SPS maybe, maybe not

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "hitssquad" wrote:
>
> --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com 13172, "hitssquad" wrote:
> > --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com 13166, "sailor.barsoom" wrote:
> > > In something set three hundred years from, [...] most people on Earth live in clean cities with aggressive recycling and energy from space. [...] How much of this is realistic?
> > Energy from space (to Earth) isn't realistic, given the presence of cheaper alternatives. A population of less than a billion is realistic, but not necessary. Most of the planet could be set aside as a nature preserve even with an Earth population of a trillion.
>
> --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com 13292, "hitssquad" wrote:
> > --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com 13291, "sailor.barsoom" wrote:
> > > hitsquad [...] says flatly that X cannot be done for Y reason
> > What did I say couldn't be done? Please quote me.
>
> --- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com 13294, "sailor.barsoom" wrote:
> > You stated that 100 trillion people on Earth was more realistic than power from space, because of tidal forces.
>
> No, I said: "Energy from space (to Earth) isn't realistic, given the presence of cheaper alternatives."
>
> The bottom line is that there's already an electricity supply on Earth, and there's nothing compelling enough about electricity from space to figure on it being a good bet. People want hot showers and cold beer. They have that.

The current electrical grid relies on fossil fuels, which we need to ween off of. There are many alternatives, SPS is one of them, are there issues? Of course, and it might not ever overcome them, exploring the option because of the energy needs/replacement and the advantage to space utilization is a good idea though. Thankfully there are some people working on it, they'll model all the issues and if someone comes up with a business model or a government finds the numbers add up they will go forward. I don't think anyone here is saying SPS is a must or 'will' work for sure, but I don't think it's reasonable to call the idea completely dead without any merit of study.
Brooks