by Anonymous Coward writes:
on Monday August 17, 2015 @09:39PM (#50336207)
Has anyone considered using a semi synchronous orbit with multiple receivers around the world to provide electricity to places at peak times (4pm to 8pm) when electricity is more expensive? I'm curious about the economics of it all.. e.g. how much down time would such a system have (as it's over the pacific say), what's the price of a receiving station, what's the comparative peak vs base load price of electricity? Would the sun still be visible to a satellite in semi synchronous orbit that can beam to a place on earth at 8pm (I imagine so) etc.
A problem with non-synchronous orbits is that 75% of the Earth's surface is ocean, and a vast amount of the remainder is uninhabited, so if a satellite isn't geostationary over the place you want, it will spend much of its time over places where you have no place to put a receiver or no market for power.
Nevertheless, I think that there may be clever solutions with other orbits; it could definitely use more thinking.
1 Angstrom: measure of computer anxiety = 1000 nail-bytes
Why geosynchronous orbit? (Score:0)
Has anyone considered using a semi synchronous orbit with multiple receivers around the world to provide electricity to places at peak times (4pm to 8pm) when electricity is more expensive? I'm curious about the economics of it all.. e.g. how much down time would such a system have (as it's over the pacific say), what's the price of a receiving station, what's the comparative peak vs base load price of electricity? Would the sun still be visible to a satellite in semi synchronous orbit that can beam to a place on earth at 8pm (I imagine so) etc.
Re: (Score:2)
I've looked at various other orbits.
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/n... [nasa.gov]
A problem with non-synchronous orbits is that 75% of the Earth's surface is ocean, and a vast amount of the remainder is uninhabited, so if a satellite isn't geostationary over the place you want, it will spend much of its time over places where you have no place to put a receiver or no market for power.
Nevertheless, I think that there may be clever solutions with other orbits; it could definitely use more thinking.