Canadian company granted patent for a space elevator

Unless you’re an astronaut or extremely wealthy, travelling into space is practically impossible.

The tower would be more than 20 times the height of the 830m-tall Burj Khalifa, current tallest building in the world located in Dubai. The idea is that the elevated launch platform will reduce fuel costs, and make traveling to space much more routine than the dramatic launches we have now.

An artist’s impression of the space elevator.

Canadian space company Thoth Technology Inc. announced that it has been granted a United States patent for its ThothX Tower design, a massive freestanding structure with an elevator capable of lifting astronauts and cargo up to 12 miles above the earth.

Thoth claims that their technology offers an exciting new way to access space using completely reusable hardware and saving more than 30 per cent of the fuel of a conventional rocket.

A report on the space elevator by CNET notes, however, that there are several obstacles to overcome before the lift can be built: “The invention here is focused on the construction of the tower itself, but how to construct and maintain a strong, reliable elevator cable 12 miles long is the real challenge in the space elevator universe”, it notes. “From the top of the tower, space planes will launch in a single stage to orbit, returning to the top of the tower for refuelling and reflight”, its inventor Dr Brendan Quine was quoted as saying.

Given that similar – though slightly less ambitious – concepts such as safe, low-priced inflatable houses or even Elon Musk’s Hyperloop have yet to make it beyond the design stage, it is likely we will need to see a few more engineering breakthroughs before the high-reaching ThothX Tower becomes a reality. Topped with a deck or decks, it could launch satellite payloads from the deck or pods attached to the tower.

The big facility, called the ThothX Tower, would be made inflatable and feature segments that are reinforced for support. Thoth has proposed the use of inflatable sections and flywheels to provide what is described in the patent application as “active stabilisation using a harmonic control strategy”. By adjusting pressure and spin, the flywheels can compensate for any bending of the tower and keep it fixed over its footprint. According to the patent, the elevator tower is a “pneumatically pressurised structure formed from flexible sheet material”, with a hollow core that cars could be run up.