4 ms·
Quick quibbles: 1. Geostationary orbits are in 24/7 sunlight except for a short period each day near the equinoxes 2. Geostationary polar orbits do not exist.
by dabluecaboose 3y ago
Quick quibbles:
1. Geostationary orbits are in 24/7 sunlight except for a short period each day near the equinoxes
2. Geostationary polar orbits do not exist. Geostationary orbits are, by definition, 0° inclined. A polar geosynchronous orbit, like you mentioned, would not offer much besides being over the same point on the Earth at the same instant every day.
- jacquesm 3y ago> A polar geosynchronous orbit, like you mentioned, would not offer much besides being over the same point on the Earth at the same instant every day. It would offer a lot: the ability to send down an absolutely massive amount of power without having the corridor shift around so that it can be reliably routed around by air traffic. Having the equivalent of a microwave scythe moving across a large area would be kind of counterproductive.
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- dabluecaboose 3y agoWhich is why a geostationary orbit would be much more feasible. Constant solar exposure with a minimal ground-track footprint that can be reliably pointed at the same ground station 24/7. In fact, if we're already beaming power (assuming this works reliably enough) it might make sense to have a set of birds "surfing the terminator" in a polar orbits that can then transmit to geostationary birds which in turn transmit to ground stations.
- jacquesm 3y agoIt makes for good science fiction. But the footprint of the spot on the receiving end would be such that most of the energy would be lost. Even at an opening angle of only 10 degrees (which would be pretty good) from LEO you'd be looking at a 50 km spot size.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]