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Scaling and the start-up phase of space industrializationBy terrestrial standards very little mass is needed to construct the space portion of a 10,000 megawatt (10 GW) power system. Use of lunar materials makes it reasonable to consider alternatives to silicon solar cells for conversion of sunlight to electricity and thereby avoid present major problems associated with solar cell production. Machinery needed on the moon to excavate lunar materials and deliver them to a transport system, to beneficiate lunar materials, to produce glasses and ceramics from lunar materials and to chemically process lunar materials into their major oxides and elements are minor mass fractions of the total mass of equipment needed in space to produce an SPS. In addition the processing equipment can throughput several hundred times their own mass each year with very little requirement for makeup mass from earth.
Document ID
19800062216
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Proceedings
Authors
Criswell, D. R.
(Lunar and Planetary Institute Houston, Tex., United States)
Date Acquired
August 10, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 1979
Subject Category
Astronautics (General)
Meeting Information
Meeting: Space manufacturing III
Location: Princeton, NJ
Start Date: May 14, 1979
End Date: May 17, 1979
Accession Number
80A46386
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NSR-09-051-001
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

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