Space Solar Power

Space Solar Power Library

SPS-ALPHA: The First Practical Solar Power Satellite via Arbitrarily Large Phased Array. John C. Mankins. NASA NIAC Phase 1 Project. September, 2012, 116 pages. PDF 12 MB.

Space Solar Power: The First International Assessment of Space Solar Power: Opportunities, Issues and Potential Pathways Forward. John C. Mankins, Editor. International Academy of Astronautics. November, 2011, 272 pages. PDF 50 MB.

2011 International Space Solar Power Symposium. Ten video presentations from the May 2011 symposium by John Mankins, Seth Potter, Darel Preble, Paul Jaffe, Thomas C. Taylor, Stehen D. Covey, Al Globus, Naryanan Komerath, Tatsuhito Fujita, and Nobuyuki Kaya.

Sky's No Limit: Space-Based Solar Power, the Next Major Step in the Indo-US Strategic Partnership by Peter A. Garretson. Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, New Delhi. ISDA Occasional Paper No. 9. August, 2010, 174 pages.

Related Op Ed piece in Sakal Times, "Power: The Next Frontier" [PDF 2.2 MB]

Online Journal of Space Communication, Issue #16: Solar Power Satellites. December 2009 (expanded in 2010). This Journal is a project of the Society for Satellite Professionals International and is hosted and managed by Ohio University.

Space-Based Solar Power As an Opportunity for Strategic Security. Report to the National Security Space Office, October 2007, 75 pages.

Executive Summary [HTML]
Full report [PDF 3.5 MB]

Sun Power: The Global Solution for the Coming Energy Crisis, by Ralph Nansen. "Sun Power will help to show that energy from space is a realistic proposal and that it has great commercial potential" (Chris Kraft, former director, Johnson Space Center). "Nansen presents the rationale for solar power satellites in an understandable form devoid of the usual technical jargon to make the subject accessible to the public" (Dr. Peter E. Glaser, inventor of the solar power satellite concept). "The time is again right to bring this very important energy option to the attention of the American public" (Joseph P. Allen, former Space Shuttle astronaut).

Space Power, by G. Harry Stine. Online copy of a 1981 book that provides a comprehensive look at the implicatons of space solar power, written by a participant in the Department of Energy Satellite Power System Concept Development and Evaluation Program.

Ad Astra Special Report on Space-Based Solar Power, Spring 2008

Space Solar Power Video Library:

Space Solar Power: Exploring New Frontiers for Tomorrow's Energy Needs - NASA DVD, 2002 (1 hour 45 minutes)
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Satellite Power System Concept Development and Evaluation Program. An extensive collection of reports from this study conducted by the Department of Energy (DOE) and NASA from 1977 to 1981. This study remains the largest to date. See press briefing about this study for a quick summary.

Lunar Resources Utilization for Space Construction. Study conducted for NASA by General Dynamics Convair Division in 1979 concluded that lunar resources could supply 90% of the material for power satellite production and become cost effective if more than 30 satellites are produced. A nice summary of this study appears in Toward Distant Suns, Chapter 8.

Solar Power Satellites. Office of Technology Assessment, August 1981. 297 pages. Evaluation of the DOE/NASA studies. [PDF 5.5 MB]

Electric Power from Orbit: A Critique of a Satellite Power System. National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences, 1981, 356 pages. Evaluation of the DOE/NASA studies. See article Press Misinterprets NRC Report on SPS and discussion of this report in Sun Power, Chapter 8.

Space Solar Power Program. International Space University, Kitakyushu, Japan, 1992, 530 pages. An overall development plan to demonstrate technologies and progressively evolve toward full commercial implementation of space solar power.

Laying the Foundation for Space Solar Power: An Assessment of NASA's Space Solar Power Investment Strategy. National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences, 2001, 95 pages. An evaluation of NASA's Space Solar Power (SSP) Exploratory Research and Technology (SERT) program conducted in 1999-2000. [PDF 5.7 MB] [HTML] [buy hard copy].

Silent Power - Available chapters from a forthcoming book by the Space Solar Power Workshop at the Georgia Institute of Technology. 204 pages currently available.

International Union of Radio Science (URSI) White Papers on Solar Power Satellite (SPS) Systems (2007)

Additional Papers

2011: A Space Solar Power Industry for $2 Billion or Your Money Back. Al Globus. July 2011. 7 pages [PDF]
2011: Operational Demonstration of Space Solar Power (SSP): Economic Analysis of a First Revenue Satellite (FRS). A. C. Charania, John R. Olds, and Dominic Depasquale, Spaceworks Enterprises. 7 pages. [PDF]
2011: Towards an Early Profitable PowerSat Part II. Al Globus. May 2011. 15 pages. [PDF]

2011: US-India Power Exchange Towards a Space Power Grid. Brendan Dessanti, Nicholas Picon, Carlos Rios, Shaan Shah, Narayanan Komerath, Daniel Guggenheim School of Aerospace Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology. International Space Development Conference, May, 2011. 9 pages. [PDF]

2010: Kalam-National Space Society Energy Technology Universal Initiative. R. Gopalaswami, October 2010. 13 pages. [PDF]
2010: Towards an Early Profitable PowerSat. Al Globus. October 2010. 7 pages. [PDF]
2009: Space-Based Solar Power: Possible Defense Applications and Opportunities for NRL Contribution. Naval Research Laboratory, Washington DC, 23 October 2009 (updated from 23 November 2008). 107 pages. [PDF 3.0 MB]
2009: Financial and Organizational Analysis for a Space Solar Power System: A Business Plan to Make Space Solar Power a Reality. Sun Xin, Evelyn Panier, Cornelius Zund, Raul Gutierrez Gomez. Toulouse Business School, France. May 18, 2009. 179 pages. [PDF 10.7 MB]
2009: Space Water: The Vision for Producing Fresh Water Using Space Power, Space Water Consensus Group, www.spacewx.com, April 2, 2009. 17 pages. [PDF]
2008: The End of Easy Energy and What To Do about It. A White paper by Michael Snead. 126 pages [PDF 5.5 MB]. Also a 2-page summary "America's Energy Future is at Risk without Space Solar Power" [PDF 400K]
2008: Recommendation on Space-Based Solar Power. U.S. Chamber of Commerce Space Enterprise Council. 3 pages. [PDF 31K]
2004: Reinventing the Solar Power Satellite. Geoffrey A. Landis. NASA/TM-2004-212743. 35 pages. [PDF 399K]
2000: Final Report NSF-NASA Workshop on Autonomous Construction and Manufacturing for Space Electrical Power Systems. 51 pages. [PDF 268K]
1997: A Fresh Look at Space Solar Power: New Architectures, Concepts, and Technologies. John C. Mankins. International Astronautical Federation IAF-97-R.2.03. 12 pages. [PDF 629K] [HTML]
1985: Solar Power Satellite Built of Lunar Materials. Space Research Associates study for the Space Studies Institute. Provided courtesy of Space Studies Institute. 100 pages. [PDF 1.5 MB]
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