I’ve been attending the 2008 Space Elevator Conference being held at Microsoft’s Redmond campus this weekend.  The many talks and papers given there clearly demonstrate the tremendous dedication and creative engineering that can be found in this nascent field.

For those of you who are fuzzy on the concept, the general idea of the space elevator involves running a tether from the surface of the earth to geosynchronous orbit and beyond.  A mechanical “climber” then ascends and descends the tether, delivering payloads into orbit.  If this sounds like science fiction, that’s because until recently, it was.  Independently conceived by a Russian (Artsutanov) and an American (Pearson), the space elevator concept was popularized by the late science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke in his 1979 novel, “The Fountains of Paradise”.  At that time, no material was light enough and strong enough to make it possible.  But with the developing field of nanotechnology and the discovery of carbon nanotubes (CNTs), a number of people have begun to take the idea more seriously.  (For the record, Clarke is also credited with originating the idea of using geosynchronous satellites as telecommunications relays back in 1945, a concept that completely revolutionized communications.)

Now while the general concepts behind the space elevator are simple, the implementation is anything but.  There are numerous technical issues to be worked out and an enormous initial investment to be made.  But the potential payoff is huge.  Currently, payloads to geosynchronous orbit constitute only about 3.5% of total launch weight and cost on the order of $5-10,000 per pound of payload.  Payload efficiency on the space elevator could be as much as 90% or more depending on the method used.  Payload envelopes wouldn’t be limited to the size and shape of cylindrical payload bays and nose cones.  Pollution from rockets would be eliminated.  Most importantly though, the cost per pound would plummet.  As a result, a new space era would be born.

Why is this important?  New materials and manufacturing methods could be developed which can only be achieved in zero-gravity.  Off-world mining would allow us to supplement our diminishing resources.  Solar power beamed from space could meet the needs of our increasingly energy-hungry world.  Whether the space elevator is built by one country or becomes a multi-national effort, it will be a huge stimulus for the world economy, particularly for the key players involved.

But it’s not going to happen without support and financial commitment.  True, NASA currently offers as much as four million dollars in prizes for the Spaceward Games, a competition designed to stimulate progress in the field.  But the planning, the engineering analyses, the proof-of-concept work is all being done on a shoestring as thin as the carbon nanotubes themselves.  Uncounted hours are being volunteered by engineers and enthusiasts the world over, people who know this will one day become a reality.  But such dedication can take the space elevator only so far.  The day is quickly coming when we’ll have to make a greater commitment if we want to participate in what will surely be one of the greatest engineering feats humankind has ever seen.

Fuel prices continue to climb, steadily increasing the cost of every mile we travel.  Meanwhile, traffic congestion gets worse with each passing year.  And tragically,  car accidents kill around 43,000 people in the US annually. 

What if all of these statistics could be improved with a single technology?

Autonomous driving – driverless cars – may eventually do just that.  Okay, to be fair, the concept involves a family of technologies: video, infra-red, laser and radar sensors; GPS navigation; AI-controlled motion planning; and a variety of mechanical control systems.  But isn’t that what current-day cars are, anyway: an amalgam of systems?

The idea of driverless vehicles has been explored for decades, but it’s only recently that the supporting technologies have reached a sufficient maturity to really be able to capture the attention of the media and the imagination of the public.  I think recent advances are very indicative of how quickly this technology is going to mature during the next few years.

In 2004, DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) held their first Grand Challenge.  It was over a 150 mile desert course which none of the twenty-one contestants finished.  In fact, the longest distance covered by any of the vehicles was only a little over seven miles.  In the second Challenge held in 2005, five of the vehicles finished a 132 mile off-road course.  All but one of the twenty-three entrants surpassed the prior year’s top distance of 7.36 miles.

Last year, DARPA held their 2007 Urban Challenge.  Of the 11 finalists, six completed the 55 mile urban course, three within the 6 hour time limit.  Rules included obeying all California state driving laws while negotiating with other traffic and obstacles and merging into traffic.  The $2 million prize was won by Tartan Racing, a collaborative effort by Carnegie Mellon University and General Motors Corporation.  Their vehicle, a Chevy Tahoe, covered the course in 4 hours 10 minutes for an average speed of nearly 14 mph.

Last month, GM and Carnegie Mellon announced a new Collaborative Research Lab and a $5 million commitment to work jointly on technologies that will accelerate the emerging field of autonomous driving.  This follows an announcement by GM in January that the company plans to test driverless car technology by 2015 and have cars on the road around 2018.  I wouldn’t be at all surprised if competitive pressures and AI advances moved this forward by a couple of years. 

In the end, regulatory issues and public acceptance of the systems’ safety may delay wide-scale use by several years, but ultimately these vehicles will become the norm.  A properly designed machine can easily react to a detected condition many times faster than a human being.  On-board transmitters and signaling systems could warn of intended actions, giving adjacent vehicles plenty of time to respond.  Combine this with AI swarming algorithms and vehicles will eventually be able to interact with each other with great speed and safety.  (How many collisions have you seen between flocks of birds recently?)

Given the enormous benefits this technology promises (fuel savings, improved utilization of existing roads and lives saved), $5 million dollars seems a trifling sum.  If a more substantial commitment resulted in autonomous vehicles being embraced just one year sooner, how much could we truly save?