Arthur C Clarke gave us the concept of a lift that could take people all the way to space in his book The Fountains of Paradise in 1979.

Yesterdays science fiction starts becoming a reality and the space lift is no longer fiction, its not yet ready but the Japanese have announced that they have been working on the space lift concept and are keen to move into the development phase.

The Japanese scientists are trying to build a lift that will take passengers 62,000 miles or 99,779 km straight into space. The lift carriages will be powered by the same technology that is used to power their bullet trains to enable them to move up and down would move up and down 22,000 mile-long cables.

The cables are a challenge, they need to be light weight and extremely strong, an answer likely to be found in carbon nano tubes.

Professor Yoshio Aoki, a director of Japan's Space Elevator Association, professor of precision machinery engineering, Nihon University, Japan, said "The cables would need to be 180 times stronger than steel. It would also need to four times stronger than the strongest carbon nanotube fibre ever produced. Carbon nanotubes are good conductors of electricity, so we are thinking of having a second cable to provide power all along the route."

Shuichi Ono, chairman of the Japan Space Elevator Association stated that the space ride would be just like travelling abroad and would be available to everyone. With Japans commitment to fund this project swift reactions have come in from other organizations like NASA who claim to have their own space lift projects under way.

An international conference is to be held in Japan in November, aiming to draw up a detailed timetable for the machine's production. The top end of the lift will be connected to a docked space station, scientists hope that the space ladders carriages would also haul solar-powered generators that could power homes and businesses back on Earth.

The space lift can also be used to remove barrels of nuclear waste by dumping them into space, which I do not think is a good idea, but it would be very interesting to take a ride on a lift that goes to space!