How Much Energy to Accelerate the ISS to LHC Proton Speeds?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion revolves around the energy required to accelerate a macroscopic object, specifically the International Space Station (ISS), to speeds comparable to protons in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). Participants explore the implications of relativistic effects and the challenges associated with such acceleration.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory
  • Technical explanation
  • Conceptual clarification

Main Points Raised

  • One participant expresses curiosity about the difficulty of accelerating a large object like the ISS to relativistic speeds, suggesting it would be a significant challenge.
  • Another participant provides a calculation indicating that to reach LHC speeds, approximately 7400 times the rest energy of an object is needed, translating to about 6 x 1021 J/kg, which is substantially higher than the yearly world energy consumption per kilogram.
  • This participant notes the ISS's mass and emphasizes the impracticality of accelerating macroscopic objects compared to elementary particles, which can be accelerated more easily due to their charge-to-mass ratio.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants do not appear to reach a consensus on the feasibility of accelerating the ISS to such speeds, with differing views on the implications of energy requirements and the nature of macroscopic versus subatomic particle acceleration.

Contextual Notes

The discussion includes assumptions about energy calculations and relativistic effects, but does not resolve the complexities involved in accelerating large objects versus particles.

cjackson
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to accelerate a macroscopic object to the speeds reached by protons at the LHC? want to accelerate an object the size of the ISS to the speed of subatomic particles in a collider. I would like to know how much energy would be required.
 
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cjackson said:
to accelerate a macroscopic object to the speeds reached by protons at the LHC? want to accelerate an object the size of the ISS to the speed of subatomic particles in a collider. I would like to know how much energy would be required.

Why?
 
berkeman said:
Why?
I'm just curious how difficult it would be to accelerate a macroscopic object to speeds were relativistic effects become significant. The ISS is a big object, so I assume making igo as fast as the 'oh my god' particle would be difficult, to say the least.
 
The maximum energy that the LHC can give to a proton is 7TeV, the rest energy of a proton is 0.938 GeV, so you need about 7400 times the rest energy to accelerate something to LHC speed.

This means about 7.4 * (10^3) * c^2 times the mass, so 6*10^21 J/kg. That's about 10 times the yearly world energy consumption for each kg. The ISS weighs more than 4*10^5 kg.

Elementary particles can be accelerated easily in a particle accelerator, because their electric charge is so large compared to their weight. This won't work with macroscopic objects, because they consist of both positive and negative charges, and any charge imbalance has to be tiny, or the charge will just fly off.
 

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