dlkf writes: "There is an article on Space.com that talks about some of the benefits, costs and current research relevant to using satellites to generate and store power. This surplus of power could then be beamed via laser or microwave to earth or other satellites."
Why bother when there are better alternatives!
by
GodLessOne
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
For a tenth of the cost we can cover several square miles of the nevada desert with solar arrays. This will produce ten times the power without the problems of beaming the power back to the ground.
This will also avoid the problems of the orbiting solar arrays regularly being hit of the collection of space junk that we have deposited in orbit over the years.
Now if these were feeding power to city sized orbiting habitats then it might be a much more interesting idea.
Just imagine a bemoth fluster of these!:)
-- Is it time to go home yet?
Re:Why bother when there are better alternatives!
by
ch-chuck
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Only thing that bothers me about taking energy from sunlight is that the existing energy is a part of the natural environment. Recall that energy is neither created or destroyed, just transformed from one kind & place to another (usually with losses and inefficiencies) - so if you take 1GW of power from the desert and sent it to high concentrations of metropolitan areas, that will contribut to 'desert cooling' and more urban 'heat island'.
If there's one thing we learn from the history of technology, no matter WHAT you do, the luddites with dreams of happy, pastoral family farm livin' will be agin' it. I have magazines from the 20's where some blatering idiot is blaming the then rainy season on all dem newfangled, high powered radio transmitters, sending kilowatts of power out into the aether.
As the AC above points out, this sounds more like a weapon than a way to generate power. Plus I think that the beam will be VERY inefficient, and I think you need a fairly large area on which to "collect" the power since I hardly think this will be extremely accurate.
In areas where no power exists, village "life support systems" can be established to provide potable water, lights, modern communications, refrigeration, information, and perhaps a few sewing machines, he said.
What's the point? isn't it cheaper to just build solar cells there? You'll have to put wires in the ground anyway from the reception point to the village...(I guess they are not going to put the entire village in the microwave)
I don't see much use in this, I think a lot of practical problems have to be solved first... and I don't see this being used to "power a few sewing machines" very soon, this sounds as some expensive technologie....
-- Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity
Space Junk a problem?
by
tsetem
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I remember watching Discovery channel where they discussed the space junk floating out there. I would think that would be a major hinderance to having a reliable power supply. With all the junk out there, and a (presumably) rather large satellite, it's just asking for problems unless there is a lot of armor to protect it with.
I think even the ISS is a target, but they have some major shielding to protect the areas that are most likely to get hit.
That brings up another question, how does the armor effectively deal with the space junk, without creating more junk out there after absorbing the impact?
Why not use the acres of urban tarpaper?
by
SgtChaireBourne
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
There must be millions of square kilometers of flat rooves in the world's cities. Since most are neither generally accessable nor designed for regular activties, they'd make
an idea place for solar arrays. You could even use DC instead of AC due to the proximity, but that would be a bother. In hot areas, the shade would help lower the temperature of the upper floors.
-- Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Re:Why not use the acres of urban tarpaper?
by
Mr.+Slippery
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Think about all the pollution in the cities, the dust would cover the arrays, and we would have to hire a lot of people to clean the arrays.
So when the window washers come by, they also do the solar array on the roof. Cleaning gunk off glass surfaces in urban areas is a solved problem.
Why on earth do we not concentrate on energy saving instead of producing more and more energy?
We definitely need both.
-- Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog You cannot wash away blood with blood
Ok for Japan, not feasible for us
by
N3P1u5U17r4
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
It should be noted that the initial proposal by Japan to meet its Kyoto emission targets was to install an additional 20 nuclear plants. This caused a major outcry and stimulated increased attention to Space-Based Solar Power. Importantly, the prices for electricity are sufficiently high in Japan that a workable Space-Based Solar Power system might be developed with launch costs much higher (1000 $/kg) than would be feasible for North America.
--
You're Just Jealous Because The Voices Are Talking To Me.
Re:Problems with solar power
by
The+Panther!
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
The maintenance factor is a problem as well, since most solar power systems require batteries for storage.
This is a little off the beaten path, but I was told by a friend who worked in Dallas of a company who was trying to reduce their energy costs. That company installed a very large tank of water on the top of their building, several stories high from the description, and used energy off the grid at night (non-primetime energy costs per KWH) to heat the water, then would reclaim it during the day back into electricity.
I don't know how efficient their reclamation scheme was, but I'm sure it didn't hurt to have the sun out 300 days a year to warm the tank while extracting energy from it. Seems that solar might benefit from a similar approach, using a natural battery of sorts. Obviously, this is only reasonable for large installations, but terrestrial solar doesn't seem to be feasible on an individual basis anyway.
-- Any connection between your reality and mine is purely coincidental.
If you only knew....
by
Orne
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
"But but but... its cheaper to build solar panels on the ground!"
1. There is no nighttime in space. There are no clouds in space, no atmosphere to dilute the sun's energy, no birds to fly by and crap on the panels. That means 24h efficiency.
2. Yes, you COULD build a 10-square-mile solar panel farm in New Mexico, but you wouldn't even be able to get the current out of state before line-losses, frequency problems, and other transmission problems ate all of your energy.
Its like you could build several dozen nuclear plants in Nevada, enough to power the ENTIRE North America on nuclear alone, but you couldn't build a power grid transmission system strong enough to move the power to where it is consumed.
Better solution
by
Julian+Morrison
·
· Score: 1, Interesting
Use the Russian "space mirror" idea to put 24/7 illumination on some patch of otherwise useless desert somewhere. Sit solar arrays there. Zero orbiting moving parts equals low maintenance costs and no risk that some sneaky sod will use it as a weapon.
Seems like that much energy passing through the atmosphere would generate a fair amount of ozone from oxygen molecules absorbing some of the energy. I guess this might be fine at high altitudes where ozone is pretty depleted, but at low altitudes it's just another pollutant.
I might be completely out in left field. Anyone out there know whether this would be an issue?
--
Bandannarama
Foretold by Isaac Asimov...
by
matusa
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
A great hope of science fiction writers is for one of their hypothetical futures, or some aspect of them, to come true.
Asimov used rings of satellites transmitting power vie Microwave to the earth in many of his stories.
He'd be happy to see this.
Before SimCity 2000. . .
by
emrys79
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
A lot of folks have noticed that this idea was in SimCity 2000. But decades before Maxis published SimCity, Robert Heinlein had used the idea in one of his future history short stories. Of course, he also had a gigantic nuclear power plant 1/4 the size of Arizona (or something like that) that he moved into space as well, right before it blew up. . .
Lunar Materials for Construction
by
Baldrson
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Satellite Solar Power has been studied since the 1970s. The NRC among others rejected it then primarily due to the launch costs, which have not declined appreciably during the intervening years.
This study by government or government-selected authorities ignored the radical option of lunar construction materials that, if properly used, could comprise almost all the mass of the satellites for a fraction of the transportation costs due to low lunar gravitation and absence of atmosphere on the lunar surface to interfere with techniques for lofting materials that would be impractical through atmospheric drag.
Space Studies Institute was the early leader in these studies of SSP-from-nonterrestrial-materials, and its founder, the late Gerard K. O'Neill had this to say about the option:
Space Studies Institute
The World's Energy Future Belongs in Orbit
by Dr. Gerard K. O'Neill
Trilogy January/February 1992
...
To make solar power satellites (SPS) practical and economical, we do not need any new science; we only need to apply what we are already doing in the more advanced industries: robotic production, computer control, and the replication by robotic machines of some of their heavier, simpler components. We do need one more thing: materials. It is neither practical, nor economical, nor environmentally acceptable to lift from the Earth by rockets the thousands of tons of materials needed to build an SPS that would supply Earth electricity equal to the output of ten nuclear power plants.
Let the Moon Pitch In
Fortunately, we do not have to. We were given something unique in our solar system: an enormous moon, orbiting tantalizingly nearby, and containing on its surface just the materials we need. Lunar soils contain 20 percent silicon for solar cells, and about 20 percent metals. Much of the rest, surprisingly enough, is oxygen. The moon has two other great advantages as a source of materials: its gravitational pull is only one-sixth of the Earth's, and because of its small diameter, the moon's gravitational grip is less than a twentieth of the Earth's.
The moon's second advantage is it has no atmosphere. The combination of the moon's weak gravitational grip and its vacuum environment makes it practical to locate electric mass accelerators on its surface which would be capable of lofting a steady stream of small payloads to a precise collection point high in space.
Such machines, called "mass-drivers," were tested nearly a decade ago under the sponsorship of our small, quiet, nonprofit foundation, the Space Studies Institute (SSI). Mass-drivers were shown to obey their computer design programs within one percent - no new science there - just straightforward engineering. Since then SSI has sponsored laboratory research on making useful products from ores similar to lunar soils.
Can SPS Technology Deliver?
As people concerned about our environment and about the world we leave to our children we should question proposed solutions to major physical problems. As fossil fuels, nuclear energy, ground-based solar, and other conventional sources of energy all fail to make sense in the world.
First of all, there is plenty of energy in space. Even in a narrow band 25,000 miles above the equator, where a satellite can maintain a fixed orbit, plenty of solar energy streams by constantly to supply far more than enough energy for the Earth of 2050.
What of the conversion on Earth? It was demonstrated years ago. The antennas convert the radio waves with an efficiency so high that less than 100 watts of waste heat goes into the environment for every 1,000 watts that goes into power lines. For coal or nuclear the numbers are: 1,500 watts waste, 2,500 watts total; for ground-based solar they are several thousand watts waste plus another thousand to make up the total - different from an Earth without solar cells - because solar cells absorb more heat than the ground they cover.
Transmission is the question that deserves continuing research: How to send the low-density radio waves from an SPS to antennas on the Earth. I have satisfied myself that transmission does not involve significant risks. But I invite you to do your own research. One of the best sources on the subject is The Microwave Debate by N.H. Steneck (MIT Press).
The points that seem to me most important about radio transmission of energy are that people would not be in the beams; that for fundamental physical reasons the beams could not be intentionally or accidentally redirected; that their intensity would be comparable to sunlight; that unlike the massive shielding around a nuclear reactor, the only shielding necessary would be a layer of household aluminum foil; and that, unlike the present irreversible dumping of 5,000 megatons per year of fossil-fuel carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, or the generation of long-lived nuclear wastes, the SPS system would leave no chemicals or radioactives behind if our descendants decided to turn it off.
SPS Stuck in Bureaucratic Morass
You and I know that satellite power aided by the use of construction materials from the lunar surface is an idea that is still almost unheard of, much less the subject of national debate, as it should be. Indeed, those most seriously studying SPS are Japan and Europe. Why does this conspiracy of silence exist? The reasons are partly unfamiliarity: three-dimensional thinking is often unwelcome in a two-dimensional world. Oddly enough, it is often more unwelcome to people who think of themselves as experts than to people who have a general, rather than a specialized education.
Institutional barriers and the normal behavior patterns of bureaucracies explain the rest of the "why". Since shortly after World War II the generation of scientists who contributed so greatly to winning that war have championed nuclear power. Though that generation is well into retirement now, it remains a powerful force in advising the government. It is joined by the heavy industries which see (or used to see) nuclear power as a market opportunity.
Fusion power research has gone on in large part because governmental science agencies like the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Department of Energy, and the National Science Foundation are extremely responsive to the scientific establishment. That establishment is led by such organizations as the National Academy of Sciences. The academy is made up of intelligent and highly qualified scientists, but as a body it is very conservative. Indeed, one of my colleagues high in its councils once described it as an "Old Men's Club." Fusion power research has been supported for some 40 years because, literally, generations of scientists have worked on it as graduate students, then gone on to positions of authority, and finally risen to positions where their recommendations arc heard with respect by government agencies.
In the bureaucratic format, satellite power has no natural home and no built-in constituency. NASA, now a timid, fearful NASA made up of aging pre-retirees rather than the young tigers who made Apollo work in just eight years, would be frightened out of its skin by a tough, make-it-work assignment with a tight budget and a tighter time scale. And NASA's charter doesn't cover energy. The DOE? Its charter doesn't include space. The NSF? Satellite power isn't science, it's engineering.
That's why research support toward satellite power has been left largely to the Space Studies Institute, a small foundation supported by thousands of private citizens -much as the organizations of the environmental movement are supported. Environmentally concerned citizens and groups, and SSI, should be talking. Their concerns are the same and their goals are the same. Since the governmental-scientific establishment in the United States is making no useful move toward a serious review of satellite power as a practical alternative, it may well be that concerned citizens are the only force that can bring about the necessary action. We as citizens have often succeeded in "Stop!" actions. Let us review, carefully and with open minds, whether SPS is something that we may want to "Start!"
Slashdot Mirror
For a tenth of the cost we can cover several square miles of the nevada desert with solar arrays. This will produce ten times the power without the problems of beaming the power back to the ground.
:)
This will also avoid the problems of the orbiting solar arrays regularly being hit of the collection of space junk that we have deposited in orbit over the years.
Now if these were feeding power to city sized orbiting habitats then it might be a much more interesting idea.
Just imagine a bemoth fluster of these!
Is it time to go home yet?
As the AC above points out, this sounds more like a weapon than a way to generate power. Plus I think that the beam will be VERY inefficient, and I think you need a fairly large area on which to "collect" the power since I hardly think this will be extremely accurate.
In areas where no power exists, village "life support systems" can be established to provide potable water, lights, modern communications, refrigeration, information, and perhaps a few sewing machines, he said.
What's the point? isn't it cheaper to just build solar cells there? You'll have to put wires in the ground anyway from the reception point to the village...(I guess they are not going to put the entire village in the microwave)
I don't see much use in this, I think a lot of practical problems have to be solved first... and I don't see this being used to "power a few sewing machines" very soon, this sounds as some expensive technologie....
Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity
I remember watching Discovery channel where they discussed the space junk floating out there. I would think that would be a major hinderance to having a reliable power supply. With all the junk out there, and a (presumably) rather large satellite, it's just asking for problems unless there is a lot of armor to protect it with.
I think even the ISS is a target, but they have some major shielding to protect the areas that are most likely to get hit.
That brings up another question, how does the armor effectively deal with the space junk, without creating more junk out there after absorbing the impact?
There must be millions of square kilometers of flat rooves in the world's cities. Since most are neither generally accessable nor designed for regular activties, they'd make an idea place for solar arrays. You could even use DC instead of AC due to the proximity, but that would be a bother. In hot areas, the shade would help lower the temperature of the upper floors.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
It should be noted that the initial proposal by Japan to meet its Kyoto emission targets was to install an additional 20 nuclear plants. This caused a major outcry and stimulated increased attention to Space-Based Solar Power. Importantly, the prices for electricity are sufficiently high in Japan that a workable Space-Based Solar Power system might be developed with launch costs much higher (1000 $/kg) than would be feasible for North America.
You're Just Jealous Because The Voices Are Talking To Me.
The maintenance factor is a problem as well, since most solar power systems require batteries for storage.
This is a little off the beaten path, but I was told by a friend who worked in Dallas of a company who was trying to reduce their energy costs. That company installed a very large tank of water on the top of their building, several stories high from the description, and used energy off the grid at night (non-primetime energy costs per KWH) to heat the water, then would reclaim it during the day back into electricity.
I don't know how efficient their reclamation scheme was, but I'm sure it didn't hurt to have the sun out 300 days a year to warm the tank while extracting energy from it. Seems that solar might benefit from a similar approach, using a natural battery of sorts. Obviously, this is only reasonable for large installations, but terrestrial solar doesn't seem to be feasible on an individual basis anyway.
Any connection between your reality and mine is purely coincidental.
"But but but... its cheaper to build solar panels on the ground!"
1. There is no nighttime in space. There are no clouds in space, no atmosphere to dilute the sun's energy, no birds to fly by and crap on the panels. That means 24h efficiency.
2. Yes, you COULD build a 10-square-mile solar panel farm in New Mexico, but you wouldn't even be able to get the current out of state before line-losses, frequency problems, and other transmission problems ate all of your energy.
Its like you could build several dozen nuclear plants in Nevada, enough to power the ENTIRE North America on nuclear alone, but you couldn't build a power grid transmission system strong enough to move the power to where it is consumed.
Use the Russian "space mirror" idea to put 24/7 illumination on some patch of otherwise useless desert somewhere. Sit solar arrays there. Zero orbiting moving parts equals low maintenance costs and no risk that some sneaky sod will use it as a weapon.
Seems like that much energy passing through the atmosphere would generate a fair amount of ozone from oxygen molecules absorbing some of the energy. I guess this might be fine at high altitudes where ozone is pretty depleted, but at low altitudes it's just another pollutant.
I might be completely out in left field. Anyone out there know whether this would be an issue?
Bandannarama
A great hope of science fiction writers is for one of their hypothetical futures, or some aspect of them, to come true.
Asimov used rings of satellites transmitting power vie Microwave to the earth in many of his stories.
He'd be happy to see this.
A lot of folks have noticed that this idea was in SimCity 2000. But decades before Maxis published SimCity, Robert Heinlein had used the idea in one of his future history short stories. Of course, he also had a gigantic nuclear power plant 1/4 the size of Arizona (or something like that) that he moved into space as well, right before it blew up. . .
This study by government or government-selected authorities ignored the radical option of lunar construction materials that, if properly used, could comprise almost all the mass of the satellites for a fraction of the transportation costs due to low lunar gravitation and absence of atmosphere on the lunar surface to interfere with techniques for lofting materials that would be impractical through atmospheric drag.
Space Studies Institute was the early leader in these studies of SSP-from-nonterrestrial-materials, and its founder, the late Gerard K. O'Neill had this to say about the option:
Space Studies Institute
The World's Energy Future Belongs in Orbit
by Dr. Gerard K. O'Neill
Trilogy January/February 1992
To make solar power satellites (SPS) practical and economical, we do not need any new science; we only need to apply what we are already doing in the more advanced industries: robotic production, computer control, and the replication by robotic machines of some of their heavier, simpler components. We do need one more thing: materials. It is neither practical, nor economical, nor environmentally acceptable to lift from the Earth by rockets the thousands of tons of materials needed to build an SPS that would supply Earth electricity equal to the output of ten nuclear power plants.
Let the Moon Pitch In
Fortunately, we do not have to. We were given something unique in our solar system: an enormous moon, orbiting tantalizingly nearby, and containing on its surface just the materials we need. Lunar soils contain 20 percent silicon for solar cells, and about 20 percent metals. Much of the rest, surprisingly enough, is oxygen. The moon has two other great advantages as a source of materials: its gravitational pull is only one-sixth of the Earth's, and because of its small diameter, the moon's gravitational grip is less than a twentieth of the Earth's.
The moon's second advantage is it has no atmosphere. The combination of the moon's weak gravitational grip and its vacuum environment makes it practical to locate electric mass accelerators on its surface which would be capable of lofting a steady stream of small payloads to a precise collection point high in space.
Such machines, called "mass-drivers," were tested nearly a decade ago under the sponsorship of our small, quiet, nonprofit foundation, the Space Studies Institute (SSI). Mass-drivers were shown to obey their computer design programs within one percent - no new science there - just straightforward engineering. Since then SSI has sponsored laboratory research on making useful products from ores similar to lunar soils.
Can SPS Technology Deliver?
As people concerned about our environment and about the world we leave to our children we should question proposed solutions to major physical problems. As fossil fuels, nuclear energy, ground-based solar, and other conventional sources of energy all fail to make sense in the world.
First of all, there is plenty of energy in space. Even in a narrow band 25,000 miles above the equator, where a satellite can maintain a fixed orbit, plenty of solar energy streams by constantly to supply far more than enough energy for the Earth of 2050.
What of the conversion on Earth? It was demonstrated years ago. The antennas convert the radio waves with an efficiency so high that less than 100 watts of waste heat goes into the environment for every 1,000 watts that goes into power lines. For coal or nuclear the numbers are: 1,500 watts waste, 2,500 watts total; for ground-based solar they are several thousand watts waste plus another thousand to make up the total - different from an Earth without solar cells - because solar cells absorb more heat than the ground they cover.
Transmission is the question that deserves continuing research: How to send the low-density radio waves from an SPS to antennas on the Earth. I have satisfied myself that transmission does not involve significant risks. But I invite you to do your own research. One of the best sources on the subject is The Microwave Debate by N.H. Steneck (MIT Press).
The points that seem to me most important about radio transmission of energy are that people would not be in the beams; that for fundamental physical reasons the beams could not be intentionally or accidentally redirected; that their intensity would be comparable to sunlight; that unlike the massive shielding around a nuclear reactor, the only shielding necessary would be a layer of household aluminum foil; and that, unlike the present irreversible dumping of 5,000 megatons per year of fossil-fuel carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, or the generation of long-lived nuclear wastes, the SPS system would leave no chemicals or radioactives behind if our descendants decided to turn it off.
SPS Stuck in Bureaucratic Morass
You and I know that satellite power aided by the use of construction materials from the lunar surface is an idea that is still almost unheard of, much less the subject of national debate, as it should be. Indeed, those most seriously studying SPS are Japan and Europe. Why does this conspiracy of silence exist? The reasons are partly unfamiliarity: three-dimensional thinking is often unwelcome in a two-dimensional world. Oddly enough, it is often more unwelcome to people who think of themselves as experts than to people who have a general, rather than a specialized education.
Institutional barriers and the normal behavior patterns of bureaucracies explain the rest of the "why". Since shortly after World War II the generation of scientists who contributed so greatly to winning that war have championed nuclear power. Though that generation is well into retirement now, it remains a powerful force in advising the government. It is joined by the heavy industries which see (or used to see) nuclear power as a market opportunity.
Fusion power research has gone on in large part because governmental science agencies like the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Department of Energy, and the National Science Foundation are extremely responsive to the scientific establishment. That establishment is led by such organizations as the National Academy of Sciences. The academy is made up of intelligent and highly qualified scientists, but as a body it is very conservative. Indeed, one of my colleagues high in its councils once described it as an "Old Men's Club." Fusion power research has been supported for some 40 years because, literally, generations of scientists have worked on it as graduate students, then gone on to positions of authority, and finally risen to positions where their recommendations arc heard with respect by government agencies.
In the bureaucratic format, satellite power has no natural home and no built-in constituency. NASA, now a timid, fearful NASA made up of aging pre-retirees rather than the young tigers who made Apollo work in just eight years, would be frightened out of its skin by a tough, make-it-work assignment with a tight budget and a tighter time scale. And NASA's charter doesn't cover energy. The DOE? Its charter doesn't include space. The NSF? Satellite power isn't science, it's engineering.
That's why research support toward satellite power has been left largely to the Space Studies Institute, a small foundation supported by thousands of private citizens -much as the organizations of the environmental movement are supported. Environmentally concerned citizens and groups, and SSI, should be talking. Their concerns are the same and their goals are the same. Since the governmental-scientific establishment in the United States is making no useful move toward a serious review of satellite power as a practical alternative, it may well be that concerned citizens are the only force that can bring about the necessary action. We as citizens have often succeeded in "Stop!" actions. Let us review, carefully and with open minds, whether SPS is something that we may want to "Start!"
Seastead this.