Why don't we launch our garbage into space?

[Vohn_exel]

OT: Ok so I can see how shooting into space using rockets would be bad, but couldn't we make a really powerful slingshot or a railgun or something? Also perhaps we could send it somewhere, like to the moon or another planet, so that later on if we do find out how to mine something from the stuff that we can't do anything with, we could send a probe or something to go and retrieve what we need.

What the hell have you been smoking?

I don't smoke. You think we couldn't create a giant rail gun? The only thing missing are the funds. Someone would come up with a way, if they really wanted to, or were getting paid enough.

 

[DoW Lowen]

You haven't heard the speech from the Officer outside C-Sec in Mass Effect 2 have you?

I was just thinking that. One day it's going to hit one of our outer space colonies.

Also wouldn't launching a few billion metric tonnes of garbage be a hassle?

 

[DoW Lowen]

OT: Ok so I can see how shooting into space using rockets would be bad, but couldn't we make a really powerful slingshot or a railgun or something? Also perhaps we could send it somewhere, like to the moon or another planet, so that later on if we do find out how to mine something from the stuff that we can't do anything with, we could send a probe or something to go and retrieve what we need.

What the hell have you been smoking?

I don't smoke. You think we couldn't create a giant rail gun? The only thing missing are the funds. Someone would come up with a way, if they really wanted to, or were getting paid enough.

If we had the technology to make a proper rail gun, we'd use it on each other first.

Remember the military always calls dibs on new technology.

 

[klakkat]

OT: Ok so I can see how shooting into space using rockets would be bad, but couldn't we make a really powerful slingshot or a railgun or something? Also perhaps we could send it somewhere, like to the moon or another planet, so that later on if we do find out how to mine something from the stuff that we can't do anything with, we could send a probe or something to go and retrieve what we need.

What the hell have you been smoking?

I don't smoke. You think we couldn't create a giant rail gun? The only thing missing are the funds. Someone would come up with a way, if they really wanted to, or were getting paid enough.

If we had the technology to make a proper rail gun, we'd use it on each other first.

Remember the military always calls dibs on new technology.

We do have that technology http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2007/01/us_navy_invents/

However, as I stated above, a rail gun is no more efficient for getting things into orbit than a rocket. Turns out, both require a very large amount of energy, and the rail gun usually gets it from burning fossil fuels (from a power plant), which produces about the same amount of pollution as a rocket does. This would be slightly different if nuclear plants were more common in this country (or the rest of the 'civilized' world), but since that won't change until Fusion is practical, no sense considering it.

 

[FaithorFire]

Because it's too expensive...at the moment.
But that is NOT because its impossible, our failure has way more to do with bureaucratic space agencies and a Congress full of dumb-asses than the difficulty in making it happen.

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/dryden/news/X-Press/aerovations/future_concepts.html

Your idea is actually exactly where optimistic & smart people think we should end up, although our way of living now generates far too much waste to launch. Good, hard working, capitalist entrepreneurs are working on solutions now; with guiding assistance from the government stooges (sorry, I couldn't help my political exposition).

Once we're recycling 80%-90% of our crap, the unrecoverable leftovers will be very launch-able.
Including waste from nuclear power plants (which are a major factor American entrepreneurs are considering when investing in these ideas).

EDIT: I wrote on almost this exact topic in an Aerospace Engineering Concepts course, before I left the program for business.

 

[Vohn_exel]

Actually off topic here, it'd be really good if we could find a way to harness nuclear waste for energy...but what would that produce? Nuclear waste waste?

But anyway, I see now why we couldn't just launch it out into space. I didn't actually know that we were actually getting anything from all the non biodegradable stuff. Still, if we could find a cheap way to launch it, I'm sure we could eventually find a way to store it on the moon until we find a way to use or breakdown the stuff we can't recycle. But there seriously has to be something better we can do with stuff then let it all float into the ocean. I'm all for recycling and stuff but just saying "you people are bad for not throwing stuff away properly" isn't gonna help any. Educating people about this stuff shouldn't be the same as incriminating them.

 

[sagacious]

Everyone's wanting a greener earth, right? We're all concerned about landfills and I was recently reading about the great plastic ocean. I've always wondered why we don't just take our garbage and blast it into space?

I know that some of it is biodegradable, but alot of it isn't. So why don't we just take the stuff that isn't and launch it somewhere far away. Pioneer has been travelling since like the sixties, right? And it only "recently" left our solar system. So, chunking a huge bunch of garbage out there wouldn't be bad for the space environment. As for the cost, it could create jobs as well as probably be done with joint ventures of sending up satelites or something.

(ITT: Bad spelling)

what goes up, must come down.

plus that would be expensive, and landfills aren't the ecological disasters most would have you believe.

 

[Snarky Username]

It would start orbiting the Earth until we have rings of trash circling the Earth.

 

[PinkAngelKitty]

Because of the ridiculously amount of energy required for a small, ineffective amount of garbage to be launched into space is astronomical.

 

[Vohn_exel]

Guys...I meant farther out into space then galactic stone throwing distance. Hence why I mentioned Pioneer.

But anyway, as in my post above, I see now why it'd be a bad idea. Because, obviously, the trash would eventually get sucked into a black hole and then come return like a couple hundred years later, sentient, and possibly responsible for an alien race that wasn't thought up yet. And we all know that the guy from Rescue 911 is too old to save us all now.

um.../nerd reference.

 

[SomeUnregPunk]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_arc_waste_disposal

They got a better idea... burn it and make fuel and stuff.

Sending it to space doesn't give you anything back while this method helps us out. Especially with that plastic junk.

 

[slopeslider]

The cost of lifting something into orbit with current chemical rockets is ~$10,000 a pound. That means it costs $1.5 million bucks just to launch a 150 pound human into orbit. It takes pennies per pound to put it in a hole on the surface.

If you have a bag of trash that weighs 20 pounds, it costs $200,000 to lift it to orbit. That's JUST to orbit, not breaking earth's orbit for the sun or whatever. So if you want to drop 200 grand to take out your 20 pound bag of old pizza and paper, which will biodegrade within a few decades, go nuts. It's POSSIBLE that really really bad garbage like radioactives could justify the price, but then there's the risk that rocket launches aren't 100%. No one wants 200 pounds of intensely radioctive waste coming down in their country, or worse, exploding in midair and generally irradiating everyone.

EVEN IF we had a space elevator that could pinprick the gravity well a little, it would still costs probably hundreds of dollars a pound to lift.

So that's why. Physics and money.

The cost has a base starting point. It doesn't cost an extra $10000 to get 101lb. vs 100lb, it costs millions just getting ANYTHING into space. Sticking an extra pound on board won't increase the space shuttle mission cost by $10000.
It's like an 18 wheeler. You can pay $1000 for it to carry 1 ping pong ball and say it costs 1000 per .5 ounce, or make it carry 10000 ping pong balls for the same price. Then its $.10 per .5 ounce. If I wanted NASA to send up an orange by itself they'd laugh me out the building. If I wanted to send 10,000 we might be on to something, then they'd be getting $100000000. It costs more than $10000 to send an orange up by itself. Because if the shuttle is unloaded it doesn't get to space for $0, right?
Also, just like any niche market, once it opens up it will get cheaper. Cars were expensive until Ford made the production line, Computers were expensive until they became widespread, now they're in your birthday cards. Space travel will go down in costs once the market demand goes up.

OT: it's better for everyone to recycle like japan than chucking everything into the solar system.

 

[bwright]

This is freakin' hilarious! I read this book that a friend gave me and it talked about this very thing. It was pretty funny, kinda like a Futurama spoof. I have to see if I can find it...but I think its called Planet Sitiety.

 

[MonstersInMyCloset]

i actually think throwing things into the sun is a good idea

now youve got me thinking

 

[Quaxar]

Maybe we could build rockets out of garbage and use garbage as fuel, that'd solve all our problems!

 

[Xeros]

I always wondered why we don't launch all of the garbage into the sun. Or everything for that matter. Garbage, nuclear waste, scrap, prisoners, etc. could all be easily gotten rid of and we'd never have to worry about it coming back.

 

[8-Bit Grin]

It *is* stupid.
We should have learned from our mistakes in Wall-E dammit!

 

[bwright]

That book I was telling you about was actually Planet Satiety (not sitity)..never was a good speller. I guess its written from one of the guys from Wendy's Where's the Beef? guys...and had an ABC movie too.

It's a good book...funny characters. This is what happens if you fling all our waste into space...Rings of Glutton.

 

[Soxafloppin]

We would likely upset the aliens that live there. Thats all realy.