Space-Based Solar Collectors to Beam Energy to Earth by the 2030s

http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/bulletin/japans-25-year-plan-to-have-space-solar-power/?tag=nl.e660&s_cid=e660&ttag=e660&ftag=TRE4eb29b5

Japan is working on this at full-speed. The space-based solar collectors will convert electricity gathered in space to microwaves, which will be beamed to collectors at antennae farms on Earth, where the microwaves will be converted back to electricity. The microwaves will not be effected by cloud cover, and the conversion efficiency will be 80%. Japan expects to have a 1-GW system in orbit by 2031; equivalent to a current nuclear power plant, and will be launching a system per year by the late 2030s.

I have said on this forum many times that the road to renewable energy will be paved by the sun. I am all for this. Not because of the climate-change argument (I'm not completely sold on that), but because petroleum and coal are finite resources, getting harder and more expensive to find and extract as each year passes. Governments start wars over oil, and if technology can help us find energy directly from the sun without an intermediate (the coal, oil, gas, and wood that we burn for energy is simply stored sunlight), well that is all good. But, we need to continue to drill for oil while all of this unfolds.

To bad Americans can't take the lead in developing this technology. We used to be first for things like this.

Newsflash.........a white male was found in a Toyota Prius microwaved.....ooooppppps. The Japanese never make mistakes with power generation.

ZVUGKTUBM wrote:http://www.smartplanet.com/blog/bulletin/japans-25-year-plan-to-have-space-solar-power/?tag=nl.e660&s_cid=e660&ttag=e660&ftag=TRE4eb29b5

Japan is working on this at full-speed. The space-based solar collectors will convert electricity gathered in space to microwaves, which will be beamed to collectors at antennae farms on Earth, where the microwaves will be converted back to electricity. The microwaves will not be effected by cloud cover, and the conversion efficiency will be 80%. Japan expects to have a 1-GW system in orbit by 2031; equivalent to a current nuclear power plant, and will be launching a system per year by the late 2030s.

I have said on this forum many times that the road to renewable energy will be paved by the sun. I am all for this. Not because of the climate-change argument (I'm not completely sold on that), but because petroleum and coal are finite resources, getting harder and more expensive to find and extract as each year passes. Governments start wars over oil, and if technology can help us find energy directly from the sun without an intermediate (the coal, oil, gas, and wood that we burn for energy is simply stored sunlight), well that is all good. But, we need to continue to drill for oil while all of this unfolds.

To bad Americans can't take the lead in developing this technology. We used to be first for things like this.

This seems like a good idea tome. Too bad the Fossil Fuel Corporations will make sure it doesn't happen. I suspect they made sure Solyndra failed also.