SRC-013

Survey of Space Based Solar Power (SBSP): A Comparison of SBSP Reference Designs and their Economics

Published claims resting on this source

• CLM-0187 The company's own 2024 analysis estimates that a single, non-reused Starship launch to low orbit would cost about $665 per kilogram, and projects (using two very different learning-rate scenarios) that this could fall to somewhere between about $12 and $614 per kilogram within ten years, with the company itself expecting something close to $500/kg.
• CLM-0532 A different space-solar-power company's own 2024 analysis estimates that a single non-reused Starship launch to low orbit would cost about $665 per kilogram, and that costs could fall toward $500/kg within a decade.
• CLM-0667 One company's design deliberately avoids the standard high orbit used by other designs, because it believes waiting for compatibility with existing satellites there would delay deployment by decades.
• CLM-0668 The same company's own numbers show that, using the identical rocket and the identical (chemical) engine type throughout, simply choosing a higher orbit roughly quadruples the cost per kilogram - a separate effect from which propulsion type is used.
• CLM-1194 The company's first planned project is sized at 200 MW to the grid from a 732-tonne satellite, running nine-tenths of the time over a 20-year life; a later project is 40 times bigger.
• CLM-1195 The design builds one thin, nearly kilometre-wide disc out of many metre-sized flat satellites, each with solar cells on one side and radio transmitters on the other; the first project's disc is 967 m across.
• CLM-1196 A separate, very light mirror flies beside each array and turns slowly, once a year, so the solar cells always see the Sun; for the first project it is about twice the area of the array, but the design does not count it as concentrating the light.
• CLM-1197 The company beams at 10 GHz and claims its beam loses nothing in space on the way down, where the other designs in its own table lose between a sixth and a half.
• CLM-1198 The first project's receiving site is a circle 2 km across, with two hours of batteries on the ground.
• CLM-1199 On its long, looping 12-hour orbit each array hangs over one region for about 11 and a half hours, then on the next loop serves a region about halfway round the world; the company plans 16 of them.

Cite this