The sun is the only star in our solar system. It is primarily composed of hydrogen, followed by helium and a small amount of carbon.
It emits light and heat all the time. Many people will ask: space is almost a vacuum and there is no oxygen, so how does the sun burn?
In fact, the sun does not burn, but a thermonuclear reaction, what we call nuclear fusion. Due to the sun's enormous mass, its center is compressed by gravity to temperatures of up to 15 million degrees. At this temperature, the element hydrogen ignites, resulting in nuclear fusion, a thermonuclear reaction in which four hydrogen atoms fuse. into a single helium atom, releasing energy outwards, releasing up to 4 million tons of energy per second. This is why the sun does not need oxygen and constantly emits energy, providing light.era and warmth to the earth.
Science fiction becomes reality! The space solar power plant is here
The sun continuously radiates energy into the universe in the form of light, which is equivalent to carrying the thermal energy of 5.5 million tons of raw coal to the earth every Second, this is only one 2.2 billionth of the energy of solar radiation. Only 64% of this 1/2.2 billion energy reaches the ground, and the rest is swallowed up by the unforgiving atmosphere. Think about it, what a shame! If we could build a solar power plant in space, convert as much solar energy as possible into electrical energy, and then bring it back to earth, how ideal and of great practical importance would that be?
In space, the intensity of sunlight is 3 to 13 times greater than that on Earth. Can a power plant be installed?
It sounds like science fiction: thisGiant solar arrays floating in space and sending huge amounts of energy back to Earth. For a long time, the concept, first proposed by Russian scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky in the 1920s, mainly inspired writers.
A century later, however, scientists have made enormous progress in making this concept a reality. The European Space Agency has recognized the potential of these efforts and is now seeking to fund these projects, predicting that the first industrial resource we will obtain from space will be "beam power."
Climate change is the greatest challenge of our time, so the stakes are high. From rising global temperatures to climate change, the effects of climate change are already being felt around the world. Meeting this challenge requires fundamental changes in the way we produce and consume energy.
TheseIn recent years, renewable energy technology has developed rapidly, improving efficiency and reducing costs. However, a major barrier to their adoption is that they do not provide a continuous supply of energy. Wind and solar farms can only produce energy when the wind blows or the sun shines, but we need electricity 24 hours a day, every day. Ultimately, before we can move to renewable energy, we need a way to store energy at scale.
aroundA possible way to overcome this problem is to produce solar power in space. This has many advantages. Space solar power plants can rotate facing the sun 24 hours a day. Earth's atmosphere also absorbs and reflects some sunlight, so solar cells above the atmosphere receive more sunlightand produce more energy.
But one of the main challenges is how to assemble, launch and deploy a structure of this scale. A solar power plant can cover an area of 10 square kilometers, the equivalent of 1,400 football fields. The use of lightweight materials will also be crucial because the biggest expense will be the cost of launching the station into space on a rocket.
One proposed solution is to develop a fleet of thousands of small satellites that would be grouped and configured into a single large solar array. In 2017, researchers at the California Institute of Technology presented a design for a modular power plant made up of thousands of ultra-light solar tiles. They also presented a prototype tile weighing just 280 grams per square meter, the equivalent of the weight of a map.
Recently, the development of manufacturing industriesres such as 3D printing are also considering this application. At the University of Liverpool, we are exploring new manufacturing techniques to print ultra-lightweight solar cells onto solar sails. A solar sail is a foldable, lightweight, highly reflective membrane that harnesses the pressure effects of solar radiation to propel a spacecraft forward without fuel. We are investigating how to integrate solar cells onto solar sail structures to create large fuel-free solar power plants.
These methods will allow us to build power plants in space. In fact, it may one day be possible to build and deploy in space the means of the International Space Station or a future Lunar Gateway station in orbit around the Moon. In fact, such a device could help provide electricity to the Moon.
The possibilities never stopnot there. While we currently rely on materials from Earth to build power plants, scientists are also considering using resources from space to build them, such as materials found on the Moon.
Another big challenge will be transporting electricity to Earth. The plan is to convert electricity from solar cells into energy waves and use electromagnetic fields to transmit them to an antenna on the Earth's surface. The antenna then converts the waves back into electrical energy. Researchers led by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency have developed designs and demonstrated an orbiter system that should be able to do just that.
There is still a lot of work to be done in this area, but the goal is that in the coming decades, solar power plants in space will become a reality. Chinese researchers ont designed a system called Omega which they aim to have operational by 2050. The system should be able to deliver 2 gigawatts of power to the Earth's grid at peak performance, which is a huge number. To produce that much electricity from solar panels on Earth, more than 6 million solar panels would be needed.
Smaller solar-powered satellites, such as those that power lunar rovers, may become available sooner.
Globally, the scientific community is investing time and energy in the development of solar power plants in space. We hope they will one day become an important tool in our fight against climate change.
The energy that can be converted by various solar bases around the world is still limited. Is it possible to transform this technology so that all of Earth's energy can be obtained from the sun?
In Fit, because energy is used in different ways, it is impossible to get all of Earth's energy from the sun.
Currently, the most used method is solar energy production. To improve the conversion rate of solar energy into electrical energy, scientists have thought of placing solar panels from space.
According to scientists, today's space solar power plant could be a large-scale construction that we humans can hope to achieve. If it can be built successfully, it will have obvious advantages over land.
First of all, Solar power plants will no longer take up valuable land resources.
Second, The issue of day and night changes will not affect power generation, and there is no need to consider weather issues, because there is noace of clouds in space, which does not block the power plant's collection of sunlight.
Another point is that sunlight is permanent. In space, the intensity of sunlight is 3 to 13 times greater than that of sunlight on Earth.
Of course, such a power plant must be difficult to achieve in many people's eyes, but scientists say it is feasible and believe it can be seen in the space in the not too distant future. a distant future. If such a power plant is conquered, the Earth will not need other energy sources to produce electricity.