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Japan will try to beam solar power from space by 2025
- quaintdev 3y agoI wonder what happens to the air craft or living things when they get caught in this high energy beam
- dvh 3y agoThey will have predominantly female offsprings https://www.jstor.org/stable/40965912 https://www.jstor.org/stable/40965912
- aww_dang 3y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aero_Spacelines_Pregnant_Guppy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aero_Spacelines_Pregnant_Guppy
- bryanlarsen 3y agoThese beams contain 1/4 of peak solar energy at more benign wavelengths. Long term exposure is probably safe but might not be. Any amount of time measured in any unit less than years will be safe. https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Space_Engineering_Technology/SOLARIS/FAQ_Frequently_Asked_Questions_on_Space-Based_Solar_Power https://www.esa.int/Enabling_Support/Space_Engineering_Techn...
- heywhatupboys 3y agoThat's what they said about leaded gasoline and asbestus. We do not know, it might cause cancer.
- bryanlarsen 3y agoLeaded gasoline and asbestos weren't studied before introduction. This has been.
- hkwerf 3y agoRF does have the slight advantage over asbestos that you can just turn it off if adverse effects are observed.
- drowsspa 3y agoDon't know about asbestos, but everyone knew lead was bad. Profits just spoke louder.
- IsTom 3y agoRomans knew that slaves in asbestos mines didn't live long.
- bryanlarsen 3y agoRoman slaves in any sort of mine didn't live long. It was considered by many to be a sentence worth than death.
- dghughes 3y agoNot was bad for lead but is bad. Lead is still used in airplane avgas. And solder for electronics. And bullets and for shot pellets.
- ffgjgf1 3y agoIt probably would in case you spent significant amounts of time between the transmitters but that should be pretty easy to avoid.
- bryanlarsen 3y agoYes if you climb the barb wire fence and ignore the "keep out" signs and then put up a tent and sleep there for a year you will probably slightly increase your chance of getting cancer.
- harimau777 3y agoThe beams could be quite narrow. We did the calculations in a course I took and from what I recall, all of America's power could be compressed to a 15 meter beam. So they could probably just setup a no fly zone around the beam. Birds might still be a problem, but don't the alternatives (e.g. wind power) already kill birds?
- runsWphotons 3y agoLets say Im not very interested in practicality but just the theory of this. How does it work? How can I send power from one side of my room to the other if I don't care about paying more.
- harimau777 3y agoUnfortunately, it's been too long for me to speak with authority on the specifics of what energy levels would be safe to do that for. However, from what I recall, in general there shouldn't be anything preventing that at reasonably low power levels. You could also use something like: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waveguide_(radio_frequency) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waveguide_(radio_frequency)
- runsWphotons 3y agoAre there any research papers on the details?
- JoeAltmaier 3y agoOld ones, with obsolete costs. Everything has been getting cheaper geometrically.
- h2odragon 3y agohttps://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2019/08/20/space-based-solar-power-is-not-a-thing/ https://caseyhandmer.wordpress.com/2019/08/20/space-based-so...
- Yizahi 3y agoAnd he also wrote a somewhat related article about space based manufacturing/mining. Basically however you calculate and whatever imaginary tech you use, it is still cheaper to do practically anything on the Earth surface than anywhere else.
- endisneigh 3y agoDoesn’t seem worth the effort from the article description. Better off trying to figure out storage.
- JoeAltmaier 3y agoFalse Dichotomy
- culopatin 3y agoAren’t we trying to manage the energy we already get, and maybe even get less energy? Isn’t it that at the current rates with our modified atmosphere we are going to cook ourselves ?
- bryanlarsen 3y agoSpace based solar is in very low earth orbit. IOW, it shades the Earth, decreasing the amount of energy that reaches Earth.
- csomar 3y agoDoes it? Because they are beaming that energy back to earth, just to a very specific place.
- bryanlarsen 3y agoSolar panels are ~40% efficient. So they capture and beam 40% of the energy, and the other 60% gets reflected away and/or radiated as heat. Reflected energy won't hit Earth. Some of the heat will be radiated to Earth and some won't.
- thx-2718 3y agoWouldn't it already then be energy on earth but now it's energy that humans can make use of? It's a benefit because it's energy that doesn't require releasing carbon to aquire and make use of.
- steveBK123 3y agoSomeone played too much SimCity 2000
- 35mm 3y agoI’m no rocket scientist but surely it’s cheaper to build more panels and batteries on Earth? Launching stuff into orbit is expensive in cash and emissions.
- notpushkin 3y agoPerhaps Japan's area plays some role here.
- bryanlarsen 3y agoThe only use case for this that comes anywhere close to being viable is if the alternative is flying in fossil fuels to run a generator. IOW, polar regions and forward military bases. The hope is that space based manufacturing will eventually make this technology viable more widely.
- bluescrn 3y agoBut then you don’t get a space-based energy weapon as an added bonus
- mrktf 3y agoMaybe doing compromise - build space mirror and beam light to earth 24 hours per day, as bonus panels maintenance it on earth and can be easily upgraded. Something like this was tried by Russia: Znamya ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Znamya_(satellite) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Znamya_(satellite) )
- csomar 3y agoI'm guessing it's because Japan doesn't have the Sahara Desert.
- dragontamer 3y agoSahara Desert is terrible for solar panels, and is why so many researchers are experimenting with molten salt and superheated steam. Solar panels lose efficiency when hot. The best locations are sunny but cool, like Germany. Not deserts
- vitro 3y agoCurious question, why not use this approach for example with wind farms or solar farms? You'd avoid the need to build high capacity cables which are sometimes a reason why renewables do not spread that much. I can imagine that coming into contact with this beam is not something anyone would wish for. You could beam energy up to a station in the orbit which would then redirect it to the place where energy is needed. You could then get "easily" energy from solar farms in Sahara, for example.
- boringg 3y agoWhat you are describing is increasingly more cost prohibitive and another level of conplexity then the problem statement
- datameta 3y agoWhat would that satellite look like to enable meaningful power transmission? A bank of capacitors and batteries? Would have multiple smaller sats scale better and/or increase coverage?
- runeks 3y ago> However, even if Japan successfully deploys a set of orbital solar arrays, the tech would still be closer to science fiction than fact. That’s because producing an array that can generate 1 gigawatt of power – or about the output of one nuclear reactor – would cost about $7 billion with currently available technologies.
- foepys 3y ago7 billion USD for 1 GW? No so far off of some modern nuclear power plants. Hinkley Point C is currently estimated at £32.7 billion for 3.26 GW.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- ta1243 3y agoMeanwhile Hinkley C, a 3.2GW plant, currently costs about $30b https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-61519609 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-somerset-61519609 So with currently available technology price is the same as nuclear even assuming that $7b overruns
- JoeAltmaier 3y agoLots of doubt. But don't doubt this: anybody who bets against orbital solar will lose, and it won't take long. The costs are all going in the direction to make space-based solar the winning option.
- blueflow 3y ago> The costs are all going in the direction to make space-based solar the winning option Citation needed. I'd especially like to see the calculation against the launch costs and the expected lifetimes of solar cells.
- JoeAltmaier 3y agoReally? We need to cite the worldwide phenomenon of drastically reducing lift costs? Astronomical growth in cheap thin solar panels? Rising real estate prices? No. No I'm not going to dignify this with a 'citation'.
- blueflow 3y agoThen do the calculation with energy instead of money. At some point you are better off putting the rocket fuel into a ground power station.
- rep_movsd 3y agoWe lived on only solar power for 7 years. For the last 2 years if I hadn't had my precious Honda GK200 petrol/kerosene generator, it would have made it quite impossible to use a desktop computer effectively. My whole successful career of 20 years as a software dev might have got upset, Betting on solar is a silly idea. Its just a way for oil companies to keep shipping baseload
- siddiqi123 3y agoQuestion....if satellite TV that already beams microwaves to earth has issues during cloud cover...how will this be any better? Sure the power may blast through but the efficiency of that will drop depending on the weather. Well, I guess progress is progress. If you don't try, you won't know. You keep going until you get it. However here is an idea, what about using this for, i don't know, powering habitats etc on the Moon?
- 542458 3y ago"Microwave" is a big range, from 1 to 1000 GHz. Satellite TV is in the ~10-20 GHz range, but I believe there are frequencies where clouds and rain are more transparent. Edit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave_transmission#/media/File:Atmospheric_Microwave_Transmittance_at_Mauna_Kea_(simulated).svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microwave_transmission#/media/... So I guess the goal would be to pick one of the high points on that graph that also wouldn't wreck havoc with telecommunications.
- thek3nger 3y agoHere it is a nice video explaining pros and cons of orbital solar panels: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZPrIE5ZMZA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZPrIE5ZMZA
- affgrff2 3y agoIs the other way also possible? Moving heat into space and then profit on the generated heat gradient on earth?
- traverseda 3y agoRadiative cooling is a thing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_daytime_radiative_cooling https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_daytime_radiative_cool...
- Hello71 3y agono, because that violates the second law of thermodynamics: it always costs energy to move energy.
- harimau777 3y agoWe discussed this in one of my EE courses. From what I recall, all of the United State's power could be compressed down to a beam something like 15 meters in diameter. However, the problem is that if you compress it more than that the air will ionize. Effectively, an orbital solar beam could also be used as a lightning gun which is something the international community might have an issue with.
- dbetteridge 3y agoThey say life imitates art... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanquish_(video_game) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanquish_(video_game)
- wefarrell 3y agoCould this be used to beam power to electric planes or cargo ships? I would think that it could be useful for vehicles that require more range than batteries currently allow.
- xyzabc098123 3y agoImagine satellite aiming is off and we have death ray zapping people.
- rep_movsd 3y agoSure, ignore a technology that is already working since 1970 (fission) and try some scatterbrained sci-fi idea
- water-data-dude 3y agoAsimov used this idea in a bunch of his stories. It’d be cool to see it make the transition from sci-fi to real life! :)
- tommiegannert 3y agoIs it a good idea to put more solar irradiation onto Earth than we already have? I thought climate change was due to us causing accumulation of solar that would otherwise diffuse into space. Assuming they're not shading Earth, robbing someone else of sun. Are they? Is Mr Burns' solar blackout machine becoming a thing?
- rich_sasha 3y agoI guess depends what wavelengths are used. If it is something not absorbed by the atmosphere then the argument is moot. I think some microwave lengths for the bill.
- tommiegannert 3y agoWhy does it have to be absorbed by the atmosphere to be a problem? If the energy reaches the surface, and is absorbed there, it will eventually become heat as we use it. At that point, we've added heat to a system we're actively trying to cool.
- rich_sasha 3y agoThe idea is that the beam hits some receiver and most of it turns into electricity, not heat. Of course the elect city eventually turns into heat too...
- woleium 3y agoSurely the real reason for this project is that it's a weapon?