MICROWAVE POWER TRANSMISSION TECHNOLOGIES FOR

SOLAR POWER SATELLITES

DEEPTHI RODRIGUES
Department of ECE, 6th sem , Don Bosco Institute of technology,
Bangalore, 560074, Karnataka
rdeepthirodrigues@yahoo.com

MADHURI.B.R
Department of ECE, 6th sem , Don Bosco Institute of technology
Bangalore, 560074 ,Karnataka
madhuribr423@gmail.com

RANJITHA.B
Department of EEE, 6th sem , Don Bosco Institute of technology
Bangalore, 560074 ,Karnataka
Ranjithab.1994@gmail.com

SUGURAYYA SWAMI
Department of EEE, 6th sem , Don Bosco Institute of technology
Bangalore, 560074 ,Karnataka
sugurayyaswamy@gmail.com

ABSTRACT: A solar power satellite (SPS) is a renewable energy system that converts the suns
energy into electricity in space and transmits it to Earth using microwaves. The SPS concept, first
proposed in 1968 in the United States. It increased public attention as a promising energy system
that can be used to resolve global environmental and energy problems. One of the most
challenging technologies for the SPS is microwave power transmission from the geostationary
orbit to the ground. This paper introduces the concept of SPS and presents the technologies and
issues associated with microwave power transmission from space to ground.

KEYWORDS: Microwave power transmission; microwave technologies;Solar power satellite

(SPS); SPS demonstration

INTRODUCTION

One of the major global issues we are facing today is the energy problem combined with a
shortage of natural energy resources and increasing atmospheric concentrations of CO2. If we
continue to rely only on nonrenewable resources, they will be completely consumed within 100
150 years. Furthermore, large amounts of fossil fuel consumption increase the CO2 concentrations
in the atmosphere, which raises serious environmental concerns. The most realistic solution is the
SPS, which can be used to harvest solar energy in space and to transmit it to the ground.

The flight segment, which is called the solar power satellite, converts sunlight into direct current
(dc) power using photovoltaic cells and then generates a microwave beam down to the ground
segment. The conversion efficiency from dc to microwave energy is expected to be 80% in the
near future.

Fig. 1. Configuration of the SPS system, consisting of a flight segment

solar power satellite and a ground segment rectenna [1].

Fig. 2. Five types of SPS.

Concentrator type has concentrating mirrors to collect the sunlight. Bus power type collects
the electric power from the solar array modules and then distributes it to the microwave
transmitters, while separated power type converts the electric power from the solar array
module into microwave within each separated module. Laser direct excitation type converts the
concentrated sunlight directly to the laser beams.

Construction of the SPS requires the use of five major technologies, namely, power generation,
wireless power transmission, heat rejection, large space structure, and space transportation, each

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on an extremely large scale. All technologies except wireless power transmission have already
been implemented on a certain scale. Wireless power transmission has been verified at the 30-kW
level in the field experiment [15]. This situation is completely different from that in nuclear fusion,
another revolutionary energy system

Table 1 SPS Technologies Compared With Existing Technologies

for which the principle technology breakeven has not been verified as yet. The main problem
associated with the SPS is to apply the technologies to a larger system, which is at the gigawatt
level in terms of power, kilometer level in terms of size, and several tens of thousands of tons in
weight. Further, it is desirable to make its power price competitive with that of existing power
generation systems on the ground. Table 1 summarizes the existing technology level and the target
level for the SPS primary technologies.

MICROWAVE POWER TRANSMISSION FOR SPS

Microwave Frequency
The microwave frequency for the SPS is taken to be in the range of 16 GHz, by compromising
between the antenna size and atmospheric attenuation. For higher frequencies, the scale of the
transmitting/receiving antenna can be smaller and the ionospheric plasma interaction is less, but
the rainy attenuation becomes larger. If we choose a frequency in the industrial, scientific, and
medical (ISM) radio bands, then either 2.45 or 5.8 GHz would be a potential candidate.

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A frequency of 2.45 GHz was used in the early phase study, but considering the recent progress in
the C-band RF technologies, 5.8 GHz is considered to be a more favorable frequency to use.

Research History

Nikola Tesla established the basis of wireless power transmission through his pioneering work in
the late 19th and early 20th centuries [16]. In the mid-1970s, W. C. Brown conducted a microwave
power transmission experiment using the JPL Goldstone parabolic antenna [15]. It has been the
largest microwave power transmission experiment conducted thus far. For this experiment, 34 kW
of power was harnessed by a rectenna array placed at a distance of 1.6 km from the transmitter. In
1983, the first microwave power transmission experiment in space was conducted in Japan using a
sounding rocket [17]. The nonlinear interaction be, tween the high-intensity microwave and
ionospheric plasma was studied by operating an 800-W magnetron. Another space experiment was
conducted in 1993 using a phased array antenna to transmit 1 kW of power into space [18].

Microwave Technology

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For SPS applications, new advancements in high power conversion efficiency between RF and dc,
and microwave beam pointing, are especially important. For microwave power
generation/amplification, the current performance and main tasks for the SPS application are
summarized in Table 3. Tubes such as the magnetron, the klystron, and the traveling wave tube
(TWT) have been proposed for SPS use because the resultant power conversion efficiency is
already high at more than 70%, at low cost. A semiconductor amplifier is another potential
candidate because it has an improved power efficiency of more than 70% with expected low cost.

Frequency Allocation
The microwave frequency for the SPS has not been assigned by the International
Telecommunication Union (ITU). To obtain a frequency band for the SPS service, a formal
negotiation is required within the ITU framework. Since the 1990s, a question in ITU regarding
the wireless power transmission was maintained by contributions from a team from NASA, and
later, by a team from JAXA. In order to proceed to the next step for the frequency assignment, a
report including detailed interference analysis is required. The microwave transmitter for the
commercial SPS needs to be designed to satisfy the ITU regulations concerning radiation
characteristics.

Ionospheric Interaction
One of the essential concerns about the microwave power transmission from space is the possible
nonlinear interaction of the high-power microwave beam with the ionosphere. The power density
of 230 W/m2 was selected as the maximum level to avoid strong interaction with the ionospheric
plasma during the early stage of the SPS design. The recent theoretical works and numerical
simulations have shown that the effects are not critical for a power density of around 1 kW/m2 at
5.8 GHz [22][24], but these predictions need to be fully verified in the early
phase of space experiments.

Public Acceptance
Another important issue related to microwave power transmission for the SPS is public
acceptance. For the power receiving station on the ground, the offshore site and dam lake have
been considered as potential locations. In the case of the typical commercial SPS of 1-GW class,
the power density is expected to be 1 kW/m2 at the center of the beam having a diameter of 3.5 km
[10]. For microwave radiation safety, the plan is to control the inside of the microwave beam as a
restricted area in which people are not allowed. The power density outside the restricted area is
planned to be kept well below the regulatory value of 10 W/m2.

CONCLUSION

One of the key technologies needed for implementing an SPS is microwave power transmission
from the geosynchronous orbit to the ground. The SPS requires new microwave technologies for
achieving a high power conversion efficiency of more than 80% from/to dc and an extremely high
precision beam control with 10-_rad accuracy from the 2-km2 array antenna. These requirements
are significantly challenging, and hence, considerable effort is needed for proper research and
development of the technologies. The technologies are to be partially verified in the ground
demonstration experiment within several years, and they are to be fully verified in the space
experiments within ten years. Ongoing research and development activities according to the
technology roadmap are expected to lead to the beginning of the new SPS era in the 2030s.

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