Space Elevator Tests - Reckless and Irresponsible

New Scientist recently put out an article on preliminary tests of the space elevator.

I am not pleased.

For those who don't know, a space elevator is a half baked idea about how to launch vehicles into space more cheaply. Basically, you put a huge rock in orbit around the earth, one big enough to destroy a whole country if it fell out of orbit. Then you tie a big rope around it, and climb up the rope to get to space.

Its only a little less crazy than it sounds.

In theory, an elevator would need to expend a great deal less energy than a rocket in order to get to space. Some numbers I saw a few years back made it sound like you could deploy something into orbit for about 100 times the cost of sending it via Fed Ex.

Neat! but there has to be a catch...

What concerns me is that nobody in the news seems to be talking about how incredibly dangerous it would be to have a rope 20,000 miles long stretching into space. What if something goes wrong? Weather? Asteroid? Terrorist? That tether could do considerable damage, even if the giant rock stays in orbit...

What concerns me more is that they are doing these initial tests without resolving the problems with nanotube toxicology! All of these tethers are made with nanotubes, since they are light and incredibly strong... but they have a nasty side effect of killing fish even in minute quantities. Many scientists ignore this, despite the fact that every proposed construction site in the middle of the ocean.

Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!

I must say shame on New Scientist for not mentioning this fact in their latest article, because their own website posted two articles about how nanotubes cause brain damage in fish, and suffocate other marine creatures, one in March 2004, and again in April 2004. Don't they read their own articles?

It is reckless and irresponsible for scientists to be performing tests out in the open environment with materials known to be this toxic. They need to discover what species are effected by nanotubes, and why, so we can either create better nanotubes or try something else. Preliminary data suggests that there may be even inhalation toxicity for mammals... which means the asbestos problem all over again.

We don't need the space elevator any time soon... but we sure do need fish in the ocean!