Japan Plans $21B Space Power Plant 550
Mike writes "Japan has announced plans to send a $21 billion solar power generator into space that will be capable of producing one gigawatt of energy, or enough to power 294,000 homes. The project recently received support from Mitsubishi Electric Corp. and IHI Corp, who are now teaming up in the race to develop new technology within four years that can beam electricity back to Earth without the use of cables. Japan hopes to test a small solar satellite decked out with solar panels by the year 2015."
Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:2, Interesting)
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Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Recession means "lack" of spending behavior, not "lack" of money. Often spending on promising technologies has important spin-off applications which bolster the economy / people spend money.
That seems to be the exact opposite problem of what we have in America. We thought we had way more money that we even thought we had. When the magicians disappeared, all the make-believe money that was coursing through the veins of the economy dried up and caused the businesses who were relying on people spending that make-believe money to burn out and fail. It was the lack of money that caused the lack of spending, not the lack of things to buy.
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:5, Informative)
Recession means "lack" of spending behavior, not "lack" of money. Often spending on promising technologies has important spin-off applications which bolster the economy / people spend money.
That seems to be the exact opposite problem of what we have in America. We thought we had way more money that we even thought we had. When the magicians disappeared, all the make-believe money that was coursing through the veins of the economy dried up and caused the businesses who were relying on people spending that make-believe money to burn out and fail. It was the lack of money that caused the lack of spending, not the lack of things to buy.
Nope, it's exactly the problem. The economy was cruising right along while people were (over) spending. The entire reason that the auto industry is in tough times is because people have been reducing their spending and putting off their car purchases. The economy was just fine when we were spending money, the problem was the money was from credit based on overvalued assets (such as houses).
This also explains why it takes time to get out of a recession. People need to spend money for companies to have the income to hire more employees, who can then buy other more stuff.
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:5, Insightful)
When the magicians disappeared, all the make-believe money that was coursing through the veins of the economy dried up and caused the businesses who were relying on people spending that make-believe money to burn out and fail.
Money and wealth are arbitrary values of measurement set by society, businesses, government, or between individuals as it is.
If you are trapped on an desert island with a suitcase full of gold, it won't seem that valuable compared to your neighbors crate of canned foods, or the guy with the can opener.
That said, the gap between utility and wealth often becomes over extended and bubbles will happen.
Just because society thinks something is valuable often does not increase its utility and the lack of value sometimes does not actually decrease utility of the commodity.
Although, if you have organizations like the IRS, world's largest prison system, and nuclear weapons you can make your money valuable by simple force of will.
Think about that next time you pay taxes or buy gas.
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:4, Funny)
If you are trapped on an desert island with a suitcase full of gold, it won't seem that valuable compared to your neighbors crate of canned foods, or the guy with the can opener.
Actually, gold bricks can do more damage at impact than canned foods ...
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I'm not a retrograde gold-standard-er, but I think it's importatnt to understand that "wealth" in the modern global economy exists only as an abstraction, and can vanish just by people losing faith in it.
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It was the lack of money that caused the lack of spending, not the lack of things to buy.
The lack of money is just as imaginary as the abundance of money that preceded it.
No. I don't know if I'm being funny or not. Why do you ask?
Japan has the resources and the government... (Score:5, Informative)
If you just woke up from a coma, America went through 8 years of voodoo economics, record deficit spending by a runaway congress, a jobless recovery, and an economy propped up with record low interest rates that lead to a housing bubble. Combine that with a failure to monitor the largest financial institutions because of an ideological aversion to regulation, and you have a perfect financial storm.
Meanwhile, Americas's financial frenemies are exploiting an arbitrage on labor and environmental costs, along with currency manipulation and protectionism, to supercharge their economies.
Now that you're up to date, we have a new American President who is not beholden to special interests, especially energy interests, who has some vision for a clean energy future. Japan has just announced a bold new project to generate photovoltaic energy and some Americans are very curious.
All of that was sardonic. What do you not understand?
Re:Japan has the resources and the government... (Score:5, Insightful)
Now that you're up to date, we have a new American President who is not beholden to special interests, especially energy interests, who has some vision for a clean energy future.
When did Obama resign?
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>>>we have a new American President who is not beholden to special interests,
Except that he's already met with the insurance CEOs and promised not to negotiate pricecuts during the next 10 years. In exchange the companies are supposed to endorse his Uncle Sam healthcare. (And why wouldn't they if they are guaranteed to be paid big bucks by the government, and without hassle.)
Oh yeah - I almost forget RIAA. Last I heard Obama's assigned 4 of their lawyers to his administrative posts... lawyers wh
Re:Japan has the resources and the government... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's shocking. It's almost as if he's in charge of _exactly the same country_ as the last guy was.
Don't they have a tradition of launching all three hundred million people into the sun every four years so they can get a clean start on things?
Re:Japan has the resources and the government... (Score:4, Insightful)
What, that's the best you got? The first one is called politics, that's how things actually work. Inspiring ideals-filled speeches are great for getting the public opinion behind you, but when it comes to getting the job done, you have to get your hands dirty and compromise left and right to even get a faint shadow of what you promised to happen. If you compromise with a powerful lobby behind closed doors then you won't have to compromise in the bills you want to pass to keep them happy.
As for the RIAA lawyers, allow me to dismiss it as general lawyer-bashing. Lawyers do what they have to to win for whoever pays them. They were picked because they were good lawyers. It doesn't matter what they did before (as long as it was legal), lawyers are the military of the justice system, they'll shower your ass with legal napalm and white phosphorous to accomplish their mission.
Not beholden to special interests you say? (Score:5, Insightful)
we have a new American President who is not beholden to special interests, especially energy interests,
Maybe not energy interests, but if he wasn't on the take from media interests he would have cut the US out of ACTA [wikipedia.org] negotiations by now, especially since he was talking all about transparency and making himself out to be a technophile during his campaign (so much for that). [wired.com] He's also made a habit of appointing RIAA lawyers to his administration. [wired.com]
Re:Japan has the resources and the government... (Score:4, Informative)
Japan has just announced a bold new project to generate photovoltaic energy and some Americans are very curious
In case you weren't paying attention, this follows a similar announcement by the state of California (although I seem to recall their proposal being a bit smaller - in fact it's mentioned in TFA: 200MW, as opposed to 1GW for the Japanese plant). It's a marginally less silly idea when Japan suggests it because they don't really have much landmass that's suitable for solar power generation, but it's still not actually a good idea.
Once you factor in the energy cost of getting into orbit, it's a silly idea. The lightest solar cells we can produce are 84 mg/cm2. That works out at 840g/m^2. The cheapest flights to orbit cost around $4,300/kg, or $3,612 for a 1m^2 of lightweight solar panel. This panel is hit by about 1kW of sunlight, but the most efficient panels will only output around 400W from this (the lightest are not the most efficient, but we'll gloss over that for now). The highest cost of wholesale electricity I can find is around $1000/MWh, or $1/kWh, or $0.4 for every hour of operation. To recoup just the launch costs, this magical solar cell would have to operate for one year.
Now, these are best-possible-case figures. In practice, the efficiency is likely to be a shade under 20%, which doubles the ROI time. The launches are probably not all going to be the cheapest possible, and the solar panels aren't the only thing that needs lifting up (you need the frame, the microwave transmitter, and so on). I've also been assuming 100% efficient power transmission to the ground so far. If it's only 50% efficient (which is still pretty high) then double the ROI time again. I also assumed the solar panels themselves were free. Given that the solar wind in orbit is fairly hostile to solar panels, you'd be lucky to get a positive EROI before the panels degraded to such a degree that they were no use.
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You Americans...
Not sure why you're addressing that at me - I'm British. Projecting much?
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How is that informative? What EXACTLY has Obama changed or plans to change?
Oh, right. Very different. Record deficit spending: $700 billion stimulus package... which was just a massive pork project for congress. Lets not forget, Ben Bernanke. Didnt Obama JUST reappoint him to the SAME POST as GW Bush?
Jobless recovery, I believe those were the EXACT same words Obama used to describe our current "recovery" (like we are really in a recovery). Cash for clunkers is responsible spending?!? Exactly how?
Yeah, Obama
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It's not that difficult:
- We had a housing bubble where homes were overvalued at, say, $300,000 but their true value was only $200,000
- When the market corrected itself, and these home prices dropped to their true value, it started a chain of events
- Those businesses with stocks or mutual funds in these homes lost money, bankruptcies spread, and recession happened.
The only good news is that, unlike the crash of 1929, our recession started in 2007 and was a gradual falling-off, so we didn't have a panic. No
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:4, Informative)
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Not the question becomes - what caused the housing bubble? The answer is too easily-available credit was extended to people who should have not received mortgage loans.
Yes, but not completely. Prolonged, artificially low interest rates meant that buying power was increased. This led to high demand, and higher prices. If I can afford $2000 / month mortgage, and the mortgage that $2k will buy at 7% is, say, $220,000 or so, but at 5% will cover a mortgage of $300,000 or so (forgive the approximate math, I'm not about to drag out a financial calculator), it's no wonder that prices floated higher than they rationally should have. Add to that the irrational behavior buyers
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:5, Insightful)
How is it that Keynesians continue to absolutely fail to understand basic cause and effect and the free market? "Lack of spending behavior" is neither the definition or cause of the recession. It is the result of the lack of productive return over the last several years due to terrible investments. Recession is defined as negative GDP growth, or lack of improvement in production, not lack of spending.
In this case, it's a terrible sign that the Japanese are so fed up with investing in the US that they now see hurling money into space as a better alternative.
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:5, Insightful)
In this case, it's a terrible sign that the Japanese are so fed up with investing in the US that they now see hurling money into space as a better alternative.
Yeah but if it works, it'll generate income, there is a risk/reward here, unlike the Keynes "bury money in a mine" scenario.
I could make a smartass remark here about how the US government decided to bury millions of dollars in cable underground in the 1960s, connecting universities and research institutions with an inefficient government boondoggle...
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:4, Informative)
No, actually, it doesn't mean either. It means an overall decline in economic activity across many dimensions taken together, the nearest thing to a single-dimensional rough definition is a decline in production rather than spending. A decline in spending usually occurs during a recession, but its not the same thing as a recession.
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Because once you've done it once, doing it a second time ought to be much cheaper. And once you've worked out the kinks in a "small-scale" project, it's easier to ramp up to bigger projects in the future.
Think of this as costing about $1,428.57 per home, plus about a $20.6B investment in future technologies that the whole world will benefit from, assuming it works.
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Perhaps they value the look of their current roofs?
PG&E is trying to do the same thing in California, BTW, it itsn't so much a Janapese thing as an expensive real estate/NIMBY thing. The NIMBY problem is so bad here that, even with rolling blackouts in the summer, the only place PG&E can build a new power plant is in space. And even then no one will accept the small receiving station in their neighborhood. Man I wish I could move back to Texas.
Re:Didn't Japan just come out ... (Score:5, Interesting)
Rather than spend $71,000 per home to buy some spacetoy, they could just spend $10,000 per home and put the solar panels directly on the roof.
Japan isn't exactly the sunniest place in the world, so solar panels on the rooftops aren't going to provide enough power.
However, if they succeed in developing space-based power, not only can they provide power to themselves, they can build more stations and sell power to other countries too. That could be very profitable. All they have to do is make it cheaper than nuclear power, and lots of places would sign up. If they make it cheaper than coal, then Japan would control a large portion of worldwide energy.
Meanwhile, what exactly is the USA investing in to secure its citizens a place in the future global economy? Real estate loans?
Robots (Score:3, Funny)
I suggest using intelligent robots to manage the Space Power Plant.
Of course, you need to be careful that they don't develop their own religion...
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And don't send those two guys, what are their names? Obnoxous bozos, especially the one with the red hair. It's their fault that the robots got religious, you know. The dumbasses...
SPP (Score:2)
not impressed [iforce.co.nz]
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If you don't find what you see on the picture you've linked impressive, something is wrong with you.
Of course, that's just a drawing, so it's still just vaporware.
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If you don't find what you see on the picture you've linked impressive, something is wrong with you.
Of course, that's just a drawing, so it's still just vaporware.
Yes I'm very much impressed by a screenshot from a game: http://www.egosoft.com/games/x3tc/info_en.php [egosoft.com]
I'll believe it when I see it. (Score:3, Interesting)
To avoid repeating myself...
http://matter2energy.wordpress.com/2009/06/12/space-power/
Re:I'll believe it when I see it. (Score:4, Informative)
Just so we're clear
SpaceX has published launch costs for the Falcon 9 Heavy @ $2,726 per pound, and Elon Musk testified before congress that they have plans to get costs down to $500 per pound.
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> Elon Musk testified before congress that they have plans to get costs down to $500 per pound.
Yeah, so did a lot of people. Remember Orbital Sciences? IIRC they were saying $100/lb. Roton was what, $150/lb? Some of these guys said the same thing to Congress too. The Shuttle was going to $25. Hell, Rockwell was trying to get Congress to let him buy a Shuttle for tourist flights.
Falcon 9 hasn't flown. It has not demonstrated safety, load capacity, turnaround times, manufacturing capability, payload handli
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I was looking at a white paper for Laser based Solar, and they were using Infa-Red Diode Lasers with 50% efficiency to beam down to a concentrator that was focussed on a 20% efficient PV panel on Earth. I asked why they couldn't focus the concentrator on a 27% efficient Stirling Engine instead. I haven't seen an answer back yet.
Cue Standard Replies (Score:5, Informative)
If you are about to post anything about any of the issues below, please at least read the Wiki page on SBSP [wikipedia.org] first. Doing so will save a lot of electrons.
A basic understanding of the technology and physics will debunk all of these, and WikiPedia gives a good overview of these non-criticisms. Anyone continuing to parrot them below will be flogged.
Re:Cue Standard Replies (Score:5, Funny)
Those are all good links and all, but what will they do about the energy lost in transit, or otherwise absorbed into the atmosphere, and would by its very nature contribute to global warming?
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No. The main concern for climate change is that humans are causing a feedback cycle with CO2 that increases the total heat capacity of the system. Once you reach that heat capacity, extra heat just gets thrown into space.
Additionally, any other power source you can imagine will have some efficiency lost as heat, and most of them will be quite a bit worse than beam losses and rectenna efficiency (which is around 90%).
Re:Cue Standard Replies (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Cue Standard Replies (Score:5, Funny)
If you are about to post anything about any of the issues below, please at least read the Wiki page on SBSP [wikipedia.org] first. Doing so will save a lot of electrons.
I read your stupid link and it says nothing about the following:
If all of the above comes to pass, I don't give a fuck what you say, the solar power sat will be upgraded into a death ray and it will be fucking AWESOME.
Re:Cue Standard Replies (Score:4, Interesting)
The wikipedia article is a little vague on the lost-in-transit question, noting only that you can beam it one mile at 80% efficiency.
I found a paper on the subject the last time this came up on /. :
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1069437&cid=26187965 [slashdot.org] ...that boiled down to just 45% transmission efficiency. Or, to get 1GW into the grid on Earth, you have to generate 2.2GW of electricity up in space. Some is lost converting to microwaves and is radiated away up there, some is lost in space before it gets to the atmosphere, some is lost in the atmosphere, some is lost in the reconversion to electricity from microwave. The last two losses come out as heat in the biosphere. A little under 1GW.
And now for the important news: ALL electrical energy turns into heat except that which goes into making products like aluminum from aluminum ore...and even that turns back into heat in the very long run.
More news: all electrical energy except hydro, anything that involves boiling water to turn turbines, runs at maybe 33% efficiency. You'd have to burn 3GW of uranium, or coal, or oil into heat to get out 1GW of electrical energy in any earth power plant.
So, summary: to get 1GW of electricity by almost any means but hydro, you have to dump 2GW into the air or water, immediately, and the remaining 1GW goes into heat when it's used. This technology would dump less than 1GW into the environment immediately, and the other 1GW when it's used. Net SAVING of heat dump into the environment.
And it doesn't matter. Larry Niven's warnings in Ringworld about the trillion Puppeteers "drowning in their own waste heat" to the contrary, waste heat is a tiny percentage of the global warming problem; almost all of it comes from trapping more normal solar heat in the biosphere.
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The third point is nothing. The energy in question is not easily absorbed by the human body or anything else that isn't specifically designed to capture microwaves. This no more contributes to space weaponization than any other activity in space.
Consider yourself flogged.
Re:Cue Standard Replies (Score:5, Informative)
No, it really isn't, not at the frequencies useful for SBSP. These frequencies must be specifically choosen to cut through all the water in the atmosphere (along with anything else). Since human bodies are mostly water, you're not going to absorb very much of the stuff, and what stuff you do absorb will be no different from being on the beach on a sunny day.
If the military wants to weaponize the basic technology, they're going to have to design with it specifically in mind (even if it's possible to use microwaves for this purpose, which it probably isn't). They won't get a useful weapon using the civilian power system. The civilian system might help increase launch capacity and thus make the weapon system cheaper to build, but again, that's no different from any other space activity of this magnitude.
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I'm sure there is no possible way the power transmission system could be changed to emit wavelenths to do something like destroy an ICBM or cause problems with a communication/power infrastructure on earth.
Your sarcasm is actually true. The antennas involved need to be tweaked to a specific frequency for maximum efficiency. If the military wants to do this, they'll need to build their own stuff, which they'd do anyway if they cared to.
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You're assuming the design only has the capability to transmit microwaves.
Which is a pretty good assumption to make, because transmissions at any other frequency (be it IR or some radio frequency) will require a totally different transmission system. An extra system means extra weight, which would increase launch costs on a system that will already be struggling to be economically competitive with ground-based systems.
Using this stuff as a weapon makes a good movie, but poor science.
USA DOD and FEMA (Score:5, Interesting)
Giving power levels in terms of houses is annoying (Score:2)
Over $71k per household? (Score:2)
Re:Over $71k per household? (Score:5, Insightful)
Why is it that people on /. who live and breath new technology always have such a hard time with new technology economics? Why is it so hard to understand that new technology R & D is obscenely expensive relative to the commoditized versions that eventually follow. If everything was left to visionless people who focused solely on short term economics we'd still be living in the technological dark ages with a miserable quality of life.
Before one nay-says, consider the benefits to society should the technology under discussion becomes an inexpensive commoditization.
Re:Over $71k per household? (Score:5, Insightful)
They don't live and breathe new technology -- they live and breathe commodity technology, and think of it as new because they have no familiarity with actual R&D.
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Run the time line a little further. Who says we have to launch pre-fabbed units from earth? As for a market why I'd suspect all earth would find it handy not to have to rely on current land based technologies, particularly fossil fuels, nuclear and hydro. I suspect that beaming power to mobile ground platforms in remote locations and/or disaster areas would be incredibly handy. I also believe it would be quite useful for scientific outposts and colonies off-world. As I see it the better question to ask
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Comments from the future (Score:2)
Comments sent from the future in Japan:
It was like Godzilla came to life. I mean flames shooting from the sky, buildings colapsing in fire, people screaming, ...
It was a subtle miscalculation, it could have happened to anybody... ...looking for the owners of the power platform, who have mysteriously disappeared...
Leap frog (Score:2)
Would it be feasible to put solar collectors outside of earths orbit which in turn transmit to earth orbiting satalties that then relay down.
Could we put something closer to the Sun and leap from back to earth more effeciently than solar winds do?
!fried (Score:2)
I see that someone tagged this story "fried". Well, no.
The microwave beam from a solar power satellite is not strong enough to fry things. It's stronger than sunlight but not scary strong. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power#Safety [wikipedia.org]
The land used for a power-receiving rectenna can still be used for raising cattle, without the cattle becoming super-powered mutants or getting cooked. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space-based_solar_power#Earth-based_infrastructure [wikipedia.org]
It remains to be seen when th
Oh, them unfortunate Japanese (Score:2)
Those poor Japanese get screwed every which way but loose. They have been conditioned to pay $60 for a melon, and now $21 billion for something that will never work. And they don't complain!
Think of this more as a big wet kiss for the Japanese space industry. Just like "Star Wars" was for our military-industrial complex.
There's no way in heck this will ever get within a factor of 100 of being practical or economical.
off topic but (Score:2)
Japan, 2015, orbital power stations and no mention of Gundam?
I must be really old.
Echoing in my head... (Score:5, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Population (Score:5, Insightful)
What will Japan's power consumption be in 10 to 20 years? They're having so few kids the population should be plummeting soon.
We don't need more power, Mr. Scotty. We need FEWER PEOPLE. Pollution would be less of a problem if there were fewer people creating it. Cutting emissions, conserving and finding cleaner sources of energy while all very good... won't mean shit if our growth is still horrifically out of control. With a smaller population we'd have more resources per person and less waste generated.
Similarly, there are no food or water shortages... there ARE places of the world that that too many people for the available resources. If we have 1 gallon per person per day at a population of 100,000... we'd have 2 gallons per person per day if the population of 50,000.
i'm not talking about killing off people or even letting them die. i'm talking about getting the population to something that is sustainable. The quantity of life is going to start seriously farking with our quality of life... and THEN with the quantity. If we don't get it under control we're going to have more wars, more droughts, more everything that sucks.
"easier said than done"
Really? No kidding! Can i have your autograph before you win the Nobel Prize for Pointing out the Obvious?
"But that's mean"
Mean is kids dying of starvation because their parents had too many kids. Mean will be wars over water.
And in related news.... (Score:3, Funny)
The Greenpeace and the International Humane Society have issued a joint statement criticizing the Japanese government for allowing their satellite to destroy the last specimen of this endangered species.
Godzilla had a long history of appearing in Japanese cities, and often caused much damage with each visit. Typically, the creature appeared when some other monstrous threat appeared. Apart from the Windows 7 launch in Tokyo, no one is aware of any significant events that would have drawn the creature to the city.
Because of his history as a destructive source, many people are glad to see the death of the giant lizard. A representative of the Japanese tourism ministry, however, is reported to have said that, "Godzilla's passing will have a profound affect on the people of Japan, and upon the Japanese tourist economy."
Japanese street vendor, Aido Hawishinna, witnessed the event and reported, "It hit the buildings as it fell, and crashed just beyond my stand. It smells like baked fish. I wanted to be the first merchant in the city to sell Godzilla-burgers, but the police and army will not let me harvest the meat before it spoils."
The Japanese government, in an official statement issued hours after the incident, announced that it plans to conduct an autopsy on the remains, to determine if Godzilla's death was related to problems on the orbital microwave power platform.
Re:seriously? (Score:4, Insightful)
I could be mistaken, but isn't the cost of this power plant versus a nuclear power plant (which many people argue is the cheapest form of electricity to produce) over 3 times more? Additionally, due to problems with this technology being in its infancy there will undoubtedly be additional costs that were not taken into consideration.
I'm sure everyone will talk about this new "green" for of energy and expect it to be cheap, but they would shit a brick if they found out the actual costs they will be paying for electricity generated in this fashion.
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Japan is a small place with a high population density, and a good number of nuclear plants already. Perhaps they're simply running out of reasonable nuclear sites.
Either way, this opens the way for whole new sci-fi-like plots to do with hijacking power satellites for nefarious purposes, so I'm all for it ;)
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Current power stations being built with two Westinghouse AP1000 reactors are in the $10 billion range, have an estimated life span around 25 years (versus 15), and produce more than twice as much power. This is a very expensive boondoggle in comparison.
Over time maybe the costs can come down. I guess you have to build one to figure out the process in any case.
Re:seriously? (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh and the cost of launching a given mass to space is falling, and will get much lower.
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Nuclear power has those problems only because we throw out 99% of nuclear fuel before we use it combined with the fact that all our nuclear facilities are aging (because we stopped building nuclear power plants) and using 30 to 50 year old technology.
A modern feeder/breeder reactor would be much cheaper and is more "green" than this (remember all that rocket fuel you have burn to launch the orbital platform and a feeder/breeder can use up the "nuclear waste" of obsolete reactors as fuel with minimal waste).
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Re:seriously? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Where I live (Vancouver, Canada) my monthly bill is about $22. I use electric baseboard heaters, too!
Yeah, but using hydro is cheating! :)
Re:seriously? (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, nobody can win an election on the basis of "50 years from now my opponent's policies would cause half of our island to sink!". However, it's easy for someone to say "That guy wants to make you pay twice as much for electricity!". Cue outrage.
True or not, the consequences of global warming are inconceivable to most people. I think we'll need to see some more directly disastrous results before people really base day-to-day decisions on such considerations.
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Re:seriously? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:seriously? (Score:4, Funny)
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It depends; how well would something like this work as a weapon in an emergency? Dual use baby!
It's just the first one. (Score:5, Insightful)
I may be wrong but I think the important thing to remember is that they are paying $21 billion for the development of this space power power plant. If history tells us anything about innovation it's that innovation is costly, but the rewards can be great. Once they get this off the ground, how much will the next one cost? And the one after that? That's the important issue.
Re:It's just the first one. (Score:4, Interesting)
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There is also the risk that they will get struck by space debris.
Not when you have a 1 gigawatt microwave laser cannon!
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Though I don't know for sure, I would think an orbital power station would have some interesting advantages such as improved efficiency in terms of collecting solar energy from a wide range of frequencies or even as simple heat driving a conversion process of some sort that doesn't necessarily rely on moving parts. (Think "pop-pop boats") With fewer if any moving parts in such a power plant and being without atmopshere and gravity to assist in creating friction and corrosion, I would think a power plant i
Re:seriously? (Score:5, Insightful)
Wind is about $1B per gigawatt, and an installation is good for 150 years with generator replacements on average 35-50 years... It also creates thousands of jobs, is easy to repair, and is not a single point terorist threat target...
Direct comparisons aren't as easy as you think. Wind also doesn't scale as easily - you're not taking transmission costs into account, or the massive siting problems. Many of the large wind farms in the Western Interconnect have had - or are having - lots of opposition from the locals who don't want large turbines 'spoiling' (personal opinion) their view, or making noise 24/7. When you put them in out of the way places (which is where the best wind is anyway), then you're generally putting them where there aren't already heavy duty transmission lines. Then when you also add in heavy transmission line costs, you also get to deal with rights of way and environmental impact studies for that entire transmission line route, etc, etc. Wind is not a baseload power source - it varies, which adds costs to how you hook it up to the grid. Orbiting solar will be 24/7/365/forever, plus you can put as many up there as you can afford to, and the cost of these things will come down as our cost-to-orbit drops in the future.
You seem to think this *first* orbiting power station means *only* (hence your 'single point'). There's always gotta be a first. I'd plan on LOTS more of these if I were you.
re: terrorist target
Lots of terrorists targeting Japan? The Taliban has space capability now, too, eh?
I'm not saying this project doesn't have its problems, but you need to put it into perspective.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If only Japan could somehow magically create more open, unfarmable, and uninhabited land where the turbines could be placed without taking away already scarce farm land or slowly deafen anyone within a kilometer!
Unlike nuclear power land for wind turbines can be used for food farming as well. Here in Minnesota many corn farmers site wind turbines on their farms. Platforms for towers don't take much space. And wind turbines aren't as loud as some make them out to be. All those who say they take too much
Re:What is the advantage... (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Even if there was Zero Loss(not possible, ob.) the cost for that much power is very high, [plus the bost of maintaining something in space.
The only thing you gt is you need less solar area to get the power, but big deal.
We have more then enough land on earth to giver everyone ample power for a billion years using industrial solar thermal.
Of Japan could invest the money in some IFR plants.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integral_Fast_Reactor [wikipedia.org]
Re:What is the advantage... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Indeed - they forgot the 'cartbeforethehorse' tag. They're planning on doing this before they even have a way to transmit the power?
Re:What is the advantage... (Score:5, Informative)
...24 hours of sun...
Maybe my geography or astronomy are off - Feel free to correct/bitch-slap me if I'm confused.
How does a satellite in geosynchronous orbit get 24-hours/day of sunlight?
/bitch-slap
The equator and the ecliptic are not on the same plane, which means the only times when a geosynchronous satellite is in eclipse is around the equinoxes. In the worst case it can last up to 80 minutes of shadow.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Note that this only happens twice a year, not every day.
Re:What is the advantage... (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe my geography or astronomy are off - Feel free to correct/bitch-slap me if I'm confused.
How does a satellite in geosynchronous orbit get 24-hours/day of sunlight?
Geosync is way out there. If the satellite's orbit were in the same plane as the Earth's, it would only get blocked for about an hour a day. But since geostationary orbit is inclined to Earth's orbit (as Earth's equator is inclined), it only gets blocked at all during two times of the year; the rest of the time, when it's "behind" Earth relative to the Sun, the Sun shines "over" or "under" the Earth and hits it unimpeded.
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Re:What is the advantage... (Score:4, Insightful)
this is an interesting point. How exactly would the energy ultimately be dissipated ? As heat loss to the environment.....
Re:What is the advantage... (Score:4, Funny)
Receiver at sea? (Score:5, Insightful)
Japan is an island nation. You could someone minimize the risk of injury or loss of (human) life by directing the beat to a receiver on some micro-island, or maybe a floating platform like an oil rig, then have cables run from the island/platform to mainland Japan. That way, if the satellite goes a *little* off target, it's not as likely to people (although it still might harm aquatic life, I suppose, though I bet the potential damage and the risks are less than the damage from an oil platform/pipe/ship accident).
Re:Hmm... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)