I tend to agree but, not to the point of entirely excluding a format
of flinging stuff into space, such as blasting nuclear fuel pellets
into orbit could become the lesser of evils, and not 1% the
alternative cost.

Actually, by far the cheapest and safest way into space, as well as
for being the utmost environmentally friendly by creating the least
CO2, is via compact robotic missions like TRACE or perhaps TRACE-II,
and of those going to/from the sorts of places that actually matter to
the greater humanity of Earth.

I've posted on the subject of doing far more robotics, such as
affording 100 of those per the cost of a single manned mission (that's
including anything using the shuttle for launch and/or servicing).

However, if you folks must insist upon doing things the hard and
expensive way, not to mention most risky, via manned missions, then I
do believe there's a reasonable back-door way out of this fiasco or
perhaps toilet. It's a little somewhat spendy, but not nearly as God
offal spendy as any future Earth Space Elevator (ESE) fiasco that's at
best decades down the road of carnage at a truly horrific price tag.
Although, a perfectly good means to many ends has been and is still
obtainable and, it could be as all American as apple pie.

I've gotten myself into this other ongoing means to an end, as for
assisting others like perhaps yourself intent upon getting folks
to/from Venus, or at least Venus L2 (VL2), as well as for the likes of
Mars and just about any planet that's within our travel speed/time
continuum. As for one testy thing, no matters what, you'll always be
in need of some rather serious mass quantities of radiation shielding
and, for that topic I've got just the ticket; the LSE Moon Dirt
Express.

Hard to imagine but, there's been some learning going on, this being
in spite of those wizards of pro-everything Apollo and of absolutely
anti-everything other under the sun.

This is almost getting downright ridiculous, as for doing a lunar
space elevator seems to technically win hands down time after time.
This following page/link is merely about our safely accommodating the
LSE lobby, or elevator sub-lobby, that's if we wanted to take some
limited advantage of what the lunar thermal signature has to offer.
This is where I've learned from others that our moon is far from being
a dead horse, in fact it's somewhat toasty hot in the center, such as
830°C, as well as (wizard Jay will not want to hear this) internally
more radioactive than Earth. Is this good news or what?

LSE Lobby: http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-lse-lobby.htm


Regards, Brad Guth / IEIS~GASA / the discovery of other LIFE on Venus
Besides way too many other topics, here's other ongoing LSE UPDATES:

LSE-CM/ISS Flywheels: http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-se-flywheels.htm
PRO/CON of ESE/LSE: http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-ese-lse.htm
Basalt tether GPa update: http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-lse-gpa.htm
What stinking insurance?
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-ese-invincible.htm
Your basic lunar space elevator:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-cm-ccm-01.htm
This is for the ESE huggers cult:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-edwards-se.htm
Another LSE delivery effort:
http://guthvenus.tripod.com/gv-cm-ccm-elevator.htm