Post
by mistermack » Sun Aug 25, 2013 8:24 pm
I can't see this being a runner. If the receiver has to be so gigantic, they you might just as well go for a solar array of the same size and price, in the desert. No need for a satellite. The problem is getting the energy to where it's needed.
It's areas of high population density, that need most energy. But if you're going to beam energy from space, it's safer to beam it at areas of low population.
I think that the swarm idea, might actually work, if you had a swarm of individual lasers, in space, all pointing their beams at one collector. Each one could be designed to be too weak to do any damage on it's own, if it pointed at the wrong place.
You could have it controlled, so that it switched off very quickly, if it didn't point at the right spot.
As it's very unlikely that two lasers that happened to malfunction would point at the same place at the same time, the capacity for damage would be pretty low. But when they are all working properly, and pointing at the collecting point, you would have very concentrated energy.
While there is a market for shit, there will be assholes to supply it.