Attaching conductive cable to orbital object

A heavy, lengthy--say 20-30 km long--conductive cable attacjed to an Earth
orbiting object (the Shuttle), tests have shown a considerable electric
charge being generated as the cable speeds through Earth's electromagnetic
field, question is: Would the cable's mass and extension (length) decay or
other wise modify the object's orbit over time? (also consider an asteroid
or comet with a cable attached as a hypthetical scenario.)

R. Henry Nigl
www.exoptica.com

Google for terminator tether.

Regards

Carsten Nielsen
Denmark

rhnl wrote:
field, question is: Would the cable's mass and extension (length) decay or
other wise modify the object's orbit over time? (also consider an asteroid
or comet with a cable attached as a hypthetical scenario.)

Well yes, of course.

So what you do is put current INTO the wire, generating thrust and
boosting it back up.

Maury