Space flights officially the new thing

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#2743459 12-Jul-2021 22:38

networkn: Joyriding into space given the amount of c02 etc it uses, feels tone-deaf when every second topic discussed is climate change.

I would imagine the carbon footprint of this is far smaller than that generated by Wellington City Council last Saturday night for their 10 minute firework display. Thousands of cars clogging up the city and turning the motorway into a super slow crawl over several hours.

My 2c - I think what Sir Richard Branson and Virgin Galactic have achieved is a superb thing. The technology that has been, and continues to be, developed here is outstanding. Things like the way the wings fold on the craft so it can act similarly to a capsule on re-entry, then the wings are reoriented so the craft can glide safely back to ground. Innovations like this can only lead to bigger and better things. It's a little craft so it's payload capacity would be quite small but continuing development of this sort of concept are exactly what's needed to help get away from the massive fuel consumption of the heavy lift rockets - the 'need' for these is not going away anytime soon. Over time I'm sure we'll also start seeing more carbon friendly emissions as propellant chemistry improves.

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#2743462 12-Jul-2021 22:49

gzt:
networkn: I can't believe this is actually a thing. To some degree, whilst I disagree with it, I can understand exploratory space travel. Joyriding into space given the amount of c02 etc it uses, feels tone-deaf when every second topic discussed is climate change.

Virgin claims the commerical flights will have the same per passenger CO2 footprint as a transatlantic flight. Makes sense - it's only a few hundred km round trip and no luggage. In practice this is not much different to a European holiday from USA and potentially not as bad as a European holiday from NZ.

don't forget to add up all the co2 in getting the high flyers to location, and the co2 in maintaining/manning/servicing the things.

it really does make my car look good.

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#2743463 12-Jul-2021 22:52

Batman:

really does make my car look good.

You really have a thing about that car, don't you?

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#2743465 12-Jul-2021 22:52

Dratsab:

networkn: Joyriding into space given the amount of c02 etc it uses, feels tone-deaf when every second topic discussed is climate change.

I would imagine the carbon footprint of this is far smaller than that generated by Wellington City Council last Saturday night for their 10 minute firework display. Thousands of cars clogging up the city and turning the motorway into a super slow crawl over several hours.

impossible. the cross continent private jets, servants, and fine dining would easily beat the 10 mins of cars.

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#2743467 12-Jul-2021 22:55

Batman: impossible. the cross continent private jets, servants, and fine dining would easily beat the 10 mins of cars.

Re-read and try to comprehend my post. Then start again.

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#2743480 13-Jul-2021 07:20

jarledb:

Batman:

really does make my car look good.

You really have a thing about that car, don't you?

yes if some billionaire can happily take a private jet across the world and light up the sky with napalm then i don't feel so bad about not having yet found a suitable electric car, even though i cycle most of the time. but i'm looking, have tested a few.

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#2743482 13-Jul-2021 07:25

Dratsab:

Batman: impossible. the cross continent private jets, servants, and fine dining would easily beat the ~~10 mins~~ several hours of cars.

Re-read and try to comprehend my post. Then start again.

"In just one hour, a single private jet can emit two tonnes of CO2." while passenger cars are measured in grams per km.

https://www.transportenvironment.org/publications/private-jets-can-super-rich-supercharge-zero-emission-aviation

unless they didn't use private jets

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#2743493 13-Jul-2021 08:10

What they've achieved is quite remarkable - and the fact it took so long to get to this point (remembering they were expecting their first flights over 10 years ago) shows how much of a feat it really was.

While I've never been a huge fan of Branson I've always been a fan of Burt Rutan and what he's achieved in his life. They wouldn't be at this point today without him.

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#2743495 13-Jul-2021 08:18

mattwnz:

IMO the Virgin Galactic tech is where we need to be heading, and away from these old style rockets. Although the self landing ones that space x do are cool.

If I was going to go up in one then I think I'd prefer the Virgin Galactic method over the rockets (especially the self-landing rockets). The rockets seem to quite consistently blow up on launch or landing, whereas the VG method is more like a plane which is of course much more proven technology.

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#2743513 13-Jul-2021 10:24

Given the current situation as regards climate change, joyriding into space is simply irresponsible.

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#2743577 13-Jul-2021 10:58

mattwnz:

I guess he was willing to take the risk of being an early user of it. Would have been a PR disaster if it had gone wrong, but guessthey had done lots of testing. But it was a very short time in 'space'. Quite cool technology though, especially the reentry procedure. Potentially this type of system could save more fuel than using rockets from the ground

The issue with real space travel is the fuel needed to attain orbital velicity, about 25,000 kph. The Saturn 5 was a fuel tank with a very small module on top. So its not usable for real space travel, just expensive joyrides at high altitude, its hardly space

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#2743599 13-Jul-2021 12:03

geekIT:
Given the current situation as regards climate change, joyriding into space is simply irresponsible.

But it's ok, these people have an EV to sell you, if you buy it then it will be all ok.

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#2743609 13-Jul-2021 12:30

geekIT:

Given the current situation as regards climate change, joyriding into space is simply irresponsible.

Ive been trying to find out what greenhouse gases the solid rocket engine of Starshiptwo actually produces. Obviously the mothership runs on aviation fuel but I would be more concerned by the nasties (nitrous and aluminium oxides, etc) being released in the upper atmosphere and their effect on the ozone layer.

Did you have the same reaction when Musk launched his EV into space? Because the extra payload would have used extra fuel?

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#2743617 13-Jul-2021 12:50

Does anyone know if there are any Kiwis on the list of 600 tickets of $250k already sold apparently?

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#2743618 13-Jul-2021 12:52

geekIT: Given the current situation as regards climate change, joyriding into space is simply irresponsible.

If as Virgin claim - the CO2 output per passenger is equivalent to a New York to London flight - then you must also believe overseas flight holidays are simply irresponsible as regards the current situation with climate change.

On the other hand if an American wishes to spend a few minutes in space instead of a European holiday then it's an even swap.

If someone a bit more leet than that wants to take a European holiday and then spend a few minutes in space, or even more leet does space once a week then you may have a point regardless. Seen from that perspective it's a new product adding to uncompensated CO2 output.

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