Going up? Canada’s Toth wins patent for Space Elevator. Image: wikimedia.

Canada may win the space race, or at least leap ahead, as a professor at York University in Ontario wins U.S. and U.K. patent and building rights for the space elevator. Dr. Brendan Quine, chief technology officer, and Rhodes scholar Dr. Caroline Roberts, CEO for Thoth Technologies, will bring to fulfillment an idea first suggested in 1895 by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky who was inspired by the Eiffel Tower. When space exploration began with Sputnik and the Apollo lunar landing, rockets proved an effective means for reaching orbit. But booster rockets are environmentally expensive, and financially wasteful when used as disposable launch vehicles (propellents account for only 0.4% of a rocket’s cost). The space elevator is reusable, and could be matched with reusable technologies in development by SpaceX. Passengers may be invited for the trip. Going up?

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