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Pastimes : Let's Talk About Our Feelings!!! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Grainne who wrote (21476)	5/11/1998 2:26:00 AM
From: Krowbar	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 108807

Hi Christine, There are several schemes on the drawing boards to take advantage of the growing use of wireless communications. Motorola and others would like to encircle the Earth with satellites in low Earth orbit (about 200 miles up). This would cost about 5 billion and need about 200 satellites in polar orbit to cover the whole globe. They would be constantly moving, and would have to hand off the signal to the next satellite as they recede from line of sight view. Fixed satellites like, Direct tv, must be in orbit 22,000 miles up to match the Earth's rotation. This means that there is a noticeable time delay in the signal when talking to someone. This is no problem with TV signals, but it isn't good for communications. Also, more power is needed because of the distance. Most cell phone communications now use land based towers every few miles, meaning thousands of towers,and still have many dead spots. With the Sky Station proposal, there would be Airships stationed 13 miles over every major city, with excellent coverage. The electronics already exist, and are similar to other communication electronics, but at a different frequency. The hard part would be to keep those unmanned airships in place. They claim to have this solved with ion engines. They would be powered by lots of solar cells for both the engines and the electronics. If this idea works, the ships could be deployed for a lot less money than satellites, and they could be brought down to fix, if necessary. It is estimated that the cost for U.S. major city coverage would be $800 million, and annual revenues would be $5 billion. Sky station is not yet public, but there is a joint venture between Energy Conversion Devices and Sky Station to produce thin-film solar cells for these airships and/or satellites called Sky Solar. ECD is public (ener). Another interesting speculation is itkg, which claims to have the rights to a revolutionary antenna for military and government agencies and iasca for public use. There are threads for all of these companies at SI. Del