![]() ![]() It would take a lot more energy to get into orbit.īut the problem is actually even more difficult than that. For comparison, if you pick up a textbook from the floor and put it on a table, that takes about 10 joules. The total energy to get just that 1-kilogram object into orbit would be about 33 million joules. ![]() Only 11 percent of the energy would be in the gravitational potential energy. Getting into orbit is more about speed than height. So let's say you want to use a rocket to increase the object’s gravitational potential energy (to raise it to the right altitude) and also increase its kinetic energy (to get it up to speed). This means that increasing an object’s altitude increases the gravitational potential energy. Gravitational potential energy depends on the distance between the object and the Earth. So if you increase an object’s velocity, it will increase in kinetic energy. Kinetic energy is the energy an object has due to its velocity. We can mathematically model different types of energy. Just a quick refresher on energy: It turns out that the amount of energy we put into a system (we call it work) is equal to the change in energy in that system. So, second, in order to keep this thing in LEO, it has to move-really fast. ![]() But if you only increased the object’s altitude, it wouldn't be in space for long. First, you need to lift it up 400 kilometers. In order to get this object into orbit, you need to accomplish two things. This is around 400 kilometers above the surface of the Earth, about where the International Space Station is. Let's consider what it takes to get a 1-kilogram object into low Earth orbit (LEO). But right now, our only option for getting stuff into space is to strap it to a controlled chemical explosion that we usually call "a rocket."ĭon't get me wrong, rockets are cool, but they are also expensive and inefficient. People like to put stuff beyond the Earth's atmosphere: It allows us to have weather satellites, a space station, GPS satellites, and even the James Webb Space Telescope. This seems like a great chance to talk about the physics of space elevators and to consider what would happen if one exploded. In the first episode of the Foundation series on Apple TV, we see a terrorist try to destroy the space elevator used by the Galactic Empire. ![]()
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