fullerene International Corporation
Junye Nano Materials, Co.
Luna Nanomaterials
Luxtera
Nanocs International
Nanoledge
Oxonica
Showa Denka KK
Deal International Inc.
Micro Tech Nano, Inc
Nano Carb Lab(NCL)
NanoLab, Inc
Nanostructured and Amorphous Materials, Inc
Nanosys
Catalytic Materials LLC
INPT
19 companies

12. Making Ribbon

13. Ribbon

14. Problems Encountered Cost – High production costs
Separation – Untangling nanotubes
Length – 63,000 mi is a lot of ribbon

15. Applications to Elevator

16. Elevator in Orbit

17. Deployment

18. Anchor

19. The Climber

20. To Infinity and Beyond….
Gigantic antenna – Capable of receiving radio waves from distant
sources
Large Geosynchronous Station – capable of hundreds of permanent
residents, science labs, pharmaceutical factories
Settlements on Mars, Moon, Venus

21. Troubleshooting Cable breakage – unrepairable 2x safety factor
If breaks, some will splash down, some will burn up
Still create less waste than burning a rocket
Nano-epoxy (Nano-tape) – Still in the developmental stages
High winds - 155mph winds (Class 5 hurricane) can snap the ribbon
position is not in a high wind, or hurricane area
Electricity – Is a concern, but chosen location avoids lightning strikes.
Oscillations –7-hour natural frequency actively damped by the anchor
Radiation – Components are good for 1000 years in orbit
Mobility
Anchor can move ~1 km each day to avoid debris and satellites
Anchor is ~400 mi from all shipping and airplane routes
Using current materials? – No.

22. Entities Involved 3M Corporation Los Alamos National Laboratory
Art Anderson Associates Nanoledge
Augur Aeronautical Centre NASA - Johnson Space Center
Bennett Optical / Compower Owens-Corning
Carbon Nanotechnologies Inc. Princeton University
Lockheed Martin ReyTech
European Space Agency Rutgers University
Flight Materials Group U of Mississippi – Space Law Center
Foster-Miller, Inc. T. Y. Lin International
Harvard University Thomas Jefferson National Laboratory
HighLift Systems University of Kentucky

23. Pricing Now, Cargo $50,000/lb Now, Cargo 4,000lb/day
Component
Cost Estimate
Launch Cost
$1.02 B
Cable Production
$390 M
Spacecraft
$507 M
Climbers
$367 M
Power Laser
$1.5 B
Anchor Station
$120 M
Tracking Facility
$500 M
Other
$430 M
Contingency (30%)
$1.44 B
Total
$6.2 B
Now, Cargo $50,000/lb
Now, Cargo 4,000lb/day
First Elevator, Cargo $100/lb
First Elevator, Cargo 12,000lb/day

24. Method to Improve Elevator
Use superconducting property of nanotube ribbon
Maglev type ascention

25. Conclusion

27. Questions

28. Thanks !!!
Online Learning Team
IRT / ITS
Drexel University