michael01

June 15, 2009 at 4:42pm

Talk about doublethink!  They want us to believe that burning fossil fuels is causing global warming so we switch to solar, wind, geothermal, etc.  People’s perception of capturing solar energy for electricity production is squeaky clean.  So how could solar panels in space be any different?  Well I’ll tell you.

 

Solar energy is being diverted to the earth that would normally pass it by.

 

This idea certainly would cause man made global warming since the earth would be receiving more solar energy than it would naturally.  It doesn’t matter that it’s being converted to radio waves for transmission.  Energy is energy.  It cannot be created or destroyed.  Once that extra energy is here on earth, it’s up to the earth to rid itself of it.  There’s no debating that this idea would cause man made global warming.

 

There are already sufficient amounts of solar energy hitting the earth’s surface that we can harness.  What we need to work on is better energy storage.  There exists today upper and lower reservoirs where water is pumped up when demand is low, and allowed to flow down to produce electricity when the demand is high.

 

We need smaller residential type systems so that the stored energy is close to the consumer, reducing the need for transmission lines over long distances.  I don’t like the idea of conventional batteries because you have to dispose of them when they die.  A system of electrolyzing water, storage and fuel cell would be more desirable.

 

I really hope this idea gets shut down before any large amounts of money are wasted on it.

 

Nuxes

April 18, 2009 at 1:10pm

Wouldn't it be better to use a laser to relay the power down to earth?  The atmosphere can play havoc with radio waves, it would seem like the more focused the beam, the less energy would be lost in transmission.  Only problem with a laser is that it would have to be aimed directly at the reciever.

Keith E. Whisman

April 18, 2009 at 6:02am

Cool.. Perhaps I could put up an antenna and connect that to a coil and a capacitor and then onto a battery set and then to an inverter and I'll get free energy. This is the technology of the old crystal radio sets that powered themselves up from AM frequency.

In 30years people will be complaining that this is causing cancer and birth defects.

Also I wonder what frequencies it's going to be on and if it'll bleed over and over power other frequencies? And I sure hope it doesn't damage other devices that are sensitive to frequencies close to the transmission and recieve frequencies becaus I'm almost certain that the energy is going to be affected by the ionosphere and we'll experience frequency drift.

Pretty cool but not something to just rush into without doing your homework. 

Shalbatana

April 17, 2009 at 10:31am

I hope this has more success than my kite and key power generator did.

 Shees what a mess that was!

 

_______________________________

"There's no time like the future."

nam112381

April 17, 2009 at 8:49am

Holy crap!  The microwave power plant from SimCity 2 & 3 approaches reality!  And they were close about when it would become available too (2020)!  I guess fusion power is on track for 2050 then.  Let's just hope the satellite can't misfire like it could in SimCity and fry some parts of California.