Space Solar Power - by Futurist David Houle

[Palmstream]

John Mankins and his team have demonstrated wireless power transfer over 90 miles from one Hawaiian island to another, about the distance from space to ground. Demo was broadcast 9/12/08 on the Discovery Channel. This confirms SSP theory by end-to-end hardware. Congress and the new president should listen to Mankins regarding space/energy/environment policy. He thinks a pilot plant at geo can happen in 10 years with funding commitment.

[EvolutionShift]

There will explosive growth of renewable energy between now and 2020. By then we should be able to live without mideast oil. Hopefully by then the Mideast countries will have become much more open and integrated into the rest of the world.

[jonnyfuxtik]

I would love to see petroleum as worthless as whale oil became before it. It's overdue. Ending any further interest in the Mideast. Laugh about how powerful OPEC used to be to us. With absolutely no other marketable resources, they can then return to the dirt poor tent dwelling religious fanatics they were 50 years ago. We could finally be completely self sufficient, needing nothing from the world abroad.

[GalileoRad]

Hopefully NSSO and others are on it with powerpoints at the ready. January starts a new clock, doesn't it?

[EvolutionShift]

All good points. Now to get governments around the world to commit to this vision/solution. Spread the word!

[GalileoRad]

A fully deployed SSP program would use a cis-lunar infrastructure for mfg, with workers and their families eventually living in high-orbiting rotating (1g) habitats. Infrastructure can then build large rotating (1g) interplanetary science ships which can be powered by outward-directed SSP beams. As SSP industry ramps up over 50 years, greenhouse gas contribution ramps down, preserving the biosphere. The sun can provide all energy for earth and space cities. Oil certainly needed for other mfg!