Why China’s space-based solar power is the next frontier of green energy

Illustration: Craig Stephens Amid turmoil in the Middle East, including the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly a quarter of the world’s seaborne oil passes, Beijing is pressing ahead with its Zhuri (sun-chasing) project to build solar power stations in space.

Chinese Academy of Engineering academician and senior rocket scientist Long Lehao likened this space-based solar power programme to putting the Three Gorges Dam into geostationary orbit, underscoring its extraordinary scale and ambition.

China plans to conduct a megawatt-level in-orbit test by around 2030.

Space-based solar power refers to orbital systems that collect solar energy via satellites equipped with enormous solar panels, convert it into microwaves or laser beams and send it wirelessly to ground-based rectennas, which then feed electricity into the grid.

The appeal is obvious: unlike terrestrial solar, it operates continuously – unaffected by weather, seasons or nightfall.

The concept is not new.

Science fiction author Isaac Asimov popularised the idea in his 1941 short story Reason, while aerospace engineer Peter Glaser published the first technical design for an orbital solar power system in 1968.

In the 1970s, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) confirmed its feasibility before concluding that engineering complexity and launch costs made it economically unviable.

But that is now changing.

Advances in robotics, wireless power transmission and sharply falling launch costs are narrowing the gap between concept and reality.

Major space powers are taking notice.

An astronaut aboard China’s Tiangong space station conducts an eight-hour mission to fix a damaged solar panel in March 2024.

Photo: CCTV Listed as a key national research programme since 2008 and advanced through a state-approved proposal in 2013, China’s space-based solar power initiative is well under way, supported by state investment and institutional coordination.

Milestones have since followed.

In 2019, the China Academy of Space Technology announced plans for a 200-tonne megawatt-level orbital power station by 2035, and later outlined plans for wireless power transmission experiments in low Earth orbit by 2028.

Longer-term ambitions are even greater.

By 2050, a Chinese Academy of Sciences road map envisions a commercially viable gigawatt-scale station.

If realised, it could generate as much energy in a year as all the recoverable oil on Earth.

Beijing’s intere

原文链接: 南华早报