Oxfordshire: Space solar farm could be operational by 2035, firm says - BBC.com
Oxfordshire: Space solar farm could be operational by 2035, firm says - BBC News
Oxfordshire: Space solar farm could be operational by 2035, firm says
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A technology firm is producing solar farms for space which it says could help meet some of the UK's future energy needs.
Space Solar, based in Harwell, Oxfordshire, is designing a 2km-long array which would orbit above the Earth.
It would beam energy created back to receivers in a similar way to mobile phone signals.
It is hoped it could be operational as soon as 2035.
Sam Alden, from Space Solar, said: "Space-based solar power has long been considered the ultimate clean energy source.
"We're really going to be able to make a material impact on net zero and a bright future for the planet."
He credits innovations in re-usable space launches for making the project "economically viable".
The technology would make more renewable energy than is possible from their Earth-based equivalents and would be active all of the time, the company said.
Mr Alden said the antenna fields use half the land area of terrestrial solar energy farms and one tenth the area of off-shore wind farms - it also produces 13 times greater energy than traditional renewables.
He said his company's target was "to deliver 20% of earth's energy supply using 600 satellites".
The government has invested £6m into space solar research projects in the UK and £5m in an international project called CASSIOPeiA.
CASSIOPeiA, which also has a base at Harwell, is one of the organisations overseeing the project.
Related Knowledge Center: ENERGY BASICS: solar
Declining costs and government encouragement have resulted in a rapid increase in solar energy production in the United States over the past 10 years, although solar’s share remains small: 1.6 percent of all electricity generation in 2018. That rapid growth is projected to continue.