0191-9067/81/040383-10$02.00/0 Copyright ® 1981 SUNSAT Energy Council ASSESSING THE SOLAR POWER SATELLITE: THE OTA EXPERIENCE RAY A. WILLIAMSON, STEFI WEISBURD, and ADAM WASSERMAN United States Congress Office of Technology Assessment Washington, DC 20510, USA INTRODUCTION The prospect of capturing the power of sunlight in space and transmitting it to Earth to generate large amounts of baseload electricity attracted the attention of the United States Congress only five years after Dr. Peter Glaser (1,2) had formulated the solar power satellite (SPS) concept in 1968. Proponents of the technology, which was under preliminary study at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and elsewhere (3,4), argued in 1973 congressional hearings (5) that the SPS was a highly effective way to use the radiant energy of the sun for the benefit of mankind. Opponents later stressed the high costs and uncertainty of the technology (6). Though far apart on many issues, both sides of the debate agreed that the technology was poorly understood. Further investigation of its potential was appropriate. As a result of those and other hearings (7) and of parallel interest within the aerospace and energy communities, program offices were established within the Department of Energy (DOE) and NASA to study and evaluate the SPS concept (8). The Concept Development and Evaluation Program, which was managed by DOE, investigated the technical, environmental, social, institutional, and economic aspects of the SPS. It generated a broad range of reports which reflect this effort (9). The program's final report was released on December 1, 1980 (10). THE OTA ASSESSMENT Largely because the uncertainties surrounding SPS are so great, the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) was requested by the House Committee on Science and Technology to pursue an independent study to “assess the potential of the solar power satellite system as an alternative source of energy” (11). Hence, OTA's study primarily addresses the benefits and drawbacks of the SPS as an energy system. It also compares the various SPS concepts and identifies the areas in need of further research and development. Since the SPS is unique among potential energy systems in also being a major space system, its development would require a large new commitment to advanced space technology. Hence, the OTA report also addresses the relationship of an SPS program to other space programs.
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