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How could you store enough power in orbit to fire it?
by jim-greer 11y ago
How could you store enough power in orbit to fire it?
- mturmon 11y agoWell, you could use your handy 200 GW solar array. With perfect conversion, and ~1300 W/m^2, you'd need to get your 12km x 12km panel array pointed consistently at the Sun.
- imaginenore 11y agoYou actually don't need anything crazy like that, as you don't need continuous 200GW forever, only for 2 minutes. You just need enough energy storage so you "only" need to store 6.6 gigawatthours. Lithium ion battery energy density is 265 watthours per kg. So you will need 24.9 million kg of batteries. Or 24.9 thousand tons. It's a lot, Tesla factory makes more per year.