Technologies for a Solar Power Future: Solar Articles: Eco20/20

Technologies for a Solar Power Future

It's not hard, these days, to believe that satellites will someday collect solar energy and then beam it to earthly receiving stations, or that stratospheric solar panels will be tethered to earthly power stations. It's not hard to imagine that solar-cloth airships will someday serve as power generators above disaster sites. For today and tomorrow, these are only concepts. But there is a saying: "What the mind of man can conceive and believe - it can achieve."

Space-Based Photovoltaic Power

* Photovoltaic power (solar power) has been a significant resource for the exploration of space and the advancement of satellite technologies. In turn, the technologies necessary for satellite-based solar collection and earthly distribution have been studied on the ground. But the designs for the transmission of high-power beams through the ionosphere, and for the safe and accurate control technologies for such beaming, still need to be tested in space.

o Meanwhile, the NanoSail-D2, NASA's 100-square-foot polymer solar sail, has recently taken a cruise around the Earth using the power of the sun. It was unfurled in low Earth orbit on Jan. 20th, 2011, as part of a study on how solar sails will behave in orbit.

Tethered Stratospheric Collectors

* "StratoSolar" is the concept name for a proposed tethered stratospheric system consisting of a pipe reaching 20 kilometers into the sky, hoisting an array of concentrated solar panels at its top. The concept's proposers say the extreme intensity of light, together with avoidance of overcast weather, and an increased time-span for tracking the sun at that elevation would allow the tethered system to collect far more power than a ground based system with the same metric surface area of solar cells. They also feel the design they've proposed could easily be built using materials that are available now, with the technologies at hand today.

Solar Airships

* If a power plant could be airlifted to wherever it's needed, it would be a great deal easier for disaster relief teams to take care of the thousands of refugees that can overwhelm local resources in the aftermath of a major disaster. An airship covered in solar panels that could be flown into a disaster area and anchored there to power rescue efforts is just one of the many concept designs for solar airships. Researchers estimate that an airship 20 meters long, using the newest thin-film solar technologies, would produce over 100 kwh per day.

* Other solar airship concepts include telescope platforms, travel cruises, and beamed-power stations similar to the satellite concept mentioned above, except the flight-path of the collector would remain within the envelope of the atmosphere, and retain the ability to land the equipment for servicing, instead of being rocketed into space.

Fifty years ago cell phones were only a concept, and look how dramatically those have changed modern life. Considering what the minds of brilliant men and women have so far conceived, and achieved, it's not hard to imagine that someday all of these concepts will be realized; and someday they will be taken for granted just as casually as cell phones are today.

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