SPACE.com: Breakthrough coming? Iceland could get solar power from space in 2030 (demonstration project)
https://www.space.com/iceland-space-based-solar-powerBreakthrough coming? Iceland could get solar power from space in 2030
By Tereza Pultarova published October 24, 2024
The space-based solar power demonstration aspires to be the world's first.
British startup plans to supply solar power from space to Icelanders by 2030, in what could be the world's first demonstration of this novel renewable energy source.
The
space solar power project, announced on Monday (Oct. 21), is a partnership between U.K.-based Space Solar, Reykjavik Energy and Icelandic sustainability initiative Transition Labs.
It intends to launch a demonstrator
satellite by 2030, which will beam to
Earth 30 megawatts of clean energy enough to power about 3,000 homes.
The power-beaming satellite will weigh 70.5 tons (64 metric tons), be about 1,312 feet (400 meters) wide (including its solar arrays) and circle the planet in medium Earth orbit, a near-space region at altitudes between 1,241 miles and 22,000 miles (2,000 and 36,000 kilometers).