Kevin was disappointed when he found some old work that looked a lot like what he was planning, but the old proposal was never funded to completion. He looked further and realized that many of the old project proposals were probably not practical. At the time the projects were proposed, solar panels were like solid windowpanes, relatively heavy and not very efficient, so right from the start power to “burn” the fuel was a problem.
Even if there was a good source of electricity, the plasma motors didn’t produce much thrust for the amount of fuel and electricity they used.
The prototypes used magnets to accelerate the fuel. The magnets generated a lot of heat in operation because the magnetic field had to be strong enough to accelerate the fuel ions, while channeling them in a way that maximized the direction of thrust and kept all those super hot ions away from the magnets themselves. So much heat was generated that plasma engines couldn’t be operated for very long before they destroyed themselves. That meant acceleration was rather poor (a lot of downtime to let the motor cool), there was a lot of wear and tear (starting and stopping the engine all the time with a lot of heating and cooling) and lots of weight for a cooling system to trap and radiate the waste heat. The pounds added up, making for poor performance. Just like for aircraft, spaceship pounds cost performance and money.
The result was that existing plasma motors were small and relatively weak.
There were new electromagnets on the market now, though, that were lighter in weight, powerful enough to be useful, and better able to survive internal heating. Kevin ran the new numbers through his head three times, checking his basic formulas, dimensional conversions, and physical constants. After all that, he realized that while there were still some issues, the problem of powering a spaceship was much easier given the new solar sheets and better magnets.
The stuff needed to build an efficient solar powered ship hadn’t really been available until recently- as in just getting press through the journals that Kevin had read. Solar cells had been getting cheaper and more efficient, but had only recently become ultra lightweight, very efficient in a wide band of wavelengths, and flexible enough to fabricate without a lot of structural support. It was only recently that materials that generated power from light could be made into flexible sheets. Maybe that was why the old plans had been pretty small scale in the first place- even if the motor had been decent, the planned prototype didn’t have a lightweight source of electricity that converted sunlight efficiently, reducing waste heat and increasing power. If so, Kevin had to move if he thought this would work. Soon enough, others would have the same flash of insight about the state of the necessary technologies and the race would be on.
So it seemed that there might well be a cheap and efficient source of electricity for the spaceship. That still left conversion efficiency and heat dissipation in the engine itself. The heat problem was tougher, but he had some ideas that might give him a starting point of forty or fifty percent engine efficiency. The new magnets were better and he thought there might be some ways to cool them more effectively than in the early plasma prototypes. He thought about the energy being left behind, tearing up magnets and overheating the motors. There was a lot there, and there just might be ways to get the system efficiency up to sixty percent. The more of that energy that he could put to work propelling the ship, the less equipment would be needed to keep the engines cool. It would take work but he thought it could be done.
There might be one other stumbling block- politics. Maybe the issue of ownership at the destination was a far stickier problem than he thought. Maybe the space-capable nations were afraid of the political consequences of interplanetary space travel. After all, something had held up the progress toward habitats in space. And political entities were enormously inertial- big blocks of paperwork not moving.
Well, first comes science and engineering; then comes politics. The other way round and nothing would ever get done.
But to do the engineering and put together a working model, money was necessary. That was the real starting point- finding someone or some group to foot the startup costs. That might be the toughest thing to get done. Even if everything went well, building the ship would cost a lot of money.
He thought about trying to build something that could go interplanetary, but Kevin rapidly figured out that the human problems were too great and overall costs were just too high. On the other hand, while the Moon had its own problems it was close, already reachable by manned craft. It was just that no one was going there. The problems of the Moon for humanity were at least reasonably well understood. If there was ever going to be a long-term habitat in space, the first one would likely be on the Moon.
He was still wondering why all the talk was about Mars. It was terrifically far away, so if you got into trouble you would be toast. It had almost no atmosphere; so little it was a minor advantage at best. Same with its gravity- while higher than the Moon, it was still quite a bit lower than Earth’s. And if it weren’t for a really tiny atmosphere to provide minimal protection from the solar wind, Mars would have one of the big problems of the Moon- lack of a magnetic field to protect it from the ion bombardment that was the solar wind.
Mars was too far away to be a jumping off point without a monumental investment, while the Moon was close enough to be a big space station that had needed resources right at hand. Maybe Mars looked good on paper, but the details looked pretty rough.
Looking at problems for habitation of the Moon would have to be a part of his long- term plan. He didn’t really know what was holding things up, but actual travel couldn’t be the only thing. His ship would do it faster and easier, but it was going to be important to have a genuine, possibly profitable reason to go there. Kevin was sure he could spend a little time on the problem, and maybe a little time was all that was needed. After all, how hard could it be?
He thought he could do just enough on his dissertation to keep from pissing off his advisor while he started to look for backers. That way he would have a backup plan in case money couldn’t be found or there was an unsolvable technical problem of some sort. It was going to be a delicate process; the wrong few words in the wrong places and someone else might just figure out what he was up to. With what he already knew, Kevin was pretty sure someone else could come up with cheap, fast transport to the Moon too. Once they caught on to the possibilities.
Whether or not he was in competition with others, if he couldn’t find money he’d actually have to finish his dissertation. It was worth some time and extra effort to find an alternative to a purely academic fate.
The Man with the Money
Danny Smith was a man without a purpose when he saw the proposal. After years of excitement in collegiate and pro basketball, a wild, risky ride in commodities futures and leveraged buyouts of a number of startup technology companies, the sheer amount of money he had piled up was making life a complete bore. So boring, in fact, that he was spending a significant amount of time on his foundation. That was a singularly uninteresting activity. It was the kind of thing old guys did before they died.
For the first time in a long time he was leafing through a bunch of funding requests that had been sent to his foundation. He’d done it a bit when he first established the foundation; at the time he thought there might be something worthwhile in it. That turned out to be untrue.
He hadn’t done it again until now. That was a true hallmark of his boredom.
Danny had more money than could be spent by a small nation in any reasonable period of time and no idea what to do with it. It had been difficult, exciting, and ultimately a fair amount of fun to get to where he was, but now he was at a dead end. All this cash and nowhere he wanted to go. He could get altruistic and just start dropping cash on struggling little goody-goody foundations everywhere, but that was a little too much like piling up bunches of paper money and putting matches to them all. He hadn’t put all that physical and mental sweat into getting where he was just to give it away.
; At first Kevin’s proposal looked like a complete loser. It was dry, didn’t seem to do much, and was difficult to read. He wasn’t sure why the chair of the review committee had sent it to him, but Chaz was a good friend. He also had an unnerving instinct for moneymakers, finding gems in the midst of useless rock. Not that he needed more money, but he didn’t like the idea that Chaz sent him something he couldn’t find the gems in. Danny went back and looked at the proposal again.
Then he got suspicious. The goal of the proposal was a little too innocuous. Chaz might have spotted something in it that would be interesting.
“A Proposal to Investigate Technologies for Fine-Grained Motion and Orbital Control of Satellites”- talk about a way to put a review committee to sleep. The topic was rather silly, too. The technology in use worked perfectly fine. Not sexy, but workable.
He decided to follow his nose and kept reading. He took a close look at what the guy was proposing. He started to read between the lines. He’d have to get one of his geeks to go over the math but his was good enough to think it might be right. On the other hand, the words were a little too vague and the bit of math was certainly not all that was necessary. If this proposal was what he thought it might be, it would open doors. Yes, indeed. Big doors. And with a wrinkle or two, it could cause a lot of trouble in the global political system. Now that might be fun. Why, it might even do some good for the world.
Danny thought the proposal was worth a serious look by some good tech eyes. It might be just the kind of fun that would make his day.
The Call
Kevin was not working on his dissertation when the call came. Instead he was working through some of the more recent papers on plasma engines. So far he hadn’t made a lot of progress on the heat problem in them.
The waste heat from the sails turned out to be pretty easy. The efficiency of the newest solar cell materials was quite good, and there were a couple of decent technologies for conversion of the waste heat to electricity. Materials advances had come to the rescue again; there were now materials that absorbed heat and turned it into electricity at a reasonable rate. Not perfect, but a reasonable solution to getting more work out of the sunlight.
He still had to fix the engine problem, though. Otherwise the engines wouldn’t last long enough to get to any place interesting. The electric-powered engines in use were very low power, to avoid the heat problem. That wouldn’t get him where he wanted to go. He needed a good start on a viable solution. He was gambling but it was still better than going back to his dissertation.
He didn’t recognize the phone number but the caller was at the Smith Foundation. He was pretty sure they were one of the foundations he had sent a proposal. He crossed his fingers and answered the call.
“Is this Mr. Kevin Lee? Hello, Mr. Lee. My name is Charity Thompson. I’m Dr. Chaz Delsun’s executive assistant. Dr. Delsun is Executive Director of the Smith Foundation and chair of the proposal review committee. He would like to arrange an appointment to discuss your proposal. The address in the proposal, is that your current address? It’s actually quite close to us. He suggests that you plan on an hour. I will send you directions. When would be convenient?”
For a minute he had a hard time understanding what the angelic voice on the other end of the line was telling him. Voices like that seldom (maybe never?) called him. Then the fog cleared enough for him to fumble through the calendar on his phone and find a date to accept the appointment.
Kevin hung up. He smiled, and the smile got bigger. Maybe he wouldn’t have to finish his dissertation after all.
The Smith Foundation
Kevin opened the door to the office. The front desk was occupied by a young man whose attire made Kevin feel like what he was- a scruffy engineer without much taste in clothing. The engineer had on a sport coat and tie with a pair of only slightly used jeans. It was a fashion statement for him. He couldn’t help that they were just a little out of fashion.
He pulled himself together and walked up to the desk.
“Hi. I’m Kevin Lee. I have an appointment with Dr. Delsun?” It came out like a question. Not that it really was.
“Yes, sir. Dr. Delsun is expecting you.” He picked up a phone and Kevin heard a buzz to the right of him.
After a moment, a tall, utterly beautiful blond walked out of an office to the side of the receptionist’s desk. She smiled and offered her hand. The smile stopped Kevin cold. It took a second for him to remember that he was probably supposed to shake the offered hand.
“Hello, Kevin. I’m Charity. We spoke on the phone.”
Kevin touched the hand as if it was radioactive. Exposure to beautiful women was still not part of an engineering curriculum. “Uh, yes, I remember.”
“Dr. Delsun has just one more thing on his desk. He should be available any moment now. He has a clock in his head that keeps him totally on time.” The smile turned rueful. “Rather unsettling at times.”
“Um, should I wait out here?”
Charity looked toward a set of double doors that were just opening.
“It looks like that won’t be necessary.”
She turned toward the doors as a man came out. He was tall, slender, and rather slow moving. “Dr. Delsun, this is Kevin Lee.”
Kevin had seen a few Gary Cooper movies from the old days; Delsun looked a bit like him. A casual smile and a casual manner. He didn’t quite expect the man’s first words.
“Ah, good. A man after my own heart. Right on time.” He offered his hand; this time Kevin knew what to do right away.
He felt as if he was in the land of the giants. He was pretty sure he was about five feet nine. The beautiful blond towered over him at about six feet one in high heels. Even if she had her shoes off she was probably still five feet eleven.
Dr. Delsun was even taller. Kevin thought he had to be about six feet six. At nearly nine inches taller, he had to look up to greet the man.
Then he remembered. Delsun and Danny Smith had played together years ago, on Danny’s first pro team. That was even more intimidating on the height scale. He’d really feel small if he met Smith. The guy was supposed to be six feet nine, a full three inches taller than his foundation director. That was on top of his player reputation, having won rookie of the year and then a few professional titles thereafter.
Delsun walked back to the open door. “Come on in.”
Kevin remembered his manners just before he followed the older man in. He turned quickly and gave Charity and her assistant a tentative smile. “Thanks for your help.”
He was a little surprised at Dr. Delsun’s office. It had a hint of stuffiness to it, but only a hint. The desk was big, but the desk angled back at one end and there were machine screens on the angled wing. There were some folders on the desk in front of the screens. The desk looked rather workmanlike, not what Kevin had expected. Not very corporate executive at all.
“Please be seated, Mr. Lee. I’ll be with you in a moment.” Delsun looked at one of the screens for a while and then apparently shut down whatever he was doing. He turned toward Kevin and smiled. “There. All set. How was the trip here?”
Kevin smiled tentatively. “Not bad. Traffic was a little heavy.”
Delsun smiled back. “Isn’t it always? One of the disadvantages of a downtown office. Would you like a cup of coffee?”
Kevin shook his head. He was too nervous for coffee. “No, sir. I’m okay.”
“Okay then. To business.” He opened a hard copy folder on his desk. He smiled apologetically. “Can’t get rid of a bad habit. Still like to read important things on hard copy.”
He scanned something in the folder and then looked up. “You sent in an interesting proposal, Mr. Lee. We had a little trouble getting a grip on it at first. For a while I didn’t think there was anything there and the committee was prepared to turn it down.” A somewhat sly smile crossed his face. “After all, the job has been done in Earth orbit for years. Perhaps just not as well.”
For a half second Kevin w
as disappointed, but then realized that ‘for a while there’ definitely had potential. “Uh, I’d be more than happy to answer any questions you might have, sir.”
“Call me Chaz, Kevin. I think we’ve got the gist of your proposal, but I do have some questions. First, it looks like you were underselling your objective. Am I right?”
“Uh, yes sir. I just thought- I wasn’t sure dumping the whole thing on someone’s desk would be a good thing. I thought something a little more practical sounding might sell better.”
Delsun smiled and turned a page in the folder. He appeared to be scanning a copy of the proposal. “Yes. Well, Kevin, you were fortunate that you didn’t hide your intent entirely. You gave me and a couple of the committee members just enough to figure out where you wanted to go and how we could verify your concept. It also happens that your objective may fit nicely with something that we would like to do.”
He looked up. “We do think it will work. How long do you think it will take to get a low acceleration prototype to the Moon?”
Kevin looked a little shocked and then remembered to speak. “Um, I think about three years. There’s quite a bit to do. Just getting a team together will take three to six months.”
“All right,” said Chaz. “This is what I have to offer. First, your annual funding is inadequate. We’ve done some preliminary work and we think your estimates on development costs are low. Quite low, actually. We’re doubling your budget. We also expect that costs will increase as you progress.
“As part of the deal you will be doing things differently from the usual grant review. To start, I expect a detailed report on progress regularly. A brief every month, and full report every quarter. And none of this ‘we’re here and working’ nonsense.
“I suggest you plan on spending about a third of the next three months doing prototype planning. Mostly, though, you should spend your time figuring out what you’re going to need and where you’re going to get what you need.
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