How much power will be required to operate the transmitter?
The HF transmitter system is able to produce approximately 3.6 million Watts of radio frequency power. However, the HAARP transmitters have been designed to operate very linearly (in Class AB mode) so that they will not produce radio interference to other users of the radio spectrum. To achieve that degree of linearity, the transmitters operate at an efficiency of only about 45 %. For every 100 Watts of input power 45 Watts of Radio Frequency power is generated and the rest is lost in the transmitter cabinet as heat. (As an analogy, a 75 Watt light bulb gets quite hot while it’s producing the light you actually see.) In addition, the on-site diesel generators must provide power for other equipment used by the transmitters including the cooling system and low level amplifier stages. As a result, approximately 10 million Watts of prime power will be required when the transmitter system is operating at full power.
