Why not build solar power stations on the moon?
We would be building solar power stations in a place which is dark half the time (for 14 days at a time). Near sunrise and sunset, lunar-based solar collectors would not be able to point at the sun optimally. A larger transmitting antenna would be needed to hold the beam spread down over >10x the distance. Also, the Moon is on only one side of the Earth at a time, so any given point on Earth could get power from a lunar power system only half the time (unless orbital microwave reflectors could be made to work). For a lunar-based solar power station to be competitive, these disadvantages would have to be offset by the advantage of not having to lift resources (or components) off the lunar surface. Mass-driver technology makes the delivery of lunar ores into space a pennies-per-pound proposition. There are also advantages to concentrating the industrial activity in a place where solar energy is available full time and there is access to 0-G. Nevertheless, Dr. David Criswell, Director of
