Time to Think

Lunar Solar Power

Recently, the idea of wireless power transmission commonly known as power beaming has been very hot among the scientists. One of the application of this technique is proposed by Dr. David Criswell who is the Director of the Institute for Space Systems Operation at the University of Huston (TX). Based on this proposal, solar power is collected on the surface of moon (that is always facing the earth) using huge solar arrays and the electricity generated by them is then directed toward a microwave transmitter which transform it to microwave signal at 2.5GHz. The high power radio signals are then beamed toward the earth using high gain antennas. On the surface of the Earth, very large array antennas gather the microwave signals and convert them back to electrical power. Some special satellites are also to be used for relaying the signal to the part of Earth that is not in line of sight with moon.

Of course the process is not as efficient as the wired power transmission but Dr. Criswell has claimed that the approach is completely feasible and economical too. In fact he believes that the cost will be a fraction of a cent per kilowatt electric hour. The details of this approach is available in here and here.