The future is here! Scientists have beamed power from space to the Earth!

[thewayne]

An experiment - which was successfully demonstrated on Earth - was launched into space in January. It uses solar collectors and a microwave system to beam power down to the planet, and they have been successful!

The part that I especially loved was that it was beamed to a receiver on the roof of the "Gordon and Betty Moore Laboratory of Engineering on Caltech’s campus in Pasadena." Sadly, Gordon Moore passed away about a month ago. It would have been so awesome if he'd been around to see it happen!

One thing that I wish the article had addressed, and perhaps future articles will as this one was kinda scant on details, is what is the transmission efficiency and how well do they expect it to scale up. Solar panels have enjoyed great improvements in efficiency in the last few years, and obviously they're more efficient in space. Inquiring minds want to know!!!

https://gizmodo.com/scientists-beam-space-based-solar-power-earth-first-tim-1850500731

Comments

[acelightning73]

I remember some of the early SF novels that incorporated "solar power beamed to earth from reflectors in orbit", and there were always large dead zones where the beam touched the ground. And regions where aircraft and spaceships couldn't fly because flying through the beam would destroy the electronics, and maybe kill all the people aboard. (And sometimes they just run the power through the support structur for the space elevator.)

[thewayne]

My wife Russet is a PhD astronomer/astrophysicist, our lodger Dave is an EE, and we're all scifi geeks.  Russet also stopped just barely short of having her private pilots license.  We were discussing things along these lines last night.

[acelightning73]

I had graduated from high school with the intention of becoming a physicist. I had also tried to talk my parents into paying for flying lessons for me (I was in the Civil Air Patrol.) I'm sure you already figured out that I have pretty decent nerd creds :-)

[thewayne]

Oh, you most certainly qualify as an Uber Geek!  Ain't no doubt there, sweetheart! <3 I have - through almost total random chance! - a wonderfully geeky license plate!  When we got my car back in '15 and went to register it, it was almost a comedy of errors.  Somehow multiple people including me, the salesman, the sales manager, and the finance clerk and possibly manager, failed to notice that the title that we gave them was not for my trade, but for my wife's car!  That caused some delayed back and forth which was eventually taken care of, and I got my temporary title to take to the local DMV.  My wife and I go down to get the title filed and permanent plates, and the DMV clerk pulls a license plate out of her drawer: NRD 512. I almost had a nerdgasm.  NRD and a number that was a power of 2!  Computer geek uber cred!  I told the clerk how happy I was and what the 512 represented. And then their computer system crashed and we couldn't complete the transaction. Russet and I went for lunch, came back in about an hour, as the clerk recommended.  Unfortunately she couldn't hold the plate, she had to issue them in sequence, so all we could do was hope.  We grab another ticket, we're eventually called to her window, and she smiles as she pulls out NRD 512! I was, and still am, very happy!  I was at a fast food place and had ordered online, and the teen who brought out my meal said 'Did you know that your license plate almost spells out 'nerd'?  That's cool!'  I acknowledged that and explained the 512 being 2^9th, which he thought was pretty awesome.

[acelightning73]

Thank you for the geek compliment! All the computers on my LAN have names. My previous computer was NCC-1701, and when I got this one, I named it NCC-1701-X ("no bloody A, B, C, or D!" - just X for the newest shiniest starship the Federation could build.) I couldn't get that on a license plate in NJ - you're limited to seven characters.

And when my daughter-in-law gave us her car when ours drowned just before Xmas, she had go give us the title (from NY state) and everything. The NJ DOT is giving us a hard time about registering the car in NJ. (D-in-law got some kind of eye inflammation, possibly COVID-related, and she can't see well enough to drive any more. So they gave us that car. And I've mentioned that they gave me an air fryer because their landlord had to install a new stove, and there's an air-fry function in the new stove. (And my son also bought me a steamer.)

[thewayne]

I don't know if you're familiar with LovelyAngel here on DW.  She's a HUUUGE anime fan and names all of her network devices after anime characters, it's pretty amazing.  She's also a major IT geekette and posts diagrams of how her network is laid out! While my equipment do have individual names, I'm much more utilitarian.  My iPhone is WayPho13, this laptop is WayPro, etc.  I'm going to have to rethink computer names a bit as this laptop is going to need replacing in the not too distant future: it's started completely seizing up every 3-4 weeks, which is unacceptable behavior.

[disneydream06]

I can hear the oil industry grumbling already. :o
Hugs, Jon

[silveradept]

We'd like to know how efficient the transmission was, and whether there would be any kind of issues in scaling up, and all of those other things. I'm sure they're still fine-tuning it in the "enough power to light up an LED" phase before going big.

[thewayne]

Most definitely.  Still, the proof of concept is VERY cool!