A solar mirror is an object with a reflective surface that is used to reflect the light of the Sun. Solar mirrors have many uses such as concentrating solar radiation for heating or the generation of electricity. When placed in orbit around the Earth, solar mirrors are referred to as Space Reflectors (SR) and could provide illumination at night for a specific area.
Part 5 of 5 Parts (Please read Parts 1, 2, 3 and 4)
Part 4 of 5 Parts (Please read Parts 1, 2 and 3)
Part 3 of 5 Parts (Please read Parts 1 and 2)
Part 2 of 5 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
SpaceX says that when all the components and tests have been completed, the rocket will carry the spacecraft above the Earth and then detach itself to fly back to Earth for inspection and refueling. The spacecraft will fire its engines and achieve Earth orbit. The president of SpaceX says that this might happen as early as 2020.
Part 1 of 5 Parts
Elon Musk has been in the news a lot lately for a variety of reasons. A lot of the stories have to do with his obsession to send astronauts to Mars. His company, SpaceX, is working on a new rocket dubbed that Big Falcon Rocket (BFR) which will figure in his plans for Mars missions.
Last week I blogged about the history of the idea of a space elevator that could reach all the way beyond an anchor in geosynchronous orbit. Cargo and people could be moved to and from orbit in elevator cars traversing the elevator. Today I am going to talk about current work and future plans for such a construction.
When I was a little kid long ago, I read a comic book where a man in a spacesuit climbed a ladder all the way to space. It turns out that an elevator to space was first written of in 1895 by the Russian scientist, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. In 1979 two different novels were published by well-known science fiction authors that featured the construction of the first space elevator.
NASA has split a sixty-five million dollars grant among six contractors to build a prototype space habitat by the end of this year. The contractors include Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Sierra Nevada Corporation’s Space Systems, Orbital ATK, Nanoracks and Bigelow Aerospace.
NASA has split a sixty-five million dollars grant among six contractors to build a prototype space habitat by the end of this year. The contractors include Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Sierra Nevada Corporation’s Space Systems, Orbital ATK, Nanoracks and Bigelow Aerospace.
