Value chain · CLM-0149
In plain terms
A 1982 Japanese government radio-research review says the famous 230 watts-per-square-metre figure was only ever a theoretical calculation from the 1978 US design study, and had never actually been tested by 1982.
The claim as recorded
Matsuura (1982), reviewing the 1978 DOE/NASA reference SPS design, states that the 230 W/m2 beam-power-density ceiling near the receiving antenna is a theoretically derived critical value for the onset of nonlinear ionospheric instability, but explicitly notes "this has not yet been confirmed experimentally, and remains one subject for future work."
Scope and limits
A 1982 status statement; does not establish whether the figure has since been experimentally confirmed (no SPS-scale source has ever flown). Stated as a property of the design being reviewed, not a new calculation by Matsuura himself.
What it assumes
Matsuura is accurately relaying the 1978 DOE/NASA reference system report's own stated basis for the figure, rather than introducing a new claim of his own.
Where it comes from
Matsuura (1982), p.724, right column: "受電アンテナ付近でのビーム電力密度上限値230W/m2は理論的な考察からマイクロ波ビームが電離圏との相互作用によって電離圏内に非線型不安定を発達させる臨界値とされているが，まだ実験的に確かめられておらず，今後の課題の一つである。" Translation: "The upper limit of beam power density near the receiving antenna, 230 W/m2, is taken, from theoretical consideration, to be the critical value at which the microwave beam's interaction with the ionosphere develops nonlinear instability within the ionosphere; but this has not yet been confirmed experimentally, and remains one subject for future work."
Basis: power density, W/m2, at 2.45 GHz, receiving-antenna vicinity
Related records
- Answers question
- QST-001 not published in this release
Cite this
energyaperture.com/c/clm-0149
CLM-0149, Energy Aperture, as of 1982.
Connected records
Other published records linked to this one. A list, not a judgement.
- Also from SRC-141
- CLM-0126The 1982 source behind the disputed 10 per cent absorption figure actually says absorption is 0.002 per cent, and never mentions solar...CLM-0150A 1982 Japanese review notes that, at the time, the American and Soviet safety limits for microwave exposure were far apart (1000 times, by...CLM-0947A 1982 Japanese review calculates that the ionosphere absorbs about one part in fifty thousand of a 2.45 GHz power beam - around 0.1 MW...