Macro-scale space systems for geoengineering

There are many pressures facing the future of human presence on the Earth. These are the effects of a changing climate and the finite resources of Earth. This thesis sets out several space-based scenarios that can be implemented to reduce these pressures, namely space-based geoengineering to offset the effect of a warming climate and the use of orbiting reflectors to reduce the challenges of human exploration of the Moon. Several dust cloud based geoengineering methods are investigated, with the aim of improving on the previously held view that these methods are extremely costly and far-term. These include an initially static dust cloud located in the vicinity of the L₁ position, a dust cloud created by ejection from the L₁ point, a dust cloud anchored at L₁ by the mass of a large, captured, near-Earth asteroid and an Earth ring. For all of these concepts the orbital dynamics and other contributing factors were considered to determine the mass of dust required to sustain the dust cloud, which is used as the main benchmark of feasibility. As well as this, the engineering feasibility of each concept is considered with a consideration also of the effect each method has on the climate. From this analysis it is concluded that the dust cloud ejected from the vicinity of the L₁ point is the most feasible concept.

Name dc:type.qualificationname

phd

Level dc:type.qualificationlevel

doctoral-pg

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

University of Strathclyde

Year dc:date.issued

2013

Author dc:creator

• Bewick, Russell

DOI

10.48730/3x3b-v814

Identifier

T13761

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:strathclyde:dz010q04x