2050

[Forceman]

In the mini-series 2050, that aired about a year ago if I'm not mistaken, the idea was put up about the possibility of towers that orbit this earth, have solar panels on the top of them, receive photons from the sun, use these photons in the stimulation of a gas laser, and have these series of lasers transmitted back to the Earth's surface, in which a ground station would receive the laser signal and the corresponding intensity of the laser would result in the proliferation of a current of a material excited by the laser.

What do you guys think will be a problem presented in this method besides money? Are there pros and cons? Does the technology have faults? Do they pose the same threat of orbiting satellites (falling to the surface), or the same fate of the moon in tens of thousands of years (floating into space to be captured by another planet's gravitational pull: most likely Jupiter)?
:shrug:

 

[BenTheMan]

I seem to recall the Japanese working on something similar.

A quick google search also tells me that US scientists are doing the same thing:

http://www.livescience.com/environment/080618-pf-space-solar.html
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=farming-solar-energy-in-space

I think it's fesible. One problem that I could potentially see is that small dust and other crap orbiting our Earth or the sun could be potentially very dangerous to the solar panels. Also, repairing the thing requires a trip to space, which isn't cheap.

It's probably more of a cost/benefit analysis problem than a science problem---this is what it seems like to me.

Of course, if the laser was misaligned, you may wipe out some buildings or something, but this is overcome by just putting the receiving station in the middle of a desert, or something.

 

[cosmictraveler]

What happens if terrorists get in control of it and aim the energy beam at cities or people?

 

[draqon]

ehhem...did I miss it, but why bother with space energy, when microwaves can be used from the ground with energy from nuclear power plants? thats the whole premise of space elevators.

 

[draqon]

and another thing...wouldnt the air get heated up or something, resulting in pressure changes, which will result in air currents?

 

[Pete]

What happens if terrorists get in control of it and aim the energy beam at cities or people?

We've sen what happens when terrorists get hold of a jumbo jet or four, yet we still continue to build and use them. It's about good cost/benefit and risk analysis.

 

[spidergoat]

Plenty of light hits the ground, why not put them there? Cost would be the overwhelming concern, it would cost trillions.

 

[TruthSeeker]

Eh.... maybe I'm not as creative as I once thought. I'm not the only one who came up with such idea... LOL!!!!

Interesting...

 

[BenTheMan]

Plenty of light hits the ground, why not put them there? Cost would be the overwhelming concern, it would cost trillions.

I think the intensity of solar radiation in space gives you more bang for your buck, so that fewer solar cells produce more energy. Then it's only a matter of doing the calculus to see where the tradeoff is.

 

[D H]

A ground-based solar array receives sunlight only 50% of the time or so (that remaining 50% of the time is what we call nighttime). The atmosphere absorbs a good chunk of the incoming radiation. Solar power satellites have three key advantages over ground-based systems: (1) they receive sunlight about 99% of the time, (2) the sunlight they do receive is not attenuated by the atmosphere, and (3) they can re-broadcast the collected solar energy in a wavelength (2.45 GHz) that is nearly transparent to the atmosphere. Solar power satellites have several disadvantages as well. As Ben has noted, it is comes down to costs versus benefits.

Things were looking good for solar power satellites several months ago when the economy was still doing fine but oil prices were going through the roof. Now that the economy is in the toilet but oil prices are low, the prospect for solar power satellites isn't quite so rosy.

 

[hypewaders]

Wrong Way: Down is much easier in every way (geothermal). It's what to do as the wells run dry).

 

[BenTheMan]

Probably any energy plan should include contributions from solar, nuclear, wind, (...), and geothermal energy.