If you think of space as the "final frontier" (per Star Trek), it's also being tamed like the frontier of the Old West. People are going there for tourism, for exploration, for future commercial use. And for energy.
California Institute of Technology started the Space-based Solar Power Project (SSPP) in 2013 to harvest solar energy in space. They think they can transmit collected solar energy to earth's surface using microwaves. One wealthy individual kicked off the project with a gift of $100 million.
They've developed technology to convert sunlight to radio-frequency microwave energy, then to direct that beam to a specific location. They may be able to run a test in space by 2023.
If this works, it will be a game-changer. Solar power is intermittent on earth's surface because of weather. In space, sunlight is steady.
from Space
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