Value chain · CLM-1082
In plain terms
Two-fifths of the lower forty-eight states were nominally open to ground stations and sixty of them could be placed near the cities they served; the gallium for one satellite was sixteen times the world's yearly output; and the ground-station dipoles would come off the line at six hundred a second.
The claim as recorded
Siting and materials as stated in April 1980. Rice's rectenna siting study: "A receiving antenna located at 35 degrees north latitude would require the dedication of approximately 35,000 acres to the elliptical rectenna and associated buffer zone (vertical dimension - 15.8 km; horizontal dimension - 12.0 km)"; after 15 absolute exclusion variables "40% of the Continental United States remains eligible", of which "Twenty-four percent of the eligible cells were subject to reclassification" on closer study, and "17%" in the worst case with 13 potential exclusions added; the follow-on found 60 rectennas could be sited "within 150 km of the load centers they would serve" at a penetration limit of "25 percent of projected baseload power for each BEA load center", so that "it appears possible ... to site 60 SPS rectennas in a manner generally consistent with existing utility planning practices", the mid-Atlantic region excepted. Materials: "The 5 GW satellite power system using gallium arsenide solar cells, now under study by NASA, would require 390 metric tons of gallium. This represents a 1,600% increase over present free world production capacity (25 metric tons)" at "$525/kg" (Rockwell's own figure "375 metric tons"); silicon "would need to operate at least five to six months just to generate enough electricity to make the amount of solar grade silicon used in its solar cells"; the rectenna's "2 x 10^10 dipoles per year" need production at "625 per second" consuming "42,000 mt of aluminum" and "14 mt for gallium arsenide Schottky diodes per year"; "About 4000 mt of graphite fiber composite structures may be required for a 5 GW SPS"; and the photovoltaic plant to feed 10 GW a year would cost "about $2.7 billion" with "an area of 260,000 m2 which is comparable to the Boeing 747 aircraft plant".
Evidence behind this: T3, two siting abstracts at national map scale and four materials abstracts' requirement figures, one from a rendered table.
Scope and limits
Siting at national map scale on 7.5-minute cells, EMC exclusions as mapped in 1979; materials from a listing of 22 materials. The "1,600% increase" is the page's own (390/25 = 15.6 times).
What it assumes
The 1978 reference system materials list "incomplete and lacks adequate traceability" (Teeter and Jamieson).
Where it comes from
PDF p.538 / printed 517, normalised: the 35,000 acres sentence; "In all, 37 variables were mapped"; "92,512 grid squares; 52,479 grid squares covered the Continental United States". PDF p.539 / printed 518: "40% of the Continental United States remains eligible for rectenna sites"; the 24 percent sentence; "This map indicated 17% to the Continental United States to be eligible"; "rectenna siting will not represent an insurmountable problem". PDF p.542 / printed 521 (Kotin): "the large area per rectenna (15,000 hectares, 38,000 acres)"; PDF p.543 / printed 522: "all but one of the regions (MAAC) has at least 12 times as many cells as required sites". PDF p.604 / printed 583: the 25 percent and 150 km sentences; PDF p.605 / printed 584: the conclusion as quoted. PDF p.280 / printed 258: the gallium sentences as quoted; "approximately 1,370 metric tons of gallium were potentially available in 1978". PDF p.271 / printed 249, Table 3: "Gallium requirement for SPS GaAs region -375 metric tons (5 GW)". PDF p.554 / printed 533: the five to six months sentence; graphite fibre growth "20-30 percent range sustained for a decade or more". PDF p.597 / printed 576: the dipole, aluminium, GaAs, and graphite sentences; "The capital cost of the industrial plants would be about $2.7 billion" (PDF p.597 / printed 576); microwave industry "close to 2 GW per year".
Basis: acres per site; per cent of CONUS eligible; tonnes of gallium; dipoles per second; tonnes of aluminium and graphite per year
Related records
- Answers question
- QST-007 not published in this release
Cite this
energyaperture.com/c/clm-1082
CLM-1082, Energy Aperture, as of 1980-04.
Connected records
Other published records linked to this one. A list, not a judgement.
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