Collecting solar power directly from space: Are space solar farms a realistic solution?

As the world marks Earth Day, which is today, we’re going to take a look now at the energy transition and how we can better harness the power of the sun. Photovoltaic panels have been used since the 1970s, but their adaption around the world remains limited. This due to technical challenges and weather issues as well. Now, that’s why scientists have been exploring the idea of capturing solar energy directly from space. To tell us a bit about that, Julia Seger is with me. And Julia, just explain that to us then, how can we capture solar energy from space itself? Well, let’s look first, first of all, at why there are numerous reasons. There are indeed several challenges linked to solar panels here on Earth. There’s the lack of suitable location for installing those solar panels. There’s, of course, the degradation of installations over time. There’s the fact that we experience a day night cycle here on Earth and the fact that there are intermittencies linked to weather disturbances. And this creates production deficits that leads people to have to revert back to fossil fuels. And This is why scientists are trying to find a better way to harness the energy of the sun because it’s kind of ironic. We have this huge star that’s emitting all this energy, all this light in a continuous manner, and we just don’t seem to be able to harness it that well. So This is why scientists are looking to harness it directly in space because up there you don’t have intermittency, you don’t have weather conditions, you don’t have night and day cycles. And also the rays are much stronger because they don’t go through the atmosphere. So they’re not attenuated. And the way it would work is pretty simple. Solar panels are are placed on satellites and they’re able to capture that energy is converted then into microwaves and then beamed back to Earth to be converted into electricity and then integrated to the grid. Now, around the world, scientists have been looking into this, trying to study its potential and its feasibility. And no one actually agrees because in the balance you have to put, of course, having to create those farms. So that actually means rocket launches. That induces, of course, a huge carbon footprint, but there’s also a lot of loss of energy when you convert that into electricity. But at the same time, others are going to say that no matter what, the solar light in space is 8 times higher than on Earth. And what’s interesting is that despite those debates between scientists, governments are still pouring a lot of money into those projects. Let it be China, the US, Japan and the European Union as well. OK, so lots of money going into this, Julia. And it is becoming more and more concrete, isn’t it? Well, the most renowned experiment is the solar, the Space solar power demonstrator by Caltech. And they’ve actually completed a huge milestone because a couple of months ago they were able to successfully transmit that energy and beam it back to Earth. So now we have a proof of concept. We know that it can work, but we don’t have much more than that. And the reason why scientists and governments are still looking into it is because we know when we talk about space exploration that if you have a tech breakthrough, things can change very quickly. For instance, when SpaceX, for instance, launched its reusable Falcon X, it reduced the cost of launch by 95%. So they, they want to be ready, they want to have the technology ready if there’s a tech breakthrough to be able to harness this endless and continuous source of energy, of clean energy as well. And finally, Julia, one of the other ideas is to use mirrors. Now this would be to boost the production of photovoltaic power plants with, well, celestial mirrors. You’ve described them as here. Just what does that mean? Well, it’s actually an old idea as well. This dates back to 1929, but it actually could become real now. Here the idea is to put mirrors on satellites and to be able to reflect all of the rays of the sun and direct them towards photovoltaic installations on Earth. And so it would be more this time of a helper, of an enhancer of those photovoltaic installations. But here, of course, scientists are going to have to be very precise and make sure that they are reflecting it indeed onto the installation, not anywhere else. Because of course then, you know, there could be consequences like fires, for instance. But this is another idea that is being, you know, investigated by by scientists. And according to their latest study, it could increase the electricity production of let’s say, 30 large solar parks worldwide by 40 to 60%. So it’s quite interesting indeed. As always, Judy, really fascinating to get a look from you as to what may be coming up. Thank you very much. Julius E Canada for us there.