Here’s the Pentagon report on this:
http://www.nss.org/settlement/ssp/library/final-sbsp-interim-assessment-release-01.pdf
You might want to check out the Executive Summary, in particular.
They laughed at Galileo. But he was right.
They laughed at Bozo the Clown.
Therefore…
I always account for the worth of something as a measure of dispensability. If humanity couldn’t do without it, it’s priceless.
The owner better keep that out of My bedroom or I’ll sue him for € 999 billion gazillions!
And don’t get Me started with those tidal waves and werewolves…
Therefore … Bozo the Clown was played by Galileo!
Therefore, laughter makes the world go…'round?
Read the linked paper. Things this plan would require to set up lunar solar collectors and microwave transmitters to Earth
- Dramatically bring down cost of launch to space.
- Build 20 to 40 permanent manned bases on the Moon’s surface, including near side and far side. Each base will be the equivalent of 1 Very Large Antenna. (27 antennas, each 25 m diameter and weighing 209 metric tons)
- Develop techniques and equipment to mine, refine, process, and build lunar materials into the base components, including hab modules, solar cell collectors, and microwave antenna equipment.
- Build several thousand receiver stations on Earth that provide the collective area of 100,000 km[sup]2[/sup].
- Build a fleet of satellites to relay power from the moon to those receiver antennas and then to the surface stations (because the Earth rotates).
- Create an organization the size and complexity of the International Space Station agency to plan and oversee the execution of the project.
All of that is merely technical challenges, not accounting for the psychological hurdle to convince people that beaming that much microwave power at the Earth’s surface is safe. Sure, the beams are 10% of the solar intensity, and the antenna zones can be closed to humans, but what are the risks of bad aim? And more importantly, what are the risks to someone changing the transmission wavelength, and turning the power transmitter into a death beam? Is the system terrorist/hacker/mad dictator proof?
Sure, the technical challenges could be overcome in 10 years - if you dump more money into the project than was spent on Apollo. They want 10% of the GDP. Apollo had, like, 2% of GDP at its height of funding. Um, yeah, I see that happening. Especially now, in our current economic situation.
That site is weird. It claims no one owns the Moon so no one can sell it, but then claims to be selling real estate property on the Moon. 
Also, they do something weird with their links. I right-clicked on the link to see what they meant about renaming a lunar crater, I get a weird pop up box telling me everything on that site is copyrighted. I can’t copy/paste the link. And clicking the link opens the site main page.
Goobers.
Did they? Any examples you can point me to?
I encourage folks to read all the linked papers, and also listen to Dr. Criswell’s taped radio interview, as well. The questions you pose are good, and all were addressed.
According the the executive summary of the Pentagon report on Space Based Solar Power, we can definitely build this thing to be safe and effective: http://www.nss.org/settlement/ssp/library/final-sbsp-interim-assessment-release-01.pdf
Apparently, the beam risks are low enough that proposals include locating rectennas above industrial complexes and farmland. In other words, the focus of the microwave field can’t become tight enough to create a “death ray”. It’s nothing like standing/working too close to a microwave communications repeater, either.
If recollection serves me, your cell phone against your head is a riskier proposition.
As to the mad dictator/terrorist scenario, Criswell’s version couldn’t be weaponized, and of course, access and control security would be baked-in. The major risk wouldn’t be someone zapping opponents, but I suppose, withholding supply and/or using rates to manipulate trade advantages - all the more reason for the U.S. to take leadership position within a coalition.
However, this thing shouldn’t be a government-run enterprise. It leverages government resources up-front, no different than we did with nuclear power plants, long-distance transmission lines, wind turbine technology, even telephone lines. This is a business.
At present, Japan is planning a more costly system that uses lasers, which can certainly be weaponized. Also, China has an aggressive space program squarely aimed at the moon, and has now begun working with Russia on unrelated energy projects.
Comparing this thing to Apollo is apples to oranges.
For one, this is a business. For another, U.S. taxpayer space investment over the decades provides the knowledge base this system rests on. Space investment has returned orders of magnitude on taxpayers’ dollars. We’ve already got skin in this game, if we choose to do this. It’s ludicrous not to.
The money we’ll spend is for cheap, safe, clean, electricity - on a system that will deliver it without long distance transmission lines, ensuring global economic development - without making the planet uninhabitable in the process.
Elon Musk looked at Space Based Solar Power, decided the first step was to bring down launch costs. That’s why he started Space-X.
Space-X now has completed successful missions to the International Space Station.
Elon Musk isn’t the only one who understands this thing, either.
Here’s one:
In part:
"At that time, the late eighteenth century, horse-drawn railways were used to carry coal and iron from mines in the South Wales Valleys and other industrial centres.
But Trevithick recognised that a steam engine on wheels - a locomotive - would be more effective than horses at pulling heavy loads.
A rival ironmaster - believed to be Richard Crawshay - dismissed the idea as preposterous."
From:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/southeast/halloffame/historical_figures/richard_trevithick.shtml
Way back in the day someone wrote a song about microwave energy transmission from a station at the Lagrange 3 point. It was in some Sci-Fi mag. Sung to the tune of “Home on the Range” and “Oklahoma!” it went like this.
[Home On The Range]
Oh, give me a home, where the gravitions roam.
Where the three body problem is solved.
Where microwaves play down at three degrees K,
And the cold virus never evolved.
Home, home on Lagrange,
Where the space debris always collects.
We posses so it seems
Two of man’s greatest dreams,
Solar power and zero-G sex.
You don’t need no oil
Or a Tokamak coil.
Solar stations provide Earth with juice.
Power beams are sublime
So no one will mind -
if we cook the occasional goose.
[Oklahoma! theme]
All the cattle are standing like statues.
All the cattle are standing like statues.
They smell of roast beef every time I ride by----
And the hawks and the falcons are dropping like flies.
[Home On The Range]
I’m sick of this place,
it’s just McDonald’s in space.
And living here’s really a bore.
Tell the civvies don’t cry…
They can kiss me goodbye…
Cause I’m moving next week
To L4.
Why it never won an Emmy is beyond me.
Wake me up when anybody sends people into orbit and returns them safely. That’s when I’ll start being interested in private space ventures.
As for trillion dollar microwave power stations… Not in my lifetime. And it’s not me you have to convince. How many converts do you have in Congress, just out of curiosity?
Looks like about a two year nap:
I’m sorry to hear that. I don’t know you, but suicide seems so drastic…
Believe me, if you can just hang in there another 20 years or so, everything will be alright, I promise.
As for Congress, it’s true, there’s far too much ADD over there, but it’s starting to turn around a bit. That’s precisely the point of discussions like this one.
The Pentagon study did have this to say about that:
" FINDING: The SBSP Study Group found that SBSP is an idea that appears to generate significant interest and support across a broad variety of sectors.
Compared to other ideas either for space exploration or alternative energy, Space‐Based Solar Power is presently not a publicly well‐known idea, in part because it has no organizational advocate within government, and has not received any substantial funding or public attention for a significant period of time.
Nevertheless, DoD review team leaders were virtually overwhelmed by the interest in Space‐Based Solar Power that they discovered. What began as a small e‐mail group became unmanageable as the social network & map‐of‐expertise expanded and word spread. To cope, study leaders were forced to move to an on‐line collaborative group with nearly daily requests for new account access, ultimately growing to over 170 aerospace and policy experts all contributing pro‐bono. This group became so large, and the need to more closely examine certain questions so acute, that the group had to be split into four additional groups. As word spread and enthusiasm grew in the space advocacy community, study leaders were invited to further expand to an open web log in collaboration with the Space Frontier Foundation. The amount of media interest was substantial. Activity was so intense that total e‐mail traffic for the study leads could be as high as 200 SBSP‐related e‐mails a day, and the sources of interest were very diverse. "
-From page 17 http://www.nss.org/settlement/ssp/library/final-sbsp-interim-assessment-release-01.pdf
I read the executive summary, as well as skimmed the Science & Technology, Logistics & Infrastructure, and Strategy and Security sections. I cannot find anything addressing the safety of the microwave transmitters or preventing them being turned into a death ray. Ah, just found it under Policy & Legal.
It seems to be claiming that the wavelengths chosen combine with the distance from geosynch to ensure that the energy density will be low enough not to be a risk. However, I would want to ensure the rectennas could not be refocused to a different wavelength. Certainly the mentioned Japanese system using lasers would be riskier.
I did read a bit about this when reading up on the Space Elevator concept. One of the justifications for developing the Space Elevator was to reduce launch costs to the level that space power satellites become economically feasible. There was a short section there describing some of what you mention.
Everything I read in that report backs up the long list I made. They make the same points. They are calling for launching/building satellites over 10 times the mass of the ISS, several kilometers across, and placed in Geosynch instead of low Earth orbit. This is not a “simple” plan by any stretch of the imagination. Robotics and automation may be highly involved in the assembly process, but it’s still on a scale larger than anything we’ve ever accomplished - including Apollo.
Apollo is the closest thing we have to a benchmark to understand the scope of what is required. Your proposal is a Lunar power station, not just Geosatellites. And using lunar materials to build the equipment. You are right, it is apples and oranges - Apollo is a tiny apple compared to the orchard of oranges this proposal entails. The paper you cite mentions Apollo and Manhattan Project as examples.
I’m not saying this is impossible. It may even be inevitable. But it won’t be simple or cheap. 10% of the world’s GDP is not cheap or simple.
I have hopes that a space elevator may be started in 20 years. But not finished.
Because so many in Congress are reading here. Not that it would help. Meet the House Science Committee.
That study is dated 2007. Your side has not taken a single step forward in five years. At this rate the program will get off the ground at approximately the same time that the sun swells to encompass the earth.
Well, according to NASA the weight of the moon is: 81 quintillion tons.
The moon is made of green cheese, a common price for blue cheese (the closest I could find) is $18/pound.
That’s 81,000,000,000,000,000,000 x 2000 x 18, so the moon is worth $2,916,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
Well, we all know that the moon is not made of green cheese.
But what if it were made of barbecue spare ribs, would you eat it then?
It’s a simple question ed. Would you eat the moon if it were made of ribs?
Beef or pork? What kind of bbq sauce? What spices?
Do I have to share?
What you see in that report is a focus on putting a cloud of generating satellites up. That’s overall the more expensive and complex approach, but also the easiest to get started with.
In fact:
The ball appears to be rolling.
Electricity from solar satellite makes economic and security sense for running military field operations within conflict and disaster recovery areas. It also makes sense for demonstration, and to some extent, to bootstrap private sector space capability.
Two major issues with solar satellite as main focus:
-
The earth’s major population expansion is in developing countries, and the price of electricity from solar satellite means the economies in those countries are held back, won’t be keeping pace with population growth - and to grow at all, will be stuck with coal and oil.
-
Ever see an illustration of how crowded Earth orbit has become? Believe it or not, there’s not enough safe orbital real-estate available where we need it, to be generating much of what we need from orbit.
So, why the focus on satellites? Check out the guest list contributing to the party, er, study. Many of them would make their money by maximizing launched mass. The satellite system means every pound/kilo that goes into generating electricity MUST be launched.
Every satellite with a discrete on-orbit propulsion/maneuvering system. And a finite orbital life before it becomes troublesome space junk.
The Lunar Solar Power system would use relay satellites around both earth and moon, not a blanket of generators. Far less stuff to maintain in orbit. Significantly less mass is launched, to achieve a parity of capacity. Generating capacity actually scales up faster, once the demonstration is established.
The best news, in my view, isn’t just that Space Based Solar Power is considered feasible and practical, but that even the solar satellite version of it is being pursued.
SpaceX is developing a heavy lift system for Mars and Moon missions, Falcon Heavy. The demo flight is on the manifest for 2013, and a DoD mission is already booked. The system will be human rated, and projected launch costs are far less than anyone ever imagined.