Preprint: Towards a gigantic Magnus balloon with motorized belts

I would expect to see a Life-cycle assessment - Wikipedia of the idea. Now it looks like you will be using enormous amounts of plastics that need to made from fossil fuels and replaced quite frequently for very modest electricity generation. You’ll also occupy a large land area, compared to the alternative, and lower the albedo of a large surface, if you’re going to go for solar heating of the balloon, which would contribute to global warming and have an impact on the local environment.

I do also wonder about the hoop stress of such a large cylinder pressurized to withstand the wind, and the weight of the material needed to be able to handle that. The pressure needed to be able to handle wind loading was discussed previously on this forum if I recall correctly.

The concept also would of course be competing with the HAWTs of decades into the future, which should be able to produce as much or more with just a few units.