The Moon Society Forum

After reading the discussion documents i must agree that the Moon Society should urge more research. As for funding that i have no idea. I am a financial ignoramus. There have been demonstrations of power beaming and there is a deal with San Francisco PGE to launch a small powersat up from Earth with several rockets then assemble it in orbit. I wish them luck.

I think we should put all ideas on the table. While it's conceivable that powersats could be built with materials from Earth, it's generally thought that if we make the massive investment in lunar infrastructure it then becomes possible to buld hundreds even thousands of powersats. It's like comparing going out west in a prairie schooner for some or laying down the railroad infrastructure and opening up the frontier for anyone.

We have to look at LPS as well as SPS. Also, what if we used lunar materials and manufactures to build robotic asteroid mining ships that tug small NEOs back to L5? We might not need mighty mass drivers to launch up the cargo for building these ships; we might just use LUNOX and aluminum burning rockets. If we can get some metallic 'oids and some carbonaceous "oids we could even make steel powersats. Steel might be unpopular with Moon miners given the rarity of lunar carbon, but a c-type NEO could supply plenty. Steel is a very versatile metal.

Also, power relay sats might come before full powersats. A relay would bascially be a big "chicken wire" rectenna in GEO with a transmission system and dish antenna for relaying power from remote deserts to populous regions. Would it compete with superconducting cables? I don't know. It seems to me the relay sat would be a lower tech challenge than a full fledged solar power satellite.

For the power relay sats...does the reflection of microwave energy at the power levels we're talking about (several megawatts) produce any kind of perceptible thrust? If so, how do you design around that? Can the amount be quantified?

I don't know the answer. We must also wonder about solar pressure on SPS and if the microwave beam produces significant thrust. Stationkeeping might turn out to be a serious problem.

Perhaps electromagnetic tethers could be used for propellantless stationkeeping for powersats of various kinds. What do you think?

I frankly don't know enough about the subject to even venture a guess, but hopefully someone else out there does.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrodynamic_tether

there are many other websites too if you just search for "electrodynamic tether"