by Peter N. Fisk
Is there a possibility we can safely start cooling the earth "now," or a dozen years from now?
Maybe we don't have to blast expensive and irretrievable shields into space, or dust our atmosphere, indiscriminately shading everyone and everything.
Solar wing balloons (or Solaerobots - see www.solaerobot.com) could shade small or vast areas only when and where needed, and they could reflect sunlight where more is needed while maintaining a net cooling effect.
Of course this does not eliminate the need to reduce carbon dioxide, or address the numerous other critical environmental issues.
Early applications where solar wing balloon arrays would pay for themselves might include
- cooling cities which use vast amounts of energy for air conditioning
- managing the unnatural melting of mountain snowmass by shading, to prevent flooding and to retain fresh water reserves, now depleting as historic mountain glaciers are lost to higher temperatures. This would save water for cities and agriculture and eliminate the need for some dams.
- shading areas before or during wildfires to aid fire prevention, and in forest and grassland firefighting efforts
- cooling clouds over unnaturally desertified and arid regions, and farmland, to increase rainfall as needed (thus increasing atmospheric CO2 absorbtion as mentioned above)
- tilting to reflect sunlight to warm farmland where needed, thus extending the growing season (while simultaneously shading snowmass as mentioned above)
- reflecting sunlight to melt or prevent ice jams on rivers to prevent catastrophic flooding
- reflecting sunlight to warm cities in winter months
- reflecting sunlight to keep arctic shipping lanes open (while simultaneously protecting sea ice, glaciers, snowmass, or icecaps)
- reflecting sunlight to concentrate solar energy at solar electric generation sites
- relaying communications signals, such as cell phone and internet
- mapping
- weather sensing
- Working in concert with other global cooling efforts, such as atmospheric spraying of seawater to increase cloud formation (see #4 above)
- Ability to prove useful if, as some fear, global atmospheric instability brings on another ice age.
- Computer chips onboard might respond to Global Positioning System (GPS) signals, other input from satellites, other gliders, onboard sensors, and control centers on the ground.
- Gliders at various altitudes and locations could relay wind speed and direction information, so that optimum use of air movement may be used to maneuver, and to remain on station.
- Solar cells would provide electricity for the craft's electrical functions.
- Huge arrays of the glider wings could migrate where needed, for example following the seasons, cooling arctic and antarctic regions in their respective summers, thereby slowing or reversing melting of the ice caps and sea ice as needed.
- Multiple service functions might realize a net gain for each individual glider launched, offsetting cost long before global cooling goals are reached. These could include gathering and relaying of weather and climate data, mapping, and relay of communications signals.
- Gliders would be programmed to avoid casting shadows on solar collecting equipment, or obstructing astronomical observatories and other equipment.
- Reflected solar heat from tilted wing balloons could possibly keep arctic shipping lanes open much of the year, while the arctic ocean freezes, and a net cooling effect is maintained.
- Would likely use and contribute to Geographic Informations Systems
Further personal brainstorms regarding solar wing balloons:
Size of the gliders could be humanly manageable (depending on weight to air displacement ratio and altitude requirements), perhaps spanning only several meters, to facilitate gathering landed craft for repairs, refitting, or recycling of components.
Production could be global, with every village having some involvement in glider design, function, manufacture, programming, inflation, release, navigation, tracking and monitoring, recovery, retrofit, recycling, and immediate benefit, thus reducing the time needed to respond to global warming dangers and local weather crises.
Gliders could link together for some purposes, such as stability, if needed.
Shape could be square, circular, or any desired, including various shapes of floating modular sections which could construct larger structures or platforms. (Though I think smaller and simpler is better.)
A vertical cross section of a typical glider may be symmetrically wing shaped, having the bottom and top surfaces mirror images of each other, to make equal forward progress while nominally maintaining altitude in either updrafts or downdrafts, or when rising or descending through still air. (An alternative would be having a shape comparable to an aircraft, or glider (sailplane) wing, that is, the top and bottom surfaces not typically being symmetrical.)
The outer membrane may need to be elastic enough to expand and contract, to allow for increased or decreased lift. Alternatively, a somewhat loosely inflated balloon wing may have greater longevity. Or a non-expandible surface may have special uses to limit altitude.
Materials could be inexpensive and recyclable and/or biodegradeable.
When necessary, gliders could be released into a "sun's ray vertical" stacked formation, with the first one released to ascend so as to cast its shadow on the launch point, and subsequent releases following suit, minimizing the cast shadow to that of a few single gliders, if needed.
Release and flight of the gliders would necessarily be coordinated to avoid, and not interfere with conventional or military air traffic.
Gliders could be recalled for retrofitting, repair, or replacement, though some tasks might be routinely be done by fleets of robotic service gliders.
Steering might be done, preferably without moving parts, by altering the shape of the wing balloon using electrically activated contracting fibers and membranes, such as the way rubber contracts when heated, or the way electrical impulses contract muscles or metal fibers. Alternatively, more conventional methods could be used.
The gliders could be recalled to land in specific locations for collection.
Gliders could be made thin and stackable in blocks of dozens or perhaps thousands of units, for economy of storage and transport. Or they might be rolled up into individual portable bundles.
Huge blocks of gliders might also be deployed from aircraft, inflating and separating, or "exfoliating" into the atmosphere.
Use of the gliders would necessarily be governed and coordinated by an international body, although regional, national, and even city governments may wish to purchase glider arrays for a particular purpose.
Wing balloon flight might be somewhat random or carefully controlled in a certain area, maneuvering to most efficiently use local air currents, and most efficiently block, reflect, or collect maximum sunlight. This would require flying in a staggered geolocation and altitude formation (swarm intelligence) to avoid each others' shadows and to prevent collisions with one another, minimizing wear or impact damage.
Wing balloons could possibly remain aloft for decades (centuries would be a better goal) as programming of the arrays is constantly upgraded for local and global response, and maximum efficiency.
Constant high-level production and deployment, as needed, might rapidly reverse the effects of global warming, buying time for reversing other environmental problems such as overproduction of carbon dioxide.
Advantages over proposed space launched sunshades are likely to be lower cost, profitability, wider community involvement, rapid deployment, maneuverability, adaptability, multiple simultaneous service functions, reversal of some causes of global warming, and the ability to adjust, redeploy, or even recall and safely remove the entire shade within days or weeks.
- Maintaining lift, by using hydrogen, or helium, or some gas mixture. Containment and replenishment of gas which gives buoyancy. One question: Is it possible to manufacture hydrogen or capture moisture for electrolysis in-flight (perhaps in a gel) at operating elevations?
- In polar regions there may be a generalized downdraft, and the gliders can possibly benefit from that, gaining forward momentum by constantly rising against it, like a sailboat across the wind. In an updraft, the wing would gain forward movement by falling in relation to the upward motion of the air. However, when the updraft stops, the wing will continue to fall unless adjustments are made. These adjustments could be made by expanding the volume of hydrogen (in an expandable wing) by creating more hydrogen, (or releasing hydrogen or other gas into the wing from onboard storage) and/or by using a hot-air effect, possibly by alternately flipping over as needed to expose its dark side to the sun, (or other means of alternately absorbing and reflecting solar heat) thus rapidly heating and expanding the gas or air inside.
- Question: In a polar region in its respective summer, is it possible for a larger glider wing, inflated with regular air to remain high aloft for an entire season, being above the clouds and in sunshine 24-7? Possibly. But when the region's summer ends and the midnight sun disappears, the air inside will cool and the wing will lose altitude. Using hydrogen, which can be produced onboard if aforementioned problems are addressed, the wing should be able to maintain altitude overnight, to absorb more sun's heat in the morning. As the polar regions will naturally be shaded in the winter, with the assistance of hydrogen, the gliders could migrate through the middle latitudes, with the seasons, to the opposite polar region or elsewhere they are needed.
- Consuming carbon dioxide. Aside from possible use to create more rainfall where needed to increase plant growth, it may be possible to create a thin algae layer to be carried aloft so that much of the surface of the glider may be used to consume and convert carbon dioxide. Perhaps just one surface is all that is needed, getting direct sunlight, or ample reflected light from perhaps 70,000 feet or more of haze and clouds below. If this technology does not exist, it could be developed as the shading gliders have begun to be deployed. This additional feature might help counter a major cause of global warming. Byproduct oxygen could be released into the atmosphere, and carbon might be released as insoluble, absorbent particulate carbon dust or pellets (as soil nutrient biochar?), and be retained onboard until collected, or deposited at designated collection points.
- Materials and construction. Many of the materials might be obtained through better management of recyclable materials which end up in landfills and as litter pollution on land and in waterways, and in non-reusable packaging. The glider could be a thin, opaque coated, biodegradable or recyclable plastic, or coated high-strength paper bubble wing, somewhat loosely inflated, or expandable, or with an expandable membrane. Higher-tech versions might have a super-thin coating of special laser etched aluminum alloy mirror scales, the scales allowing expansion and contraction without checking or cracking of the bubble membrane, and without allowing sunlight to deteriorate the material. The laser etching might make each scale effectively part of each glider's unified virtual flat or concave mirror surface, as needed. Some number of the scales could also function as solar electric cells, or algae coated carbon dioxide converting panels, if those become available.
- Operation. Steering, maneuvering, and tilting might be assisted with a ballast which could be moved to one side or the other, and fore or aft, allowing the wing to dive, climb, flip, turn, and to suspend itself on end vertically, or fly at an angle, to block the most sunlight possible, or to reflect sunlight to a certain area or point, or even feather somewhat edgewise to the sun if having a minimal solar-blocking effect is needed. As the sun will seldom be directly overhead, optimal use if tilting to absorb or reflect the most solar energy will have to be constantly adjusted with respect to intended direction of movement, rising or setting sun, wind direction, and other factors. The shape of the wing could be maintained with vertical panel membranes within, and consist of several separately-inflatable sections, so that a damaged craft could still maneuver to a point where it could be collected and kept out of the surface environment. It may be possible to construct the wings with few or no moving parts, thus helping avoid wear and breakdowns. Initial inflation with hydrogen, locally manufactured through electrolysis on the ground, could simplify release at thousands of sites. Hydrogen storage may not be necessary as gliders could be filled as hydrogen is produced on site. Valuable byproduct oxygen could be bottled and stored for industrial and medical uses. Gliders could alternatively self-launch, released when onboard hydrogen production has reached a degree of lift such that the craft will safely clear obstacles on the ground. Conversely, gliders could release all hydrogen moments before landing to reduce fire hazards.
- Cost. Multiple functions as discussed above may reap rewards for each individual glider wing that is launched, with both wider and more concentrated arrays having their immediate benefits long before the benefits of global climate management are realized. Enormous savings in regional air conditioning and heating costs might be realized in a season by a region's investment in the array. Research, development, and production costs could be shared globally. Grants and endowments can enable university and private research. Sale of energy credits, carbon credits, and bonds can fund production, and incentives and volunteerism can help divert materials from waste stream to production.
Global warming may have reached a tipping point, where the associated problems begin to accelerate out of control. A rapid, comprehensive, global response which has relatively little negative impact is needed. If it can be done while addressing many needs at once, all the better.
What is ultimately needed is humanity's cooperative involvement in earth stewardship, where mistakes of the past can be corrected, forseeable hazards avoided, and future hazards anticipated. The concept proposed here is tailored to that need.
I was unable to find examples of such an overall concept on the web, though I would be surprised if any of these ideas had not been considered and written down already, somewhere else. The ideas expressed here are offered for discussion, study, research, and implementation.
Much of the technology probably does not yet exist, while much does already exist. What is needed is to combine and expand existing technologies to develop the concept.
Please pass this along to anyone you think might appreciate it, or who is looking for solutions to global warming.
Help is needed, including financial assistance, for research, computer modeling, and to build working models.
Copyright Peter N Fisk
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