On Apr 8, 8:36 am, Michael Ash <m...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> Charles Talleyrand <kitplan...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
> I mentioned a roof because it should scale horizontally to a basically
> infinite degree, and as a roof it doesn't have to be particularly tall.
> You'll need sup****ts at frequent intervals, of course, but that's
entirely
> doable. You may be able to piggyback on buildings and utility poles to
> some extent if you want to make it cheaper, but with enough money,
roofing
> a city with glass ought to be entirely feasible with current technology.
There are some practical issues that come to mind. If the city wants
to raise the temperature, presumably this is because it is cold. Cold
often is associated with snow in the winter. Heavy snow loads can
cave in roofs. The usual method of getting around this - sloping the
roof - is impractical on the scale of a city. You will need to make
the roof strong enough to withstand the extra load of overlying snow,
which will require more than your usual greenhouse roof.
There is also issues of how you deal with rainfall - the city will
intercept a fair amount of water, where does it all go? Of course,
this can also be a benefit, as the runoff drains for rainwater could
go into the municipal water supply assuming the roof were kept fairly
clean.
Which also leads to dealing with detritus and debris, such as wind
blown leaves, dust, bird droppings, and the like. You will need
someone to go up there periodically and clean out the gutters or
equivalent.
Luke
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