Bofferbrauer on 18 August 2015
| Lafiel said: in 20km distance from the surface? how would that work when the geostationary orbit is 35km from the surface.. either they plan to keep it in place with boosters (waste of fuel) or have a counter weight at the geostationary orbit, but the station would then cause an enormous amount of shear stress to the cables, probably way more than any viable material for the cable could take |
Not even 35 kilometers, it's 35 thousand kilometers for a GSO. Or, to be precise, 35786 kilometers. And yeah, any space elevator either needs to reach this altitude or put a satellite there as an anchor. This also limits the distance from the equator where you can build such a thing to +- 30 degrees north or south.
