Like nuclear fusion, the idea of space-based solar power has always seemed like a futuristic technology with an actual deployment into communities ever remaining a couple of decades away.<\/p>\n
The concept of harvesting solar power continuously from large satellites in space\u2014where there are no nights, no clouds, and no atmosphere to interfere with the collection of photons\u2014is fairly simple. Large solar arrays in geostationary orbit collect solar energy and beam it back to Earth via microwaves as a continuous source of clean energy.<\/p>\n
However, implementing this technology is not so simple. In recent years, in search of long-term power solutions and concerned about climate change, the European Space Agency has been studying space-based solar power. Some initial studies found that a plan to meet one-third of Europe\u2019s energy needs would require massive amounts of infrastructure and cost hundreds of billions of dollars. At best, such a system of very large satellites in geostationary space might come online by the middle of this century.<\/p>\n
In short, the plan would require massive up-front costs, with no guarantee that it all would work out in the end.<\/p>\n
So when a physicist with a background in financial services told me he wanted to reinvent the idea of space-based solar power beginning with a relatively small investment\u2014likely a bit north of $10 million\u2014it\u2019s fair to say I was a bit skeptical.<\/p>\n
That physicist is Baiju Bhatt, who co-founded the electronic trading platform Robinhood in 2013. Bhatt served as co-CEO of the company until November 2020, when he became chief creative officer. Robinhood has, at times, courted controversy, particularly during the GameStop frenzy in 2021. Bhatt left the company in the spring of this year to focus on his new space solar startup. Space, Bhatt said, has always been his true passion.<\/p>\n
The company is called Aetherflux, and it is starting small, with only about 10 employees at present.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s beyond my creativity how to bootstrap something that\u2019s going to be the size of a small city in geostationary space, and I think that\u2019s one of the reasons why the idea has died on the vine,\u201d he told Ars. \u201cI also think it\u2019s one of the reasons why there is skepticism about the idea of space-based solar power. Our approach is very different.\u201d<\/p>\n
,<\/p>\n
That approach starts in low-Earth orbit rather than 36,000 km away from the surface of the Earth. Aetherflux plans to begin with a single satellite, launching into an orbit about 500 km above the planet on a SpaceX transporter mission about 12 to 15 months from now.<\/p>\n
This initial satellite will be based on a commercially available bus from Apex, which will produce, on average, about 1 kilowatt of power. It\u2019s a modest amount, enough electricity to power a dishwasher. This satellite will also include a high-powered infrared laser to transmit this power back to Earth. A mobile ground station, about 10 meters across, will receive the energy.<\/p>\n
With a single satellite in low-Earth orbit, power beaming will only be available for any location on Earth for a few minutes as the spacecraft passes from horizon to horizon.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve spent a lot of time over the last year with folks within Department of Defense, and with some of the folks within DARPA,\u201d Bhatt said. \u201cThe idea is like a demonstration mission, which kind of establishes the core functionality.\u201d<\/p>\n
One of the key aspects of the test is to determine both the safety and efficiency of collecting solar energy in space, transmitting it through the atmosphere, and then producing a usable source of power on the ground.<\/p>\n
If the demo mission works, Aetherflux plans to develop a constellation of satellites in low-Earth orbit that could provide power continuously and at greater amounts. Initially, the company seeks to deliver power in remote locations, such as disaster relief areas, off-the-grid mining operations, or forward operating bases for the military.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf we can make that business model work, that\u2019s kind of the jumping-off point to being able to say, hey, could we put this on things like freight shipping?\u201d Bhatt said. \u201cCould we meaningfully address the ability to do freight shipping across large bodies of water with renewable energy?\u201d<\/p>\n
In the long term, there\u2019s the potential to provide a base load of power to augment the intermittent availability of terrestrial wind and solar energy\u2014a key need if the world is to de-carbonize its electricity generation.<\/p>\n
But that\u2019s probably putting the cart before the horse. One of the biggest challenges of space-based solar power is that it has always been theoretical. It should work. But will it work? Trying out a low-cost demonstrator mission in the next couple of years is a fine way of finally putting that question to rest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Like nuclear fusion, the idea of space-based solar power has always seemed like a futuristic technology with an actual deployment into communities ever remaining a couple of decades away. The concept of harvesting solar power continuously from large satellites in space\u2014where there are no nights, no clouds, and no atmosphere to interfere with the collection […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44678,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44675"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}