A first for Mankind: Caltech successfully transmits solar power from space to Earth

[Hamartia Antidote]

Caltech successfully transmits solar power from space to Earth

A satellite launched by Caltech has received and transmitted solar power to Earth, the first time this has been done.

www.pv-tech.org

A satellite launched by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) has successfully received and transmitted solar power back to Earth, the first time solar power has been transmitted to Earth in this manner.

Researchers launched the satellite, known as the Space Solar Power Demonstrator, on 3 January this year, which has tested a number of processes and components. Chief among these is the microwave array for power-transfer low-orbit experiment (MAPLE), an array of flexible lightweight power transmitters placed one foot away from two separate receiver arrays on the demonstrator, which receive light from the sun.

The MAPLE array received sunlight, converted it to direct current and fed the current through the transmitters to light up a pair of lights on the satellite. Critically, these transmitters also transferred energy back to Earth, where Caltech researchers detected the transmitted energy via a receiver on the roof of the university’s Gordon and Betty Moore Laboratory of Engineering, demonstrating that solar power can be gathered in space, and transmitted to Earth.

“Through the experiments we have run so far, we received confirmation that MAPLE can transmit power successfully to receivers in space,” said Ali Hajimiri, Bren professor of electrical engineering and medical engineering and co-director of the Space Solar Power Project, of which the MAPLE array is a part.

“We have also been able to program the array to direct its energy toward Earth, which we detected here at Caltech. We had, of course, tested it on Earth, but now we know that it can survive the trip to space and operate there.”

The researchers also announced that the signal received on Earth appeared “at the expected time and frequency”, and that it matched the frequency shift that the team had expected. The MAPLE array was also not sealed, exposing it and its transmissions to the environmental conditions of space, such as large temperature swings and the presence of solar radiation, so the success of the experiment is encouraging on a number of fronts.

Space-based solar power is an exciting concept for the solar industry, with solar panels built in space not limited by many of the conditions present on Earth. Space-based solar panels would not have their effective hours limited by the day-night cycle experienced on Earth, and there is vastly more room to build and operate facilities.

The sector has received considerable attention in recent years, with a Japanese project led by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry aiming to demonstrate the transfer of power from space to the Earth by 2025.

Historically, satellites have been used for data collection and analysis in the solar sector, but with Caltech’s MAPLE work demonstrating the efficacy of space-based power transfer, and earlier than other groups expected, transmitting solar power directly from space could see greater interest in the future.

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Team — Space Solar Power Project

www.spacesolar.caltech.edu

Principal Investigators​

Professor Harry Atwater
Howard Hughes Professor of Applied Physics and Materials Science; Director, Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis



Professor Ali Hajimiri
Bren Professor of Electrical Engineering and Medical Engineering; Co-Director, Space-Based Solar Power Project



Professor Sergio Pellegrino
Joyce and Kent Kresa Professor of Aeronautics and Professor of Civil Engineering; Jet Propulsion Laboratory Senior Research Scientist; Co-Director, Space-Based Solar Power Project

Project Manager​

Dr. Richard Madonna

Bren Visiting Associate in Aerospace​

DANIEL P. SCHARF

Research Scientists​

Dr. Mike Kelzenberg
Senior Research Scientist in Applied Physics & Materials Science





Dr. Emily Warmann
Assistant Research Staff in Applied Physics & Materials Science




Dr. Terry Gdoutos
Research Scientist in Aerospace

Postdoctoral Scholars​

Pilar Espinet-Gonzalez, Ali Naqavi, Nina Vaidya, Daniel Turk, M. Reza Hashemi

Graduate Students​

Samuel Loke, Christophe Leclerc, Thibaud Talon, Fabien Royer, Michael Marshall, Antonio Pedivellano, Austin Fikes, Matan Gal-Katziri

Alumni​

Jeff Bosco, Dennis Callahan, Tatiana Roy, Jing-Shun Huang, Philip Saive, Manan Arya, Melanie Delapierre, Nicholas Lee, Lee Wilson, Miguel Bessa, Florian Bohn, Behrooz Abiri

 

[Redbeanpaste]

So why can't we wait for solar energy to reach earth to harness it. Why do we need to way lay it in space and send it to earth. Its not like its going to get here any faster....

 

[Tamerlane]

So why can't we wait for solar energy to reach earth to harness it. Why do we need to way lay it in space and send it to earth. Its not like its going to get here any faster....

Yes, that question makes sense. There’s far more solar energy coming to earth than we can harness. Why would we beam it back from a satellite?

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

So why can't we wait for solar energy to reach earth to harness it. Why do we need to way lay it in space and send it to earth. Its not like its going to get here any faster....

Earth's atmosphere apparently blocks much of the power of the sun. Plus the satellite can beam down 24 hours a day.

 

[Jazzbot]

So why can't we wait for solar energy to reach earth to harness it. Why do we need to way lay it in space and send it to earth. Its not like its going to get here any faster....

Read the article for answer:


Space-based solar power is an exciting concept for the solar industry, with solar panels built in space not limited by many of the conditions present on Earth. Space-based solar panels would not have their effective hours limited by the day-night cycle experienced on Earth, and there is vastly more room to build and operate facilities.

 

[DabbuSardar]

So we got the dyson sphere, skynet getting activated by chatGpt, hadron collider producing god and his particle’s somewhere in cheese country, seems like hollywood and simpsons are the best forecasters for our future

Gotta go watch that new transformer movie this weekend

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Caltech researchers show power can be wirelessly transmitted in space; the implications are huge

With backing from Orange County billionaire Donald Bren, wirelessly transmitting power in space opens door to harnessing solar power and beaming it to Earth.

www.pasadenastarnews.com

Caltech researchers show power can be wirelessly transmitted in space; the implications are huge​

A team of Southern California researchers were buzzing this week after an out-of-this-world milestone.


In a kind of galactic Thomas Edison-esque moment, the Caltech team demonstrated, for the first time, their ability to wirelessly transmit power in space and beam a detectable amount back to Earth.


The experiment of space solar power is still very much in its prototype stages, but the implications are potentially game-changing, said Ali Hajimiri, Bren Professor of Electrical Engineering and Medical Engineering at Caltech and co-director of the Space Solar Power Project team.


“In the same way that the internet democratized access to information, we hope that wireless energy transfer democratizes access to energy,” Hajimiri, the experiment’s primary investigator, said in a statement announcing the milestone. “No energy transmission infrastructure will be needed on the ground to receive this power. That means we can send energy to remote regions and areas devastated by war or natural disaster.”


He added: “To the best of our knowledge, no one has ever demonstrated wireless energy transfer in space even with expensive rigid structures.”

In effect, successfully demonstrating that power can be wireless transmitted in space opens the door to harnessing power from the Sun and sending it to Earth.

Along with the rocket fuel for the project was policy fuel: To combat climate change, the U.S. government pledged to make its energy sector pollution-free by 2035.


As it stands, current renewable energy sources lack fossil fuels’ consistency. Solar cells, in particular, suffer atmosphere, weather and nighttime.

But for years, researchers have dealt with what has been an elusive solution: Under development for decades, space solar power, the process of harnessing solar power in space and beaming energy back to earth using solar power satellites, was not just the stuff of sci-fi.


Ten years ago, Caltech formed the Space Solar Power Project, which culminated in a Jan. 3 launch milestone. The launch affirmed hopes about the future of a technology once deemed technically possible but economically infeasible.


Officials tout Caltech’s SSPP project as an example of modern, private-sector aerospace research at work.


The project has been fully funded from private sources, developed at a private institution, and the experiments were launched by Momentus, private-sector aerospace company, mounted aboard a Momentus platform.


But the project really got off the ground in 2011 when billionaire real estate developer Donald Bren approached Caltech with a proposal to fund research into space solar power. Bren pledged a donation of more than $100 million to be paid throughout the lifespan of the project.


Additionally, Northrup Grumman Corporation, a military and aerospace company, pitched in $12.5 million.


Bren, in the announcement last week, said the milestone was a major step forward.


“The hard work and dedication of the brilliant scientists at Caltech have advanced our dream of providing the world with abundant, reliable and affordable power for the benefit of all humankind,” Bren said in the announcement

But how does it all work?


The successful experiment — known as MAPLE, short for Microwave Array for Power-transfer Low-orbit Experiment — demonstrated two key functions: the ability to send a concentrated beam of energy to receivers at will and the possibility of beaming power to a specific location on Earth.


Space Solar Power involves collecting solar energy in space, converting that energy into electromagnetic waves and beaming those waves to receivers on Earth. The benefit is that solar cells in space are able to collect eight to nine times more power than solar cells on Earth by eliminating the inefficiencies of atmosphere, seasons and the day-night-cycle.

The first of the MAPLE experiments tested the technology’s ability to successfully direct a beam of energy at a precise location in the harsh environment of space.

To do it, Hajimiri’s team directed a microwave beam from the transmitter arrays in space to one of two LEDs also onboard the satellite. Each LED individually lit up when the microwaves were directed at its receiver, proving that the beam could be precisely directed at targets.


A second experiment consisted of directing the energy beam from MAPLE to a receiver on the roof of the Moore Laboratory on Caltech’s campus.


By ensuring that the receiver on earth picked up the signal at a predetermined time and frequency the researchers at Caltech were able to conclude that they had successfully received energy on Earth from the orbiting experiment.

The SSPP team envisions a future where fleets of thousands of lightweight solar satellites orbit the globe, collecting solar energy and beaming it down to receivers on the ground.


Alongside the MAPLE experiment, the Momentus satellite also holds experiments testing ultralight photovoltaic technologies and flexible, lightweight spacecraft structures, both of which will be integral for the realization of this vision.

Additional results from MAPLE, along with data from the other experiments onboard, are being collected by the SSPP team.

Caltech President Thomas F. Rosenbaum said the milestone foreshadows “a remarkable payoff for humanity: a world powered by uninterruptible renewable energy.”

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

How Wireless Energy From Space Could Power Everything | Ali Hajimiri | TED​