This is our first post from a contributor. CNStars17 sent this to us and asked if we would be interested in sharing this information with the public. We looked through it and were very impressed with not only his research but his content. Thank you CNStars, and we look forward to hearing more from you.
Have you heard the news out of Hawaii? Former NASA executive and physicist John Mankins captured solar energy from a mountain top in Maui and sent it wirelessly 92 miles to the main island of Hawaii. The team of researchers was only able to send around 20 watts, which is not even enough to power a fluorescent light bulb. Most of the power was lost in the transmission process.
Makins says that the project was limited by budget, and that with the proper equipment he could increase efficiency up to 64%.
Not impressed?
Did you know that 170 million gigawatts of solar energy hit the earth every second? That is more energy than the earth has used since the beginning of the industrial era. Now imagine being able to tap into that source on a large scale. With Mankins wireless energy transfer idea many satellites would be launched with high tech solar panels on them. Then the satellites would relay the energy to earth via harmless wireless energy transfer to receiving stations. Also, with the solar panels in space there is no loss in efficiency due to clouds or night. The energy would be available 24/7.
Mankins says he can get a demonstration system in orbit in around 6 years and have the full system up in around 15 years.
There are scientists in Japan that claim they could get the space-based solar power project started in less than 5 months with less than 1 million dollars. Their concept uses mirrors to focus as much solar power possible into the solar cells, and thus create 5 times more energy than conventional solar cells.
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September 14th, 2008 at 11:44 pm
Highly appreciable idea to exploit the solar power!
September 29th, 2008 at 11:53 pm
Carson - can you show me that link about the guys who claim to be able to pull this off for $1M? I don’t buy it…
October 6th, 2008 at 6:30 pm
im not sure about the $1M thing either but i do know the jaxa group in japan is planning on putting one up by 2030
November 23rd, 2008 at 7:15 pm
The 1 million dollar number was from an unreliable source, Sorry. However, The National Security Space Office recommended that the government spend $10 billion over the next 10 years to build a test satellite capable of beaming ten megawatts of electric energy down to Earth.
Once again, sorry for the false information
January 26th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
its really cool how you figure this stuff out from space.
if you can,can you send me a picture from space because im going to the planatarioum on wed.@ 8:10 and i wanted to show my class the picture.
please try.
sinseraly,BRIANNA. im 9 yearsold.
March 2nd, 2009 at 11:52 am
Looks like Solar Power is taking off eh.
There is a lot to learn and I found a
really good website that is mostly video
that teaches a lot about solar panels at
http://www.solarpanelspowercells.com