Not as big as you might think. To within an order of magnitude, only the part of the cable which has an apparent angular thickness greater than the angular diameter of the sun will cast a shadow. If the cable is 10m in diameter, its shadow will never be more than about 1km long.
I would imagine that the shadow of the thing would not present that much of an issue. Consider the shadow of the international space station, has that made a nuisance of itself?
Kim Stanley Robinson has written a trilogy of sf novels that among other topics, discuss the use of an ‘elevator’ in the colonization of Mars. The first of this series is named Red Mars. Worth a read.
Again, again and again people just don’t Get It.
Every calculation of a ground connected space elevator comes out with an exponential taper from the ground end.
Exponential over 10s of thousands of miles means a mountain size base, even with “magic fibers”.
Again, I ask: Where is this mountain 1 hour before hookup???
It can’t be hanging from the cable as its weight would be too great plus adding even more instability. It can’t be on the ground as the top would flap over.
So where is it and how does it stay in place?
We are not talking about strings here. Here are talking about massive objects.
And then there’s rotational torque, gravitational pertubations, lack of damping, the atmosphere, and on and on.
Oh, well why didn’t you say so earlier? That’s wrong.
This nasa.com site says the taper would be exponential, but in the opposite direction you’re saying. That is, the part in orbit would be big and the base would be where it’s smallest.
But more importantly, exponential growth does not necessarily mean a mountain-sized end; it depends on the scale length. They say on that site that the cable would have to be 22 times thicker at the top than the bottom for diamond, and something comparable for nanotubes.
Why is it so hard to understand that the space elevator is a self-suporting structure even during construction? It’s not a tower. It’s a very, very big satellite.
The details of which you’ve conveniently left blank, so we cannot discuss or refute your concerns.
By the way I’m not claiming that the space elevator is definitely possible. All I’m claiming is that there is currently no conclusive evidence that it’s impossible. Which is all you can say for any future technology.