Towers on the Peaks of Eternal Light: Quantifying the Available Solar Power
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arXiv
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| Format: | Preprint |
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2021
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| author | Ross, Amia Ruppert, Sephora Gläser, Philipp Elvis, Martin |
| author_facet | Ross, Amia Ruppert, Sephora Gläser, Philipp Elvis, Martin |
| contents | The Peaks of Eternal Light (PELs), that are largely unshaded regions mostly at the lunar south pole, have been suggested as a source of solar power for mining the water and other volatiles in the nearby permanently dark regions. As mining is a power-intensive activity, it is interesting to estimate the maximum solar power that could be generated at the PELs. Here we use average percentage illumination maps for a range of heights above the local topography from 2 m to 2 km to determine the total power available as a function of time of lunar day. Overshadowing of highly illuminated areas by towers placed in sunward locations (at a given time of day) limits the total power to much smaller values than the highly illuminated area would suggest. We find that for near-term realizable towers (up to 20 m), the upper limit to the time-averaged power available is ~55 MW at >70% illumination, and ~6 MW at >90% illumination. For the more distant future a maximum time-averaged power of order 21000 MW at >70% illumination could be realizable for towers up to 2 km in height, and ~5270 MW, respectively, at 90% illumination. Towers 1 km high provide about a factor 2.7 times less power. The variation with lunar time of day ranges from a factor of 1.1 to ~ 3. |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2102_11766 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2021 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | Towers on the Peaks of Eternal Light: Quantifying the Available Solar Power Ross, Amia Ruppert, Sephora Gläser, Philipp Elvis, Martin Earth and Planetary Astrophysics Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics Physics and Society The Peaks of Eternal Light (PELs), that are largely unshaded regions mostly at the lunar south pole, have been suggested as a source of solar power for mining the water and other volatiles in the nearby permanently dark regions. As mining is a power-intensive activity, it is interesting to estimate the maximum solar power that could be generated at the PELs. Here we use average percentage illumination maps for a range of heights above the local topography from 2 m to 2 km to determine the total power available as a function of time of lunar day. Overshadowing of highly illuminated areas by towers placed in sunward locations (at a given time of day) limits the total power to much smaller values than the highly illuminated area would suggest. We find that for near-term realizable towers (up to 20 m), the upper limit to the time-averaged power available is ~55 MW at >70% illumination, and ~6 MW at >90% illumination. For the more distant future a maximum time-averaged power of order 21000 MW at >70% illumination could be realizable for towers up to 2 km in height, and ~5270 MW, respectively, at 90% illumination. Towers 1 km high provide about a factor 2.7 times less power. The variation with lunar time of day ranges from a factor of 1.1 to ~ 3. |
| title | Towers on the Peaks of Eternal Light: Quantifying the Available Solar Power |
| topic | Earth and Planetary Astrophysics Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics Physics and Society |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2102.11766 |