Not Another Post Your Ideas Thread!

looking at a few online articles i think that's about what earth generated solar costs. i think costs for solar on earth will go down faster than the space costs, there's more room for improvement in cost to build and in efficiency. technological advances don't lower the cost of the space stuff much, except for launch vehicles, but they do lower it's earthy equivalent.

also, i think you're underestimating development costs by a LOT, as in, several $hundred million. a regular satellite costs a good $150mil to build (for a big one), a lot of that cost is waste, but a lot of it isn't, especially when you consider the exhaustive testing that is NECESSARY (even though it's expensive and frequently redundant) to ensure you're not wasting your time. plus, labor is expensive. no one's going to build this thing for free.

Hello, TerraMrs,

the cost per kwh Klaus found are that low that there could be significant higher development costs without rising the cost level too much.

Next development costs are handled differently than production costs because development generates experiences and knowledge of interest beyond the satellite developed - this can be seen at MAV.

I personally didn'have in mind a satellite in GEO but in LEO because the experiment done on Earth does fit into the distance of LEO. Then the cost relations shift even more in favour of Klaus.

It will be interesting to have looks at the data about the solar panels of the ISS, Spirit and Opportunity and oof Phoenix.



Dipl.-Volkswirt (bdvb) Augustin (Political Economist)

Short comment, more later when I have time: The listed "SCARLET" type is Deep Space One

I didn't include development costs due to the imagined mass production of hundreds of modules and "solar stations".

About power density: Welsom Space Power writes:
"6 micron thickness CP1/a-Si:H TFSC deployed on 20-meter (400 m²) CFRP booms can deliver DEPLOYED power density of 2430 Watts/kg"

Additionally they plan to manufacture "Twin 150 meter, 8 MW Array Module and X-aerogel filled Graphite SPS Structures" by 2012

Then: The University of Neuchatel and SRS Technologies in Huntsville have produced parts with 4300 W/kg.

Of course it's nothing to have tomorrow but with the rapid increasing energy costs, especially oil, I could imagine to see experimental constructions by 2015 IF a cheap, reliable launcher is available.

those are really good power/kg ratios... but i still think 10 years is too tight a timeframe. also, LEO doesn't work for the simple reason that your ground station can't move. power stations will have to be in GEO, for that reason alone.

i guess all this debate is moot, it all depends on the price of oil and whether or not more nuclear is pursued by the governments. right now though, i'm not convinced that space solar beats earth bound solar for the immediate future.

I thought the same about LEO and GEO but actually all presentations I read these days put their power stations into LEO. That shouldn't be a problem if you have enough receiver stations.

I agree that 10 years is quite tight but I could imagine to see the first prototypes in 10 years, especially in the context of the rapidly increasing energy costs.

Hello, TerraMrs,

a satellite in LEO might periodically interrupt the beaming down each time its distance to the receiver station on ground becomes too large or when that station is beyond the horizon. It might reestablish the beam when it is close enough again.

Alternatively - in Klaus' approach - it might switch to another station.

There also might be a switch between gathering power when the station is too far away and beaming down when it is close.



Dipl.-Volkswirt (bdvb) Augustin (Political Economist)

i think you'd need some serious advances in capacitors to make gathering power an option, but then again those advances are probably only a couple years away so that's a possibility. i still think you guys can't neglect development costs though, especially since stuff becomes obsolete those aren't exactly static. i personally like the idea of stations at mercury beaming power back with super awesome lasers then being relayed to earth through microwave more than stations in earth orbit gathering and relaying down. but that's some sci-fi shenanigans there.