Japanese Researchers Testing Prototype Space Elevator In Orbit

Going up or down? - Space Elevator in the Works.

If you’ve ever read Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, then you too might have had dreams of simply pushing a button and drifting up into space in a big see-through box. Well, that dream might one day be a reality, as Japanese researchers say they will test a prototype space elevator later this month.

The team of researchers, hailing from Shizuoka University, are planning on launching a prototype 6cm box on a H-2B rocket to the international Space Station on September 10th. After a successful arrival, astronauts aboard the space station will later release it.

Speaking to AFP, a university spokesperson explained “it’s going to be the world’s first experiment to test elevator movement in space”. (We’re assuming the university has not read about the efforts of one Willy Wonka!)

The project is a collaboration with Japanese construction company Obayashi, whose plans for the exciting space-elevator project were released in 2012, with a target date of 2050.

“The space elevator is planned to be built by the year 2050 with a capacity to carry 100-ton climbers. It is composed of a 96,000-km carbon nanotube cable, a 400-m diameter floating Earth Port and a 12,500-ton counter-weight.” Obayashi explains on their website. “Other facilities (at the Elevator’s destination) include Martian/Lunar Gravity Centers, a Low Earth Orbit Gate, a Geostationary Earth Orbit Station, a Mars Gate and a Solar System Exploration Gate.”

The construction and process to create it is based on, and inspired by, work done by construction engineers who completed Tokyo Skytree in Japan, an impressive feat and the world’s tallest free-standing tower.

While this project feels like something out of a futuristic novel come to life, eager elevator enthusiasts shouldn’t plan any trips just yet. With a maximum cable length of 10 metres, this test run planned for September falls short of the intended length of the finished space elevator by about 1.6 million times.

Considering that in the “space elevator contests” previously held by NASA participants struggled to reach heights of tens of metres, the thousands of kilometres required by this project seem a long way to go in every possible sense. But, the team of researchers are optimistic that they can reach these new and dazzling heights.

So, while an elevator trip into space is not yet a reality, we can eagerly await the results of the University’s experiment later this month!