Virgin Galactic - Spaceflight for $200/kg?

[Boxy]

Virgin Galactic's flights aboard its inaugural "SpaceShipTwo" will cost about $200,000 a pop for a "sub-orbital" (i.e. non-ISS level) space transit. However, after its 500th flight, Virgin Group is planning on reducing the cost to $20,000 for a suborbital flight. Given 100 kg for an average-sized adult, that would be about $200 /kg cost to get into space.

Now, this doesn't exactly get us into orbit. However, it does make it significantly cheaper than NASA's $45k per kilogram at the height of the Space Shuttle program. My question is, could we with current materials create a partial "space elevator" (or Skyhook, as it's apparently called) to lug up people in a reasonable fashion? My understanding was that the problems with building a long geostationary tether are the tensile strength of such a long tether required (i.e. 35,000 km, much greater than the 100 km space-barrier) would be avoided by building on a much smaller scale.

What think you, gentle Earthlings?

[Sam Fraser]

Yes, Virgin Galactic's efforts are stepping stones to orbit and not to be sneered at as "going nowhere" like some space purists do. I think the incremental stage business model that various space start-ups are following is a sound one e.g. doing something simple that can quickly turn a profit, proceeds of which are then poured into a more ambitious project. Each step pays for the next one.

As for a skyhook, it's possible, but developing our own launch systems from scratch isn't part of the PERMANENT brief. When I first met Mark, I also got excited by various cool CATS concepts. Having worked in DC on space systems for the DOD and consulted for the government, Mark made it quite clear to me it's not simply necessary. See this section:

http://www.permanent.com/ep-cheap.htm

Even today, space enthusiasts might be surprised by the amount of published research that doesn't appear online and the number of working prototypes that already exist in various laboratories that can be used for space mining etc. It's just a case of picking what's already available and putting together in a workable package. We don't want to be reinventing the wheel or heading into the unknown (unless it's deep space :cool: ).

Also, simply from an investor point of view, what's easier to pitch? "We'll use your money on proven technology like a Bigelow inflatable module, mated to a cluster of Centaur upper stages and a NASA nuclear space battery launched on a Russian Proton!" (for illustrative purposes only, I have no idea if that combo's doable) or "We'll use your money to develop X that never's been tried and possibly won't work!"