Comments on: Reality Check – Space Based Power

By: Tanna Mcmaster

Tanna Mcmaster — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 23:50:09 +0000

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By: Ryan Norseth

Ryan Norseth — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 23:04:07 +0000

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By: Edgar Deroberts

Edgar Deroberts — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 23:59:59 +0000

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By: Michel Mayen

Michel Mayen — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 00:04:29 +0000

Awesome post. I so good to see someone taking the time to share this information

By: Isis Biehl

Isis Biehl — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 00:52:56 +0000

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By: Maury Markowitz

Maury Markowitz — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 15:20:01 +0000

Hi Dave,

I’ve written a “more direct” version of the statements here:

http://matter2energy.wordpress.com/2011/06/21/the-maury-equation/

By: Maury Markowitz

Maury Markowitz — Mon, 23 May 2011 21:47:10 +0000

Sure Dave, you can find longer versions on my blog too. Feel free to use what you like.

As I said above, I think there’s no escaping the math, unless launch costs fall well below $10 a pound.

Given that it’s about $8/pound just for the electricity for a space elevator, you can see just how difficult/impossible that is.

By: Dave Bertagna

Dave Bertagna — Mon, 23 May 2011 15:42:22 +0000

Good! Thank you! I always wanted to write in my site something like that. Can I take part of your post to my blog?

By: Maury Markowitz

Maury Markowitz — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 17:36:29 +0000

This will never, ever, happen. At least not for any commercial use.

A space-based power system gets five times as much sunlight as the same panel in Earth. It will lose about 1/2 of that on the way down, and another 50% due to the shorter lifetime in orbit (12 yrs vs. 30 or so). So in the end a SBSPS gets maybe 20% more electricity before it dies.

So now we have to decide whether or not to put the panel in space or on the ground, knowing that the space advantage is on the other of 20%. The economic value of electrical power is very low, for baseload its around 3 cents a kWh. So the conclusion is inescapable:

($ of electricity from space – $ of electric) << launch costs

There is no way to escape this problem. I suggest everyone try it, and run some numbers on their own.

By: vince delmonte

vince delmonte — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 21:11:29 +0000

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