Dec 08 2011
Space Energy
Science fiction or science? Researchers are currently exploring the possibility of collecting Solar energy in space, National Geographic reports. Orbiting satellites can collect solar energy continuously and beam it down to earth through lasers and microwaves. Collecting sunlight in space also reduces losses suffered as sunlight penetrates the atmosphere. This article is definitely worth a read. Comments welcome.
One response so far
For anyone who wants to see the difference between solar radiation in space and what gets through the atmosphere, here’s a spectrum graph: http://homepages.ius.edu/kforinas/ClassRefs/ElectroMagnetic/Solar_Spectrum.jpg
The article emphasizes the economic issues with getting collectors in orbit, but I think the transmission problem is really more interesting. As the article covers, both lasers and microwaves have issues associated with their use (and the article only briefly touched on possible health/environmental effects of high-energy targeted beams…). Even if you can get the system to work in a controlled situation, whether it would work at scale is really unclear, it seems.