The price per KW of SPS : A brief economic guestimate

>>>>If we aim for $1/watt of installed capacity on
the space-side of the construction, the cost of an SPS would come out at
about $100/kg.>>>>

I forgot to take into account the power losses that take place during
transmission. Under these conditions, $1/watt is too optimistic. You might
want to double or even treble it. SPS might compete with fossil fuels from
a whole lifetime perspective, (ie, total cost/total life time power.) The
high construction costs will probably push electricity price into the
10c/Kwhr range for the first 5 years.

total cost = $3000/kw
total number of kw generated by 1kw of installed capacity over 5 years,
assuming 98% capacity factor: 0.98x1x24x365.25x5 = 42,953.4.

Cost per Kwhr = 300,000c/42,953.4 = 6.98c.

Factor in the management costs over 5 years and the cost of the ground
array, and you are looking at a ball park figure of 10c/kwhr , give or take
a cent, for the first 5 years. After that, SPS should be as cheap as
nuclear (1.81c/kwhr) or better!

One crucial point, this doesn't take into account the interest that we
must pay on the money that we borrow. The first five years cost might be
about 50% higher if we take this into account.

Tony

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