Harnessing Space Power

One of the biggest problems in the world is definitely the energy crisis. For the past century, world has been dependent largely on fossil fuels to supply energy to the world. Fossil Fuels have been the main source of energy for cars, planes, ships, trains all over the world. Even now fossil fuels like coal, natural gas and petroleum are being used for the production of electricity and power all over the world. However, with the world’s resources of fossil fuels dwindling down, energy has become a major issue in the world again. Besides using Nuclear Power, which may have adverse negative environmental effects, the world is in a serious energy bind. Perhaps it is one of the newer reasons why wars are being fought all over the world. However, with the advent of new space technology we can harness the space power to create inexpensive, endless and a clean source of energy to meet all of our needs.

The concept of space power systems was first introduced in the 1960’s. It was regarded as science fiction at the time, but as public support grew bigger, there were some new and important developments in the space power program. Things picked up pace in the 1970’s when the US Government decided to pay $20 million dollars to advance Space Power Systems.

Basically space power systems are construed of several solar energy collecting satellites placed in equatorial orbits around the world. These solar satellites are to be designed in such a way that the solar flaps in the satellites can be used to harness solar energy. Of course, the main concern would be to deploy this energy and transport it unto Earth to make it useful for mankind. However, the main advantage would be the fact that solar energy is limitless. There will be simply no end to solar energy for thousands maybe millions of years. Thus, all of this solar power is just bouncing around the cosmos and getting diffused in the Earth’s atmosphere. With the usage of Space Power Satellites, all of this solar power can be collected with very small diffusion. Also because space is cold, storing all of this solar energy (which also carries UV Rays or Heat Energy) will not be a problem

The problem of transporting the space power to Earth is solved by means of microwave beams. These microwave beams are used so that this solar power is beamed to Earth in straight paths. Of course, there are some things that need to be worked out before this plan can be finalized. For example, the beaming of this microwave energy must be within a confinement beam. In the end of these Energy paths, there are several solar power collection stations that will take the energy beamed from the satellites and convert it into electrical energy. However, these power stations that receive the power projected from outer space will need to be specially protected as the power overload can cause huge explosions. Perhaps putting these power stations in a remote part of the world can help alleviate the problem somewhat. Then only the last step of transferring this electrical power into the normal power grid of the nation remains. Another theory for harnessing the space power is by creating diffuse but confined energy beams to be projected onto Earth. This energy is projected in an Electromagnetic Wavelength with a high frequency. Thus satellite dishes similar to what we put in our backyard to watch satellite TV can be used to harness this energy. Although it may sound like a science fiction, the theory behind it is sound and the technology to do such an endeavor is not beneath us. Of course, serious funding needs to be done to overcome the expenditures of the launches required, but in time it is hoped that more and more funding will be done as the world realizes how important energy is.