Beaming a continuous supply of renewable energy to Earth from solar panels orbiting the planet sounds like the stuff of science fiction.
Fittingly enough, the idea started life in Reason, a 1941 short story by the Russian-born author Isaac Asimov, and a 1968 scientific paper by an American scientist. But beaming space-based solar power back to Earth could be nearing reality thanks to a deal struck by a UK company and an Icelandic energy firm.
Space Solar, a British startup that has received £10 million from the UK government, believes it can have a £600 million system sending green energy from 8,000 kilometres away within five years’ time. Its solar array would be about 400 metres long, bigger than the International Space Station.
The hardware being developed by Space Solar could provide gigawatt-scale power
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