EEVblog 1637: Solar Freakin' Space Mirrors! - Reflect Orbital DEBUNKED

[@mikeselectricstuff]

How can anyone not see this doesn't work? The simple 100x100m to 5km translation is all you need to see it's hopeless. And why 5km? Some atmospheric scatter, but you'd need a convex mirror to get that.

[@volvo09]

I know nothing, and it sounds ridiculous to me...

[@EEVblog]

@@volvo09 When I told her about it, Mrs EEVblog laughed and said "are they serious". She instantly knew it was impractical for generating power.

[@GamingWithNikolas]

I'm completely ignorant on this and even I know sure enough to bet money that is isn't going to work as claimed

[@2meters2]

The 5km diameter comes from the 0.5 deg angular diameter of the sun as seen from earth. This means that a flat mirror at a 500 km orbit shines a cone of light down that spreads out over a 500 * sin(0.5deg) = about 5 km disk of light on the ground.

[@elektromagnetik2786]

I wonder if they did all the calculations for 10x10 km mirrors in each satellite, which would be insane of course, but it would probably get pretty close numbers to their initial claims..

[@scorch855]

Mom can we get a dyson sphere? No, we have a dyson sphere at home. Dyson sphere at home:

[@CptJistuce]

Worst. Ringworld. Ever.

[@hanifarroisimukhlis5989]

This is more like surviving mars but earth instead.

[@Croz89]

Never underestimate the gullabilty of investors picking startups based on vibes and marketing buzzwords.

[@LordDragox412]

Honestly, at this point you can't blame those scam companies. If investors want to throw money away, who's to stop them? "We are YouWish! We invented a new way to produce energy - cosmic wind generators! It's like wind turbines, but in space! Cosmic wind is a higher form of wind that is capable of producing much higher levels of energy than regular wind! We pop those bad boys into orbit, and they beam the energy back to earth using lasers! We're looking for a meager $2 billion in funding just to kickstart our first satellite. Let us turn YouWish space lasers from myth to reality!"

[@MisterMakerNL]

They just have a budget for renewables and such, which they obviously don't give a damn about so they just dump it somewhere.

[@redsquirrelftw]

That seems to be what lot of these projects are really for. They don't even care if it's practical or not. It's lucrative especially if they can eventually get public funding involved, aka tax payers. There really needs to be more accountability for this sort of stuff.

[@edthelazyboy]

They would have even more investors if they added AI and Machine Learning to their buzzwords.

[@oldbatwit5102]

@@edthelazyboy Yeah, and 3D printing. I never buy anything now that isn't 3D printed, even food.

[@universeisundernoobligatio3283]

These are the people that space companies did not want.

[@andre-7423]

nope - they are perfectly qualified for the Boeing starliner team, perfect fit. :)

[@ABaumstumpf]

Nah - if they pay that is all those companies need.

[@compuholic82]

Apparently one of them worked for SpaceX, which would explain a lot.

[@Cara.314]

@@andre-7423 no they arent. the star liner successfully docked and returned from the iss. if they worked for that team the iss would be a debris cloud by now. despite Boeing making some mistakes in recent years, they are still decades ahead of solar friggin satellite mirrors.

[@universeisundernoobligatio3283]

The energy it would take to launch the rockets would never be reclaimed from reflected light from orbit.

[@EEVblog]

That would be an interesting calculation...

[@NewtoRah]

Tech bros once again falling into the trap of spending absurd amounts of money to put solar power systems in impractical places, instead of spending a fraction the amount of money to put solar panels on rooftops and empty land and battery systems to power overnight

[@teardowndan5364]

Don't forget the energy needed to manufacture the satellites in the first place when counting from the mines to final assembly and packaging into launch units. These things are probably net-negative long before they reach the launch pad.

[@vejymonsta3006]

It's in another GALAXY

[@IonRoux]

Hang on, rocket plumes generate lights right? what if we direct the rocket plume light with mirrors onto a neighbouring solar farm! CHECKMATE

[@mqb3gofjzkko7nzx38]

My guess is that a battery is cheaper to deploy than a space mirror.

[@adamrak7560]

and there are plenty options for batteries: - used lithium batteries from EVs, in 10 years we will have lots - sodium and other less weight optimized but cheaper chemistries - flow batteries (this one is still not a mature technology though, but has a very long history)

[@cottsak]

Just the commercially available grid scale batteries right now would be orders of magnitude better value per kWh than this No contest.

[@calholli]

bwhahaha.. I wonder, by how many orders of magnitude, would a battery be better... Especially with the belly in that duck curve being so much cheaper during the day.

[@dgo4490]

@@adamrak7560 Kinetic batteries, aka flywheel batteries are the best solution for static deployment. No polluting technologies, volatile or precious metals needed.

[@ZealotOfSteal]

​@@dgo4490pumped hydro power stations are a solution to energy storage that has been used for over 60 years.

[@kdawg2468]

This is almost worse than solar roadways, which is pretty impressive in a way.

[@vejymonsta3006]

Honestly I think it is much worse. It's busted on the most basic laws of physics, completely ignoring the logistically crap that makes solar roadways stupid and impractical.

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

these ideas are better than the classical solutions

[@8o86]

well you can still reflect the sunlight at night onto a solar roadway

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

@@8o86 only if you are stupid. if you are smart, you reflect things onto themselves, and collect energy from the quantum foam space

[@petitio_principii]

@@vejymonsta3006 I guess that if FSRs were "evolved" into "freaking solar canopies on roads so you don't get slowly roasted on traffic jams, maybe with some fancy futuristic led-panels here or there or something" would be incomparably better than this.

[@baylenlucas8923]

Their proof of concept of using mirrors mounted on balloons makes way more sense their actual planned final product.

[@EEVblog]

Ironically, yes.

[@jessicav2031]

Exactly what I was thinking. You beat me to it.

[@vejymonsta3006]

Seriously. Placing mirrors in high places to illuminate shaded zones is actually a more practical idea and infinitely cheaper to implement with zero risk.

[@666aron]

@@vejymonsta3006 there are risks. If placed low - animals and ice chunks, if placed high - ice chunks, but the repair is still cheaper.

[@framegrace1]

@@vejymonsta3006 And that's actually done already. So proven tech. (One just need polished stainless steel plates, really)

[@IlluminatiBG]

First, the you need to include the cosine of the angle. Assuming mirrors cannot reflect at 45 degrees you will get 70% or more. Then the mirror are not 100% reflective. But even if we ignore any of that, to reach 500W/m2 to have a sun equivalent in an area of 2500m radius, you will need more than 9.8 million mirrors. Earth is the only planet we can live in the foreseeable future, we won't colonize Mars soon, but I am really really afraid of this crazy startup companies if they get enough funding to launch almost non-controlled thousands of satellites in low-Earth orbit. It will take just a single chain reaction to make impenetrable barrier of debris to trap all humans on Earth.

[@EEVblog]

I didn't calculate how many mirrors it would take to get the claimed 200W/sqm, it's was already enough clown world for one video.

[@adamrak7560]

The big problem, due to cost and weight limitation they have to put the mirrors on higher orbit where drag is very small. But due to optics, they need to put it into the lowest orbit with low enough drag. That exactly the orbit where Kessler syndrome can cause massive problems! This is literally the worst possible orbit to put their junk on.

[@antongromek4180]

Good for the universe ✨️

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

u only need one mirror, for maximum capital performance

[@markevans2294]

@@adamrak7560 also the lower the orbit the more of the satellite needs to be ion thruster (and fuel tank) than mirror in order to be able to reflect light in a controllable direction. When the thrusters operare the mirror isn't likely to stay flat either.

[@pyredynasty]

I keep telling these people they just need to put the solar panels on the sun for the most energy output per panel.

[@cojones8518]

I vote we run an extension cord straight to the sun. Lifetime supply of energy. 🤪🤪😆

[@gominosensei2008]

Dyson sphere and a giant extension cord from the sphere to earth

[@to_loww]

@@cojones8518 Why an extension cord? Solar freakin' lasers!

[@rlfvacslakenheath]

thats not the best idea solar panels lose efficency when they heat up you need a distance where there is enough light with out generating the heat.

[@pyredynasty]

@@rlfvacslakenheath E=mc²

[@MayaPosch]

I covered this topic for Hackaday in an article a while ago. Other than the ridiculous claims made, there are also massive health & environmental implications of space mirrors, mostly due to the disruption of day/night cycles. This messes with the reproductive behaviour of plants and animals, and like other forms of light pollution (like from cities & street lighting) has been shown to increase stress and incidences of cancer. Much like with beaming microwave power from space-based PV arrays, it's much cheaper and efficient to just build a few ground-based nuclear plants. Just good ol' hot steam generated from spicy rocks, powering steam turbines. No new science required and all off-the-shelf.

[@vylbird8014]

You could use it as a weapon of mass annoyance. Focus it on an enemy city and cost everyone twenty minutes of sleep. True evil!

[@andrewdunbar828]

They would have to use more energy to 'turn off' the mirrors by folding them up or reorienting them away from earth when they're not over any solar array.

[@simoneowen4296]

There trying to play God there is day and night a reason

[@takanara7]

It won't impact day/night cycles b/c it only happens at twilight/dawn, not the middle of the night and only results in a spot of light around a solar farm which most people won't be sleeping. All the lighting people put up on their houses these days due to cheap high power LEDs is way worse.

[@MayaPosch]

@@takanara7 Atmospheric diffraction says that's nonsense. Plus many of these solar farms are in remote areas that used to be far away from artificial lighting.

[@kamilZ2]

* Orbital decay time of satellite with large surface of 100m2 and small weight of 1 - 10 kg will be very short - it is similar to a parachute! * Sun angular size is ~0.5 degree, even with prefect mirrors it can not be focused to a narrower beam (without loss of energy, proof: the second law of thermodynamics). The distance to solar farm is longer than satellite altitude. * Uncontrolled space debris on orbits perpendicular to most satellites * Unexpected light pollution annoying pilots, astronomers and environmentalists

[@placeholdername0000]

You could use it as a solar sail, but you would have to be quite high, diluting your solar energy further. However, if they scale up the satellite after flying the demo mission, you could have say a 250m x 250m panel. That would give you a lot more power per satellite, negating at least part of the penalty of the higher altitude. It's a giant solar sail, so the deorbit time is not going to be very long, so I wouldn't worry too much about the space debris aspect. But the light pollution aspect would be massive, and lead to significant complaints.

[@psyience3213]

If it were able to generate enough energy to be useful there would be massive environmental and weather risks.

[@Skelath]

Already got a layer of space junk orbiting our planet at 10 times the speed of a bullet, and now people want to put more junk up there?

[@EEVblog]

They'll go out of business after the first test satellite, if they get that far.

[@gblargg]

Their Mylar reflectors will serve as targets to catalog how much space junk there is. Put some cameras on them to photo the holes as they form over time.

[@cojones8518]

Bet the astronomers will love all those things up there. They're already complaining bitterly about all the junk in orbit now.

[@spgoo1]

That's the musky dream

[@linuxguy1199]

@@EEVblog You underestimate how much stupid people will fall for this, if they get a test satellite we're screwed because then governments will start dumping truck loads of money onto them.

[@kozmaz87]

And we barely talked about the existence of atmospheric scatter and clouds, and weather in general.

[@EEVblog]

Even assuming perfect weather, they are still several orders of magnitude off on the calculations.

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

@@EEVblog corresponding higher capital efficiency

[@dogwalker666]

And when it gets dark at 3pm in winter.

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

@@dogwalker666 at 5 pm

[@SparkyTom1]

They should team up with solar freaking roadways for that infinite investment money glitch.

[@Hope_Boat]

They should launch directly the freaking solar highway stuff into space.

[@uwezimmermann5427]

yes, they could illuminate the solar freaking roadways from space... 😎

[@redsquirrelftw]

Brilliant! (no pun intended) they can reflect this on solar road ways. All the batteries inside the roadway tiles should also be fitted with batterizer tech.

[@LeadHeadBOD]

This would also make Solar Freaking Roadways more efficient, because you wouldn't need the LEDs anymore! Snow will melt in the light, so those heating elements can also be removed! It's a win-win.

[@TNTom67890]

Alright it is settled... I am going to start a business called Solar Freakin Tires! I am going to put solar panels on car and truck tires. just doing some toilet paper math here and I think it will be enough to charge a Tesla so you never have to plug it in. Don't question my math because I am a math god. Anyone who criticizes my ideal is a big oil bigot.

[@EEVblog]

Straight to StartEngine or Indiegogo

[@gblargg]

This sounds good. I put one of those TPMS things on my tires and it's amazing how hot they get when parked in the sun. That energy could be harvested.

[@HenryLoenwind]

@@gblargg Joke aside, I really want those TPMS to use the changing pressure differential between inside and outside while driving for energy harvesting and to pump up the tyres as needed. I'd say that is totally doable. The electronics need minimal amounts of energy, and the pump doesn't need to pump any large amounts, just what's lost over time.

[@gblargg]

@@HenryLoenwind Oh wow, that would be awesome. Self-airing tire caps. I wonder if some kind of microscopic molecular diffusion mechanism could be used that used micropower to slowly move air in.

[@becky15675]

You got my backing! :D

[@realharo]

When the obvious solution of "just buy a battery" is not exciting enough...

[@conodigrom]

All those engineers..and nobody to do a quick calculation off the top of his head? And they still get to keep the "engineer" title..?

[@FrankGennari]

They probably understand it doesn't work, but want to scam investors out of money. I guess it's easier than getting a real job.

[@StealthSecrecy]

The math does actually work out.... if you never deliver the project

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

oh, they did the calculations, rest assure! but those calculations are proffessional mistery

[@krzysztofkowalski2816]

p.eng -net 5 (000.00)

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

@@krzysztofkowalski2816 you in crisis?

[@mnus2016]

No one need even envelope to do calculations. Obviously, if we want to have the same power output as under direct sunlight, then area of mirror should match lighted area on the ground - for 5 km diameter light spot it should be 5 km diameter mirror(not counting for angle).

[@Ojref1]

What's the chances that an entire team of sus and shady people come together on a project like this? Its astronomical!

[@calholli]

Either than, or what else could this be used for? Military's like to secretly build stuff in plain sight and claim that it's for something else..

[@hanifarroisimukhlis5989]

I will bet with Epstein's body.

[@gorak9000]

I think the term you're searching for is "tech-bro-nomical" - it's way more prevalent than you think - shysters of a feather flock together...

[@v8vrooooom]

The guy naively excessively nodding on the other end of video conference could be meme-worthy

[@patrickdk77]

hopefully they go public so I can short their stock

[@davidc1878]

This is like a junior high school science fair project. Sheesh.

[@teapot2_1]

I would say this is an insult to Junior high school science projects. Those kids would at least to the basic calculations and realise its wrong.

[@Dreddip]

There needs to be serious financial consequences for these 'companies' that collect other peoples money and waste it on these clearly false claims. Misleading shareholders isn't enough. But what's worse... people are dumb enough to invest in these people in the first place.

[@Rob2]

There should also be serious financial consequences for companies putting things in space. Like a hefty property tax or similar, to discourage people from sending up junk just to prove that they are bad at maths.

[@lostcreek9286]

Worse than the wasted money is the environmental destruction to build this crap and shoot it into space.

[@krzysztofkowalski2816]

@@lostcreek9286 i dont know what they actually can do.

[@Schwuuuuup]

I love Dave's "doing the maths" but I can't get around the simple argument: a mirror of 10x10m can only reflect the sunlight of 10x10m (max!), how do you power a solar farm of thousands of sqm with this? The produced power would always be a tiny fraction of what is financial viable - even without all the huge losses.

[@EEVblog]

Yep, it's no harder to figure out than that. And that's all I'll edit into my 1 minute Short on this.

[@tymoteuszkazubski2755]

Sun radiation isn't perfectly collimated, if they orbit at about 1100km they should get a spot 5km in diameter if I did the math right.

[@cottsak]

It really does come down to this. Even the basic intuition on hearing this idea should be enough to ask “hang on wait…” But no one has asked this? How?

[@Schwuuuuup]

@@cottsak I mean there are other Applications for "light from space with a switch" the Russians surely didn't research this for purely civilian reasons...

[@tedarcher9120]

You get thousands of satellites to reflect on one farm

[@ZergZfTw]

I'm here to announce my new start-up, KittenPower; we are developing a groundbreaking new system of generating eco-friendly power enabled by the latest disruptive technologies such as GaN, AI, and ultra efficient super conditioning materials by harvesting energy from hyper kittens with a never before seen patented running wheel! We also have plans to add additional monetization by live-streaming the kittens! Accepting VC funds now.

[@EEVblog]

$100M valuation on StartEngine

[@adamrak7560]

this is still legit better idea than the orbital mirrors. Especially the additional monetization!

[@j.f.christ8421]

Wild animals like running on wheels, you can reduce your costs because you don't have to feed them.

[@LordDragox412]

We are YouWish! We invented a new way to produce energy - cosmic wind generators! It's like wind turbines, but in space! Cosmic wind is a higher form of wind that is capable of producing much higher levels of energy than regular wind! We pop those bad boys into orbit, and they beam the energy back to earth using lasers! We're looking for a meager $2 billion in funding just to kickstart our first satellite. Let us turn YouWish space lasers from myth to reality!

[@markevans2294]

@@ZergZfTw missed mentioning the Cat Delivery System (CDS).

[@glasslinger]

They did manage to get a LOT of suckers to pay them a LOT of money! THAT IS WHAT COUNTS!

[@electrodacus]

All correctly calculated in the video and extremely generous. There is no way none of those people know all this but they want to scam the investors for a few years.

[@igorzkoppt]

Linus got possessed by Emmanuel Macron 😱

[@EEVblog]

I can't unsee it now.

[@wtmayhew]

I believe if this were presented to an undergrad physics class, they would conclude within an hour that the idea is unworkable as stated. The people hawking the orbital mirrors must realize they can’t deliver what they’re suggesting. To that extent, it is tough not to conclude that this is an overt investor scam.

[@grima0482]

What an absolutely ridiculous idea. What were they smoking to even believe for a millisecond, that you can use a mirror of 100m^2 to serve a ground area of nearly 20km^2? This project would have been an April Fools' Day joke at best, but how on earth can they be serious about this? Just for the record: even Pluto nearly gets an entire Watt per square meter, over 100 times more than this ridiculous mirror project would provide.

[@GamingWithNikolas]

Yup. They aren't just having overunity with this, they are completely in fantasy delusional land

[@to_loww]

Just install 100 m² of solar panels in another time zone and you outperform this crackpot idea.

[@gorak9000]

Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation - DUH. Put enough high altitude sharks with freakin' lazer beams mounted to their heads between the space mirrors and the solar panels, and boom - --free-- amplified energy!

[@gorak9000]

@@to_loww You do have to build transmission lines for that, and they tend to be 'spensive...

[@to_loww]

@@gorak9000 No, you just need local customers. Transmitting money over long distances has never been an issue.

[@jimtron66]

I do recall the French government back in the '70s talking about a giant spinning mirror in a synchronous orbit positioned above Paris with the intention of extending daylight hours. Personally I wish they'd spent the research money on making a less smelly sewerage system in Paris.

[@toomanyaccounts]

well if you didn't have third worlders urinating everywhere and turning your parks into large outdoor toilets than maybe people would realize the sewage system smells

[@kapa1611]

🤣

[@calholli]

The words that they overlooked are called "dissipation" ... or "dilution" . You can't spread the same energy over a larger area without the density going down. It's just physics 101 .. This has to be where they went wrong.. they are looking at energy density at the mirror and just "assuming" it would be the same on the ground (minus clouds, etc). It's amazing that they can get this far without someone tapping them on the shoulder and explaining this

[@xponen]

they can fix that with concave mirror shape, but the ground tracking will be very hard.

[@calholli]

@@xponen You're still only dealing with a maximum capture area of 100m sq. (each).. It's just not enough to justify the price of a satellite.. If you make it a concave mirror so that (ideally) it would shine down a perfect 1 to 1 ratio so that it mimics direct sunlight, your 100m mirror would only be supplying light for 100m area on the ground. lol.. not to mention inefficiencies of the reflection... What is that? like 50 to 70 solar panels? For only a few minutes per day? It just makes no sense. If they could get Square Kilometer sized mirrors, it still wouldn't make sense. Let alone at 100m sq..

[@nonna_sof5889]

More reflective objects in space? *Every astronomer would like to know you're location.*

[@CptJistuce]

Waitwait! Hear me out... What if we rebuild them? Paint 'em with an ultrablack paint, change the orbit, and sell shadow squares to observatories? Midnight on demand!

[@FreeFinca]

​@@CptJistuce 😂

[@vylbird8014]

That's one of the few things that wouldn't be a problem. The orbit for these things puts them comfortably our of the way for astronomy. They'll only be visible twice a day around dawn and dusk, where no telescopes point.

[@StreuB1]

I have been following Ben for years and years and years, since he was a kid. I knew he would eventually go down this pathway. Pretty sad TBH.

[@jonny5alive123]

100sqm mirrors shining light over 5sqkm areas? That's naff all energy.

[@EEVblog]

Half a bee's dick.

[@threeMetreJim]

@@EEVblog Nowhack.

[@IanScottJohnston]

Reverse comparison......The 'Centrale solaire Thémis' in the Pyrenees was a solar thermal plant. 11000 square meters of reflectors all pointed at a single receiver 15 square metres in size. It was a concentrated solar power (CSP) plant, i.e. thermal and had an output of 2.5MW. So, the power reflected per square meter was approx. 227 Watts (2.5MW/11000). ........but using Reflect Orbitals maths it'd be quite scary the output it should have been producing.....LOL!

[@EEVblog]

Yeah, seems to match the number they got from the baloon test, which sounds about what you'd expect. The problem is the cost to put it up into the orbit, and the spot size on the ground.

[@GamingWithNikolas]

Using whatever form of math they had, it wouldn't be a scary amount of power, you would be able to run a fusion reactor off of that energy input. Sence their math bumps up solar power input by many orders of magnitude and then if you do their math in the situation you layed out.....

[@hanifarroisimukhlis5989]

Oh dear... they should just apply for DARPA and call it orbital solar.

[@Rob2]

There actually are plants like that in the USA as well. They are a failure, economically. Just too much investment and upkeep compared to the amount of energy produced.

[@Luk3d411]

Dave the bots freaking love you. 😂😂😂

[@EEVblog]

I'm a chick magnet.

[@mattknowsnothing]

"click magnet" 😜​@@EEVblog

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

@@EEVblog your analisys is not worth a dollar. that guy proposes gains of say million dollars per watt. you have your solar freaking roof tiles. how many dollars do you get per watt? (watt-hour)

[@hermannschaefer4777]

Well, there are indeed some good idea about mirrors - on a mountain. Like in Rjukan, Norway or Viganella, Italy. So, it might be OK-ish to put mirrors in space to enlighten darker areas on the globe, but that's just.. for the human soul, not the watt-meter.

[@eugenioarpayoglou]

Each satellite will effectively be a solar sail. How will they maintain orientation against the pressure of sunlight?

[@GamingWithNikolas]

That's the least of their concerns considering even if it stayed in place for a few hundred years it still wouldn't come close to getting a return on investment

[@tymoteuszkazubski2755]

By being shredded to tatters by micrometeoroids 😁

[@MsSuckyfish]

In low earth orbit a 10-by-10 sail will experience significant drag. It probably won't stay up for 10 years. If you go to higher orbits, you fix that, but you dilute the light more

[@SomeMorganSomewhere]

@@tymoteuszkazubski2755 that was one of my first thoughts...

[@offspringfan89]

Investors who will put their money in this scam don't need to know about petty details like radiation pressure and aerodynamic drag!

[@twoody2148]

They”ll probably get funding from DCS batteries

[@colormaker5070]

It would have been a funny if they had said it was all controlled from the cloud 😂

[@gorak9000]

with AI - cloud AI - keep up here... cloud is so last decade

[@seanb3516]

Wait...They ProtoTyped a NEW Form Of Energy? WTF? XD

[@vejymonsta3006]

It magically generates warm fuzzy energy.

[@michaelbuckers]

Let's irradiate the shade side of the Earth with sunlight, what could possibly go wrong? Other than that, it's just Dyson Swarm 0.1

[@profrook]

More like v0.0.0.1 😂

[@teapot2_1]

@@profrook V0.0.0.0.0.0000000000000000000001

[@toomanyaccounts]

This was proposed back in the 1970s. The cost of launches not even the cost of the satellites which would have used materials such as emeralds etc meant it never got anywhere.

[@Xizario2]

Imagine if you tell people in 1970 that we will have starlink now. And we use that starlink to watch a YT video that claims it is impossible to make a profitable model for sunlight. I have news for you: sunlight is more expensive than internet if you have the right clients.

[@toomanyaccounts]

@@Xizario2 lol! in 1970 they already had sats that streamed tv and even transmitted computer data. how do you think cable tv worked? it was sat tv that was beamed down and then a local network of cables transmitted the images. Also in the 1970s there were plans for sats in space to collect sunlight and then beam it by microwaves to local relays who would then put the power into the local grid.

[@IanScottJohnston]

3, 2, 1, launch…….3 months later……hmmm, we’re getting some light but the figures are real low? Oh wait a minute I think we……..What, our investor on the phone!……oh shhhhhhhh

[@EEVblog]

They can pivot to become a really really expensive emergency moonlight provider.

[@Phoen1x883]

Extra light for late night events and search and rescue would be a cool service. Too bad it's not $7,410,000 cool (using their Starship numbers)

[@robertadsett5273]

FWIW, I have seen solar export energy under a bright full moon. Of course it was in winter and with a clean snowfield. Still wasn’t significant but I was surprised to see export of any power.

[@smalltime0]

Dave, just to put your worst fears to rest. Climate Capital is registered as a venture capital fund. So in theory, any retirement assets that are invested into it would be part of their "high risk" portfolio - so it's not going to be wiping out some worker's fund "low-risk" management like the credit default swap scenario did.

[@rw-xf4cb]

What we need is some solar road ways in space with built in Gen-AI

[@WizardTim]

Imagine if somehow the math did work and they actually did get 200 W/m² over most of their 5 km target. You don't even have to be near a solar farm for that to be annoying, if not dangerous. If you lived in between two solar farms every evening you'd have to put up with this massive flash of light when the satellites are repositioning between the two solar farms. The satellites in order to be just 12U small and last that long in space will need to use magnetorquers for reaction control so they're can probably only move at like 0.5 degrees per second, at a 900 km orbit that would move the 5 km spot at about 7 km/s, so for just under a second everything would go from moon lit (0.001 W/m²) to 200 W/m², so 200,000x brighter... Just imagine the lawsuits from say people driving at night and then suddenly the space high beams blind them. Also a ~2 MW beam of light moving around the night sky would be very visible. That 30% lost in the atmosphere is scattered everywhere, would be cool the first couple of nights but I imagine not after that. But as you point out this cannot possibly make any sense for power generation, the claims are multiple orders of magnitude bogus. However I can totally see rich people paying $$$ for a light show to impress their guests... I'm sure there's plenty of people out there who would pay $10,000 to have a magnitude -10 dot fly across the night sky let alone several, sell that several times a year and they have a business model.

[@The4Crawler]

Maybe the Brusaw's could chip in on this one, get some additional light on their installation in Sandpoint, Idaho!

[@EEVblog]

They could offer their extensive government grifting experience as consultants.

[@Mr.Not_Sure]

Placing 1 sqm mirror in space will basically have the same effect as placing additional 1 sqm of solar cells on earth. Guess which one is cheaper? 🤔😂

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

the main concern, the orbit corections, deviation corections. done with fuel. the fuel will not be transported, it would be too complicated, and investors cannot perceive complex stories. the fuel will be launched with a plasma gun, projected into the mirror. the mirror is a quantum sponge. quantum capilarity will trasport that fuel into the fuel tanks, and this is a story that can attract investments

[@teardowndan5364]

Less than 100kW worth of solar light by the time it hits the ground will revolutionize the dusk/dawn outlook of 100+MW solar farms! Moving motorized solar panel racks to efficiently catch the extra light might consume more energy than what would be produced.

[@EEVblog]

Details... Details...

[@Marci124]

LMAO, I haven't even thought about how with their current orbits, the angle of incidence would effectively vary from horizon to horizon, from each satellite in the conga line rising and setting in the N-S direction.

[@teardowndan5364]

@@Marci124 If each satellite is within working range for only 4min at a time, the movement is probably too fast for sun-tracking racks to keep up with, especially the time needed to reset position to catch the next one. Also, most sun-tracking racks are single-axis in the east-west direction. Since the north-south satellite ring is practically perpendicular, single-axis racks won't be particularly effective at tracking those satellites.

[@Marci124]

@@teardowndan5364 I was under the impression that, eventually, multiple satellites would be reflecting at a time, meaning that some, if not most, would fall outside the optimal range of the panels.

[@teardowndan5364]

​@@Marci124Since solar panels can only point in one direction at a time, the "optimal range" becomes much narrower when you want to overlap satellites. Your panels pretty much can only point as close to straight-up as they can since that is the only position the "next" satellite can hit while panels are still receiving useful light from satellites about to depart the subscription window. If there were more satellites, then solar farms would likely end up buying increasingly narrow time windows instead of buying time that is 15+ degrees off-axis.

[@DarthChrisB]

I'm pretty sure they did their calculations very thoroughly. Their financial gains calculations that is.

[@Armada2010]

Major problem in this calculations - Earth rotation ) They can reflect sun only in sunset point, not further.

[@russell2952]

They would be expensive to launch because of the weird orbit. And they'd have to change that orbit throughout the year to stay along the terminator. It makes less than no sense.

[@Rob2]

@@russell2952 That isn't actually true. They use a "sun synchronous orbit", that is an orbit with like 97 deg of inclination, i.e. slightly retrograde. Due to the precession of the orbit, the orbital plane will rotate slowly and will remain perpendicular to the line to the sun. So, without any propulsion it will remain above the terminator "indefinitely". This kind of orbit is actually used by low orbit weather and reconnaissance satellites. Still, the point made above is true: it cannot reflect light into night areas, only to the dusk area.

[@mduvigneaud]

The problem of alternating periods of excess supply and no supply of a vital resource was figured out over 10,000 years ago and it was a simple and straight forward solution that didn't involve satellites: storage.

[@davidc1878]

I cannot understand how anyone can think that launching anything into space is somehow 'green'... utterly mindboggling.

[@jamescoppe]

Why?

[@to_loww]

If it has a net benefit, why not? Let geosciences have their satellites.

[@petitio_principii]

that alone wouldn't be the problem, theoretically one can have space infrastructure as part of something that on the whole is "green," although the technologies invented so far do not necessarily suffice for such a thing. There were plans/speculations about solar power being produced in space and beamed to the Earth, back in the 60s-70s-80s, if successful, it could have prevented humanity from reaching the current levels of CO2 concentrations and diminished some other related pollution as well. Not defending this project in particular, though, which ironically might really be more effective in warming the planet more with this "stretching" of daylight than generating "green" energy.

[@ionbeam14]

I was an Engineer at Cherry Semiconductor in EG Rhode Island. We were bought by an IPO company called ON Semiconductor. I was a Failure Analysis Engineer. I also ran the Metrology tools lab. I'm now a Geocentrc knower. I now know the sun moves and the Earth stays fixed and immovable. Before you literally kill me, take the time and really do the research.

[@Cor_Boer]

sure, reflect more heat to an already overheating planet.....Great idea

[@slipperyslope3912]

-Now make them 1km x 1km -Scale it with 100 units -Stick in geo-stationary where it can beam all night long. Now run your numbers. Big difference.

[@totalermist]

Someone might want to look up what geostationary means and reconsider their idea...

[@slipperyslope3912]

@@totalermist Geo-stationary means wider field of view.

[@totalermist]

@@slipperyslope3912 No. it means the Earth is between the sun and the satellite 12h a day. That's why sun-synchronous orbits are used in the first place.

[@kynkokytsumi1931]

Changing topic slightly but our friend "Solar Roads" are making their way to the UK .. they say ---- " Solar roads are a new and innovative concept as they do not require land to be specifically allocated. This is because the road infrastructure already exists. Therefore, this emerging technique of embedding solar panels into pavements and roadways is becoming a more attractive proposition." ----- and they say that "solar roads may supply up to 96.42% of the UK's total electricity, which is a substantially promising potential." i bet your BS sensor picks this up lol

[@EEVblog]

Is there a proposed UK system?

[@kynkokytsumi1931]

@@EEVblog It appears so

[@kynkokytsumi1931]

Tried sending a link but it wouldnt work ... just google "Solar roads - a new potential renewable energy for Great Britain"

[@EEVblog]

@@kynkokytsumi1931 JFC they just got their 7th government grant in June! They have been grifting this for 18 YEARS now!

[@kynkokytsumi1931]

@@EEVblog funny they are making it sound like it's a new thing 🤣

[@EpicOfChillgamesh]

I love the idea that we'll be shining spotlights down on various places on earth and all sorts of lawsuits start cropping up demanding that their neighbors stop ordering sunlight so that they can sleep.

[@vincei4252]

As an amateur astronomer I am so annoyed at all these companies tossing junk into orbit. Let's also not forget the "accidents" where Chinese and Russian satellites that had "accidents" that have increased the amount of junk in space. Compounded by so many countries planning to put up their internet satellite constellations.

[@EEVblog]

Don't worry, they won't get past the first prototype before they go bankrupt.

[@AffordBindEquipment]

@@EEVblog But if the point is to live on fools' money, then bankruptcy isn't a problem. Take the money and run.

[@superbeef1337]

As an amateur astronaut I agree

[@vaikjsf34a]

reflecting sunlight to have 24 hr daylight everywhere surely won't cause problems for wildlife and ecosystem

[@Herby-1620]

Next they will have "Roadways in space" (solar even!).

[@CptJistuce]

Who needs space elevators when we have space highways?

[@gorak9000]

solar freakin' moon-ways

[@FranLab]

You know that they'll put up a bunch of these reflector sats anyway, and we get years of global permanent light pollution as they each begin to fail and tumble randomly in polar orbit. The world will love this and thank America!

[@flymypg]

Yes, the tiny 10mx10m reflectors are bunk as revenue generators. But they are an adequate proof-of-concept, good enough to play with beam steering and focusing, though the SNR against the twilight skyglow could make the data noisy. Going with a larger yet thinner structure that borrows from solar sail research could provide a better testbed for the same launch volume and mass. The basic satellite idea looks OK, viewed only as something that can be built. Moving the target spot by warping the mirror can work using minimal power, significantly less than trying to pivot the entire structure. This should be investigated on-orbit to determine both functionality and reliability, with only enough solar flux reflected to permit accurate performance measurements from the ground. Thrust will be needed both to maintain the SSO orbit (to correct for the solar thrust against the collector and orbital perturbations due to the earth's shape and space weather), which can be accomplished in any number of ways (ion thrusters, electromagnetic tether, etc.). Some force will also be needed to maintain the overall reflector orientation, again which can be done in any number of ways (gyros, gravity gradient boom, etc.). Let's assume the underlying concept works (a solar reflector in SSO that can be focused). As Dave said, the scale of the reflector is off by orders of magnitude for minimally useful flux to be delivered to a solar farm. First, how big of a mirror is needed to reflect full solar intensity (1 sol) to a solar farm? Assuming a perfect reflector, to reflect the projected size of the sun (0.5°) onto LEO (600km-800km for typical SSO), would mean an area of roughly 14km^2 after accounting for a 45° tilt. That's on the order of 4km on each side! (I'm using hand-waving math here, barely above mental math, so I could easily be off by 2x or more.) OK, that's way too large. The limit of engineering may be closer to 1km on a side, but I'm thinking the Mylar thickness would also need to grow, due to the tension needing to be applied to accomplish the dynamic focus requirements. Let's go for 1/4 sol (still very useful) and add some redundancy at each orbital slot, say, 4 satellites at each location, meaning each would be ~500m on a side. That seems more manageable. Maybe. But that's still one hell of a lot of Mylar needed to fill all the orbital slots! The 10m satellites are an excellent and affordable proof of concept that's worth testing. Scaling up to commercially useful levels of solar flux at affordable systems costs is the problem. Even if Starship can provide delivery to SSO at 1/10 of the Falcon 9 price, launch costs will still dominate, meaning the satellites would need to have maximal lifetimes to amortize JUST the launch costs, meaning thicker Mylar to tolerate cumulative micrometeorite damage, meaning a heavier satellite, and the cost spirals upward. There is probably an optimum balancing satellite mass against launch costs against longevity against performance against revenue, but I'm way too lazy to try to calculate it.

[@robertbackhaus8911]

Could you imagine swinging those huge mirrors - CMGs or reaction wheels would be needed - to direct the reflection to where you want it, without twisting the mirror, which would scatter the light and make it worthless?

[@mqblowe]

The only 'product' I'm interested in is what they're smoking. Maybe they should sell that!

[@richardjones38]

Unbelievable. If only those doing the investing had al little more science / engineering knowledge. I remember learning the inverse square law in a high school physics experiment aged 14. It's about all you need to know to see this can't work.

[@xponen]

just use concave mirror, then the collimated beam won't have inverse square law drop.

[@richardjones38]

@@xponen That doesn't help at all. With a collimated beam you get a smaller spot of light on the ground, so can hit less panels, for less time as each satellite passes overhead. They're effectively un-collimating the beam anyway (i.e. making it diverge more by using a convex mirror - there must be a word for that) to make a 10m mirror make a 5km spot on the ground. If the mirror were flat (and perfect), you'd effectively get a 10m spot on the ground too, as the satellite orbit altitude will be irrelevant relative to the distance to the sun

[@howsthis4aname]

When do they install the " space fans " to blow cloudy weather out of the way ??

[@beskamir5977]

In theory, this would work. In practice, we don't have the tech to do this affordably. Besides, logically this would result in more heat hitting the earth which would be bad. So even assuming that they get the amount of power that they dream of it'd still be a terrible solution. The better option would be scaling this up until it becomes practical. So massive mirrors that can capture light from hundreds or thousands of kilometres, convert all of that energy into a focused microwave beam, and then finally send that power down to collectors on earth. But that requires having better launch tech than what we currently have.

[@WereCatf]

Collecting all that power into a concentrated beam.....like a giant space death ray, eh? If it went astray even for a minute, it could cause massive amounts of damage and kill who knows how many people.

[@Croz89]

​@@WereCatfI mean, for some people that might be the point, especially if they've got a fluffy white cat and a penchant for holding the world to ransom...

[@beskamir5977]

@@WereCatf Seems my comment didn't want to post, so I'm forced to retype it. Still not planning on doing any actual math for what a safe beam energy would be. Anyway, there's no need to use a beam that's got many thousands of times the energy of regular sunlight to be commercially viable. Even just a few times regular sunlight would be sufficient. Not sure what the safe range would be, but my estimate would put it at around 10x regular sunlight. Then just build a larger collecting region while keeping the incoming energy at 10x sunlight per metre. Also beams can be focused from multiple collectors into a single area on earth. That way each of those collectors individually has a beam of only a few times the energy of normal sunlight. So even if one of the satellites is compromised, it can't cause any damage on it's own. It can then be promptly destroyed or retargetted correctly. Though of course that'd still be concerning if all the collectors were turned into a weapon.

[@to_loww]

There is a way easier option. Just install more solar panels and energy storage on the ground. It's not rocket science (literally).

[@beskamir5977]

@@to_loww Currently, yes. Once we have cheap launch costs or industry in space, placing the solar collectors up there will be the better option. This is all mainly an engineering and political limitation rather than an scientific limitation. While stuff like solar roadways is a scientific limitation cause its stupid, placing solar panels in space gets you more efficient energy (space doesn't really have weather, clouds, useful land, day/night cycles, etc). So once we get the tech and will to make such a thing for cheap, it will be done and it'll be more affordable than covering the planet in solar panels. Unless you're suggesting that we'll never get to a point where we can or need to do that. Which would be quite disappointing.

[@SusanPearce_H]

The orientation reaction gyros would be massive.

[@WhiskyCardinalWes]

I'm curious about the level of the founders pay? How much of that investment capital is going into their pockets? When the money runs out what will actually have been built vs. what is in the founders bank accounts...

[@user-pk4hn1uz1k]

pretty smart to use his youtube career to make millions from vc money

[@AffordBindEquipment]

@@user-pk4hn1uz1k a fool and his money are easily parted.

[@mummifiedgamer]

Even without thinking for more than a second about it, I guess this is as effective as harvesting moonlight with solar panels?

[@gorak9000]

Do you know what solves the "duck curve" problem for essentially free? More daylight savings time. If you shift the clock so people are going home when the sun is still shining, problem solved.

[@blitzwing1]

I feel that, the amazing thing is even farmers when polled (if I remember correctly) are not interested in the whole shifting time thing depending on the time of the year so who actually wants it? During WW2 in the UK there was double summer time, so at the height of summer you'd be looking at 22:40 or so by the time the sun went below the horizon, that's a significant chunk of daylight after people get home, and in the bottom winter it means it'd be some time after 18:00, which isn't great but better than 16:00.

[@gblargg]

Is there any reason that everyone should be going home from work at the same time in the first place?

[@christianullrich2923]

Particularly if you only shift the clock in the evening so people can still get out of bed after dawn, too. Oh wait …

[@gorak9000]

@@blitzwing1 Because farmers don't do anything other than farm. To them it makes no difference, if they're awake, they're "at work". And they're not the ones driving the duck curve anyway - they don't stop what they're doing and go home and have supper because it's 6PM - they work while the conditions are right, and might not go home to eat until midnight, and the dew is making whatever they're working on too wet. It mostly matters to office and factory people, and they're the ones driving the duck curve anyway. If you polled most people that work fixed hour jobs, I think they'd appreciate more "sunshine hours" after work to do their own thing.

[@Sergiu.antifascist]

regretably, no. the objective is the money, not the energy production

[@erisgath7688]

For reference, that illuminance is about the same as moonlight (~3-7mW/sqm) , and you can't run a solar plant on moonlight.

[@universeisundernoobligatio3283]

Aim these space mirrors at the solar roadways, then you will get some real power.

[@franciscovarela7127]

I've got a brilliant idea. Orbit a gigantic magnifying glass and focus the light on a kettle of water on the surface using the steam to drive turbines. Investors will be lining up any day now.

[@edthelazyboy]

and make sure AI is somehow involved

[@philscott7949]

Do these guys also sell those magic mirrors which turn your mobile phone screen into a projector?

[@-Jethro-]

Wait, are you suggesting that we shine phone screens on solar panels at night? I’m in! 😂

[@DIYDaveOK]

"I didn't build this model to scale or paint it..." Great Scott!! 😂😂😂

[@wojciechbedzinski9551]

Imagine amount of fossil fuel needed to deploy single cubesat with mirrors. Better to supply that to fossil fuel power plant. Energy gain will be higher.

[@guillermoelnino]

Imagine still refering to gasoline as the same propaganda term coined in the 90s.

[@Psi105]

It seems like they want seed/investor money to play around with and have fun. The alternative is that they think it's actually viable, but that seems less likely.

[@wtmayhew]

I’m pretty sure they just want money to play. They have to know the promise does not match the math.

[@maddios]

Solar freaking laser beams

[@ruperterskin2117]

Right on. Thanks for sharing.

[@jamesjames5715]

total bullcrap use nuclear reactor best energy source

[@MrJef06]

It is quite obvious that their business is not putting mirrors into orbit but rather taking money out of the pockets of gullible people... I would be curious to know how much they personally invested.

[@redsquirrelftw]

They seem to have lot of big brains working on this, crazy that they have not really figured out how impractical it is. If a solar farm wants to generate whatever extra revenue this would give them, they could literally add a couple extra panels to their array and get more power than what this will give them.

[@markiangooley]

It’s astounding that someone is not merely convinced that something so idiotic will work, but is SMUG about how brilliant an idea it is and proud of it! As for politicians and venture capitalists supporting such nonsense, it’s a mixture of ignorance and being taken in by sincerity, which has a lot of power.

[@engelon125]

Would be interesting to see how much fossil fuel they are saving from the extra power they generate. And then compare it to the fuel they burnt to get it to space. I'd be interested to see how long it takes to break even.. if ever

[@fishyerik]

Another perspective; with 45 degree angle, about 3.6 mW sunshine per m², assuming 100% reflectivity, and, that all the reflected light hits that area, which doesn't happen. But, even assuming 3.6 mW/m²/satellite, you'd need ~280,000 of those satellites to equate ordinary daytime sunlight, for a few minutes. You don't need full sunshine strength, but even 5% of that is 14,000 satellites, that's more than twice as many as Starlink has, at the time of this writing.

[@decoder9949]

"I bought four minutes of sunshine, but some shady cloud decided to rain on my parade."

[@shoktan]

A lot of people (typically new engineers and students) often forget that just because something is technically possible doesn’t mean it’s reasonable or practical.

[@joetkeshub]

you're my favorite debunker Dave!

[@WreckDiver99]

We'll sell at $50/mwh, the power grid will re-sell to the local power corporations at $80/mwh, and the local power companies will sell to the customer at $250/mhw (that's essentially what we pay in my area for 1kwh (0.25/kwh). I'm in the wrong business. OH, and don't forget, IF we are forced by law to buy your excess power from your solar array, we will give you $0.0175/kwh.

[@person98453]

This would never happen due to the risk of being sued for a Billion dollars because they permanently blinded a kid with a telescope.

[@nashaut7635]

One problem with these self-proclaimed engineers is that the profession risks being turned into ridicule. They are a shame to the profession. Scientists are facing the same dangerous trend with pseudo-science zealots. There definitely is no limit to stupidity, it's most probably going to be overwhelming eventually, I'm afraid.

[@sce-to-aux]

Besides „Dave's solar power math“, I don't know how attitude control or mirror alignment would work effectively for such a system, with a 12U cubesat ... and also, up to 20 year lifespan? Within this budget? 🤣No way!🤣

[@johng4527]

What if Instead of launching the rocket, you take the fuel that it would have burned and use it to power a generator.......and use the generator to power some light bulbs that you string up directly above some solar panels.

[@timha4102]

If one 10x10 satellite would work, just imagine putting a second one next to it! Together they would be brighter than the sun!