What is keeping us from anchoring a cable to Earth’s surface and tethering a platform in space?

Question

What is keeping us from anchoring a cable to Earth’s surface and tethering a platform in space?

In: 10077

Answer 1

So, building a space elevator? We don’t have any material that 1) has the necessary strength to support its own weight over such a distance and 2) can be manufactured in industrial quantity. There are materials like graphene and carbon nanotubes that *on paper* have the necessary tensile strength, but they exist in small quantities in laboratories, not as cables long enough to reach 40,000 km up to geostationary orbit.