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Elon Musk Bets on the Sun to Supply Energy to the US. Understand How a Giant Photovoltaic Installation Can Transform Sustainable Energy and the Energy Future
For Elon Musk, the energy demand of the entire US could easily be met with the help of a giant fusion reactor installed in the sky, directly above our heads. The good news, according to the entrepreneur, is that no crazy project or billion-dollar investment is needed to achieve something like this: we have one that’s billions of years old and we call it the Sun. The CEO of Tesla and SpaceX estimates that a massive photovoltaic plant, approximately 160 x 160 km, would be enough to meet the energy demand of the US.
That Musk likes bold headlines and provocative ideas is no secret, but in this case, he is not the first to suggest a project of XXL size with a futuristic approach to harness solar energy.
The Mother of All Installations
Elon Musk loves impactful phrases, and this was made clear recently during his appearance on ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’, a podcast hosted by commentator and comedian Joe Rogan, who in recent weeks has featured a lineup of guests as eclectic as actors Dwayne Johnson “The Rock” and Whitney Cummings, former CIA agent Michael Baker, martial arts expert Tim Kennedy, or writer Elliott West. Musk appeared on the podcast on October 31 and, among other things, spoke about the potential of solar energy.
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“In fact, it would be possible to power all of the United States with a solar area of 100 miles by 100 miles,” the magnate explained in statements recorded by Money Wise. Converted to our metric system, this would amount to an installation of about 160 x 160 kilometers. Musk’s proposal is so colossal that upon hearing it, Rogan asked him to clarify: “So you could pick a dead point, cover it with solar panels, and power the whole country?”
Panels, Batteries, and a Giant Solar Energy Reactor
“Absolutely. We need batteries, but yes,” Musk replied, who believes that bringing such an idea to practice would not be difficult and sees it as perfectly “viable” to provide energy to the entire country with the help of the Sun: “This thing just works. We have a giant fusion reactor in the sky.” His bet actually goes beyond words.
Investing in the Solar Energy Industry
In 2016, Tesla acquired SolarCity, a company dedicated to marketing solar power generation systems, in a deal valued at about $2.6 billion. “Tesla is preparing to commercially scale its Powerwall and Powerpack energy storage products,” Musk’s company explained at the time, which had just launched its own energy division: Tesla Energy Operations.
Musk’s bet on photovoltaics is also not unique. The Solar Energy Industries Association and Wood Mackenzie recently estimated that this year, the US solar industry will add 32 GW of production capacity, a 53% increase compared to 2022, and that by 2028, the country’s operational capacity will reach 375 GW. The growth forecasts are also substantial in Europe.
The Issue of Megaprojects
Musk is not the first to suggest a project of XXL size and a futuristic philosophy to elevate the utilization of photovoltaic energy to a new level. In fact, there are already concrete initiatives that go far beyond the magnate’s statement on ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’. One of them is led by the European Space Agency (ESA) itself.
For some time now, the intergovernmental agency has been nurturing the idea of leveraging SBSP, which stands for “Space-Based Solar Power,” a strategy that would involve capturing solar energy with the help of enormous satellites in geostationary orbit, which would then convert it into low-density microwaves and transmit it to receiving stations located on Earth.
Achieving something like this would, however, require facing “prohibitive challenges,” such as the deployment of massive receiving antennas, the assembly of large structures in space, or studying the effects of low-power microwaves. For now, the ESA has already launched the SOLARIS initiative to assess its feasibility.
In the Spotlight of Other Agencies
The ESA is not the only one that has dedicated time to analyze the possibilities of SBSP. Its Japanese counterpart, JAXA, published a report detailing its advantages and challenges, and even suggested solutions. In the 1990s, JAXA’s predecessor participated in a conceptual design, the SPS2000, of 10,000 kW, and in the first decade of the 21st century, the space agency and the Japanese government worked on another SSPS concept of one million kilowatts.
China and NASA have also considered this possibility. Last year, Space News published that the American agency had initiated a study to assess the possibilities of SPS. “As technology evolves, the viability of the system changes over time,” explained Nilokolai Joseph of NASA’s Office of Technology, Policy, and Strategy. With the new report, the agency aimed to “assess to what extent it should support SPS.” Recently, a study from the Universities of Surrey and Swansea concluded that it is feasible to create lightweight and low-cost panels to generate energy in space.
Large Installations on Land
Not all solar megaprojects are focused in space. Here on Earth, gigantic solar farms with panels have been created, such as the deployment that China is driving in Inner Mongolia, which includes a unique installation: 196,000 panels distributed over an area of 1.4 million square meters, making it the largest station of its kind in a desert. Tesla itself has participated in large solar projects.
… And in Theoretical Studies
If there is an installation that makes any of the solar farms built to date look small, or even that enormous strip of 160×160 kilometers suggested by Musk to power the US, it is the Dyson Sphere, an idea proposed in the 1960s by physicist Freeman Dyson. His proposal: to build a structure capable of surrounding the Sun.
Dyson believed that to continue evolving, there would come a time when a civilization would need to drastically improve its energy collection. And how could this be achieved? With an installation capable of covering its star, in our case the Sun, with a “mesh” lined with panels or other technology that captures its potential.
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