I once again present the JetPack Rating System™, my effort to help humanity cope with its collective disappointment over the broken promise of personal jetpacks, the Sean Connery-era James Bond standard of cool.

To recap, the JetPack Rating System™ is used to not only begin the healing process, but also for rating automobiles and buildings by a duel criteria: 1. How environmentally-friendly are they? 2. What would James Bond think of them?

Today, we alter the parameters a bit by rating neither an automobile nor building, but a technology. Today, we JetPack™ space-based solar power.

The National Security Space Office (U.S.) sez:

Consistent with the US National Security Strategy, energy and environmental security are not just problems for America, they are critical challenges for the entire world. Expanding human populations and declining natural resources are potential sources of local and strategic conflict in the 21st Century, and many see energy scarcity as the foremost threat to national security. Conflict prevention is of particular interest to security ]providing institutions such as the U.S. Department of Defense which has elevated energy and environmental security as priority issues with a mandate to proactively find and create solutions that ensure U.S. and partner strategic security is preserved.

The magnitude of the looming energy and environmental problems is significant enough to warrant consideration of all options, to include revisiting a concept called Space Based Solar Power (SBSP) first invented in the United States almost 40 years ago. The basic idea is very straightforward: place very large solar arrays into continuously and intensely sunlit Earth orbit (1,366 watts/m2), collect gigawatts of electrical energy, electromagnetically beam it to Earth, and receive it on the surface for use either as baseload power via direct connection to the existing electrical grid, conversion into manufactured synthetic hydrocarbon fuels, or as low-intensity broadcast power beamed directly to consumers. A single kilometer -wide band of geosynchronous earth orbit experiences enough solar flux in one year to nearly equal the amount of energy contained within all known recoverable conventional oil reserves on Earth today. This amount of energy indicates that there is enormous potential for energy security, economic development, improved environmental stewardship, advancement of general space faring, and overall national security for those nations who construct and possess a SBSP capability.

NASA and DOE have collectively spent $80M over the last three decades in sporadic efforts studying this concept (by comparison, the U.S. Government has spent approximately $21B over the last 50 years continuously pursuing nuclear fusion). The first major effort occurred in the 1970's where scientific feasibility of the concept was established and a reference 5 GW design was proposed. Unfortunately 1970's architecture and technology levels could not support an economic case for development relative to other lower ]cost energy alternatives on the market. In 1995 ]1997 NASA initiated a "Fresh Look" Study to re -examine the concept relative to modern technological capabilities. The report (validated by the National Research Council) indicated that technology vectors to satisfy SBSP development were converging quickly and provided recommended development focus areas, but for various reasons that again included the relatively lower cost of other energies, policy makers elected not to pursue a development effort.

The post -9/11 situation has changed that calculus considerably. Oil prices have jumped from $15/barrel to now $80/barrel in less than a decade. In addition to the emergence of global concerns over climate change, American and allied energy source security is now under threat from actors that seek to destabilize or control global energy markets as well as increased energy demand competition by emerging global economies. Our National Security Strategy recognizes that many nations are too dependent on foreign oil, often imported from unstable portions of the world, and seeks to remedy the problem by accelerating the deployment of clean technologies to enhance energy security, reduce poverty, and reduce pollution in a way that will ignite an era of global growth through free markets and free trade. Senior U.S. leaders need solutions with strategic impact that can be delivered in a relevant period of time. - from the executive summary of the Report to the Director, National Security Space Office Interim Assessment dated 10 October 2007 (PDF)

Business Green sez:

The National Security Space Office (NSSO) predicts such a service will be in operation between 2017 and 2020. The spacecraft, the report argues, would be equipped with a microwave or laser beam, which could supply energy to remote locations facing high costs to generate or import electricity.

However, despite the fact an array of solar panels in geo-stationary orbit would be exposed to roughly eight times as much sunlight as it would on the ground, the orbiting array would still need to measure one and a half square miles across to generate 1 gigawatt continuously, the capacity of a traditional power station. […]

But while the Pentagon reckons the technology is decades away from commercial use there are several private companies aiming to launch a prototype SSP platform within the next two years and one of these companies, California-based start-up Space Island Group, predicts it will supply space-generated electricity to the UK domestic market at competitive rates as early as 2012. […]

However, some observers are far less than optimistic about the technolgy's chances of short and even medium-term success. Leopold Summerer, head of advanced concepts at the European Space Agency (ESA), remains conservative about the prospects for SSP. " Space solar pops up every ten years or so; it generates a lot of enthusiasm, then fades away," he says. "Presently we are still far from a commercial proof-of-concept. I think we'll see some plants in orbit, but not until 2050." - Business Green

The JetPack Rating System™ sez:

We realize that this JetPack thing had been a weekly gig, and we've been away for awhile, but 007 has been busy with some top-secret stuff. Without giving away too many details, let's just say that James has been searching for leads in a fresh case that began with an anonymous tip which contained the words "running" and "refrigerator".

But we digress. Now let's speak about this matter of space-based solar power.

JetPack-era Bond hasn't really kept up with the political developments of the Yanks since his heyday 40 years ago, but he's sure that any use of such enormously influential technology would be used for the betterment of all the people in the world, free of any hidden agenda. James firmly believes that should the U.S. choose to make large-scale, world changing plans, they would undoubtedly be very careful in their long-term planning, preparing in great detail for every potential outcome.

And think of the possibilities. To put it in purely scientific terms, space is a really big place. And in a place that big, the chances for undiscovered forms of moon-maidens are nearly beyond comprehension. Where's the downside? 007 knows what you're thinking; "What if these moon-maidens don't speak the Queen's English?"

Don't you know by now that James Bond is never unprepared? He never leaves the Earth's orbit without his ace-in-the-hole.

Mr. Barry White.

It doesn't matter what galaxy the ladies are from. If they don't understand the words coming from 007's mouth, the come-hither seductiveness of his eyes, or even the magnetic eloquence of his thick tufts of chest hair, they'll understand Barry White's inter-galactic language of amour. Who in the universe could resist the presence of James Bond, paired with such passion-igniting lyrics as "Take off that brassiere, my dear", comme chantonné par les vocals bas divins et splendorous de M. Barry White?

So Bond says bravo to space-based solar power. This just might be the answer to one of 007's greatest problems. There's only about 3 billion ladies on Earth so we're not talking about an infinite resource. But if there is a government or governments willing to spend billions to zap the earth with electricity, creating potential for a new era and new breed of conflicts while James still gets the girl, it seems like a fair trade-off. Doesn't it?

JetPack Rating? 5 JetPacks (out of a possible 5)