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The earth's surface heat flux is 46$\pm$3 TW (terrawatts, 10$^{12}$ watts). Although many assume we know the earth's abundance and distribution of radioactive heat producing elements (i.e., U, Th, and K), estimates for the mantle's heat…
Could anthropogenic saturation with pumped seawater of the porous ground of active sand dune fields in major deserts (e.g., the westernmost Sahara) cause a beneficial reduction of global sea level? Seawater extraction from the ocean, and…
Laser-accelerated lightsails enable new types of missions that are very different from the Breakthrough Starshot mission to the Centauri system that aims to send 1 gram of payload at 0.2 c. The present work widens the mission design space…
A transition to a fully global renewable energy infrastructure is potentially possible in no more than a few decades, even using current wind/solar technologies. We demonstrate that at its completion this transition would terminate…
By 2030 Austria aims to meet 100% of its electricity demand from domestic renewable sources, with most of the additional generation coming from wind and solar energy. Apart from the benefit of reducing CO2 emissions and, potentially, system…
The habitable zone is the main tool that mission architectures utilize to select potentially habitable planets for follow up spectroscopic observation. Given its importance, the precise size and location of the habitable zone remains a hot…
The atmospheric aerosol loading may significantly influence the performance in solar power production. The impact can be very different both in space (even in short distance) and time (shortterm fluctuations as well as long-term trend).…
Different solutions have been proposed to solve the "faint young Sun problem", defined by the fact that the Earth was not fully frozen during the Archean despite the fainter Sun. Most previous studies were performed with simple 1-D…
Terraforming Mars can be evaluated with a set of system-level constraints linking (i) target pressures & compositions to required atmospheric inventories, (ii) target surface temperatures to the required radiative control, (iii) inventories…
Solar activity is controlled by the magnetic field, which also causes the variability of the solar irradiance that in turn is thought to influence the climate on Earth. The magnetic field manifests itself in the form of structures of…
Solar power harbors immense potential in mitigating climate change by substantially reducing CO$_{2}$ emissions. Nonetheless, the inherent variability of solar irradiance poses a significant challenge for seamlessly integrating solar power…
A gossamer structure for end-of-life disposal of spacecraft to mitigate space debris is considered in comparison with other end-of-life disposal concepts to determine when it would be preferable. A needs analysis, potential use cases, and…
Climate change is a prevalent threat, and it is unlikely that current mitigation efforts will be enough to avoid unwanted impacts. One potential option to reduce climate change impacts is the use of stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI).…
Global warming is one of the problems of human civilization and decarbonization policy is the main solution to this problem. In this work, we propose using the gravity-assist by the asteroids to increase the orbital distance of the Earth…
Climate changes and its many associated impacts are one of the most critical global challenges. Photovoltaics has been instrumental in mitigation of CO$_2$ through the generation of electricity. However, the goal of limiting global warming…
We suggest a new methodology for designing robust energy systems. For this, we investigate so-called near-optimal solutions to energy system optimisation models; solutions whose objective values deviate only marginally from the optimum.…
The design and scale of a future mission to directly image and characterize potentially Earth-like planets will be impacted, to some degree, by the expected yield of such planets. Recent efforts to increase the estimated yields, by creating…
Asteroid mining offers the possibility to revolutionize supply of resources vital for human civilization. Preliminary analysis suggests that Near-Earth Asteroids (NEA) contain enough volatile and high value minerals to make the mining…
This paper studies the economics of carbon-neutral synthetic fuel production from renewable electricity in remote areas where high-quality renewable resources are abundant. To this end, a graph-based optimisation modelling framework…
Space weather poses an important but under-quantified threat to critical infrastructure, the economy, and society. While extreme geomagnetic storms are recognized as potential global catastrophes, their socio-economic impacts remain poorly…