Cable Forum - View Single Post - How to harvest solar power? Beam it down from space!

TheBlueRaja · 01-06-2008, 22:46

Why would you need a huge Satellite?

Why not a huge space based parabolic mirror, made from say aluminium foil which would reflect a focused beam of sunlight (or more likely sunlight converted to microwave energy) to ground based collectors?

You would probably need several ground based tracking stations / collectors at strategic points around the globe to account for the earths rotation but it would be cheaper than putting the whole caboodle in space.

You would need a serious no fly zone around it and some bird fanciers might get a bit twitchy and you would probably also need some studies on the effects of Microwave energy on the ozone layer too but this would seem a smarter approach.

01-06-2008, 22:46	#18
TheBlueRaja cf.mega poster Join Date: Dec 2003 Location: Baw deep in a munter Age: 50 Services: Initiations, rep rigging and orgies! Posts: 5,750	Re: How to harvest solar power? Beam it down from space! Why would you need a huge Satellite? Why not a huge space based parabolic mirror, made from say aluminium foil which would reflect a focused beam of sunlight (or more likely sunlight converted to microwave energy) to ground based collectors? You would probably need several ground based tracking stations / collectors at strategic points around the globe to account for the earths rotation but it would be cheaper than putting the whole caboodle in space. You would need a serious no fly zone around it and some bird fanciers might get a bit twitchy and you would probably also need some studies on the effects of Microwave energy on the ozone layer too but this would seem a smarter approach.