Module to save Drupal configuration settings?

I believe that a module that would save all the configuration information for a drupal site without the data, that is just the configuration settings for all of the modules, would be enormously useful. I often want to create a new site that has many of the same modules, and same functionality as a site I have made previously, but I want to do a clean install instead of using a copy of the database from another site. It is very time-consuming and aggravating, to have to attempt to remember how modules were configured on a previous site to achieve a certain functionality, and recreate that configuration. This is something that has cost me untold hours of time.

If there were a module that would list all of the configuration settings for a site in say, a text file, this would be very helpful, but it would be even better if it were capable of automatically applying these settings to a new site.

Is there already some module that does this? If not, I would be willing to undertake such a project, time permitting, but unfortunately, right now, I have a lot more ideas than time, so I don't know when that would be. Maybe someone else might be willing to run with this ball? It doesn't seem like it would be difficult. Does anyone else think this would be useful?