WHY - THE MOTIVATION FOR A SPACE ELEVATOR

摘要

The goals and vision to motivate the development of a space elevator have been discussed repeatedly. However, the WHY has been glossed over. This paper will discuss two major issues: Why go to space? And, Why a space elevator infrastructure? The emphasis for this paper is on the second question which is broken down into three parts:rnWhy?rnMission Enabling - From no to YES? Cost Reduction - How much savings, 99 % ?rnSome major missions are enhanced or significantly enabled by a space elevator infrastructure. These would be; global communications, energy, monitoring of the Earth, globalational security, planetary defense, and exploration beyond low Earth orbit.