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ISS Goes Solar

Posted by samzenpus on Wed Jun 13, 2007 06:29 PM
from the no-clouds-in-space dept.
Space Power Science
SumDog writes "The international space station's newest power source, a set of solar wings, made its debut yesterday. The solar array is part of a new 17.5-ton space station segment that was connected to the orbiting outpost during a spacewalk Monday."
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[+] Science: Space Station Partners Bicker Over Closure Date 222 comments
jcdick1 writes "The current partners in the ISS are in discussion regarding the closure date of the space station, even though it still has not been fully assembled. 'The United States insists it will pull out of the station at the end of 2015 while Russia wants its life prolonged, said European Space Agency (ESA) chief Jean-Jacques Dordain at an astronautics congress in Hyderabad, southern India. NASA administrator Michael Griffin has told space station partners that the US agency has no plans for "utilization and exploitation" of the science research lab for more than five years after it is completed, Dordain said.'"
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  • It's good to see ... (Score:5, Funny)

    by WrongSizeGlass (838941) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:32PM (#19499085) Homepage
    ... solar power finally working its way into our everyday lives.

    • Re:It's good to see ... (Score:4, Interesting)

      by malsdavis (542216) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @11:12PM (#19501111)
      I'd like to know the realistic reasons why solar power isn't far more prevalent as a source of power generation, particularly on a local/household scale. Why are solar panels still so expensive?

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by bryan1945 (301828)
        From what I've read (not a whole lot), the basic photo-electric conversion process is just not that efficient. Something about the solar power knocking electrons out of place, creating a current between the displaced electron and the hole it left. The problem is that the electron quickly falls back. I believe current research is focusing on materials that either 1) remove the electron further or 2) somehow keep the electron from falling back as quickly.

        It's 3 AM and I'm doing this from memory, so take it

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by dino213b (949816)
        At the risk of being called a troll, I will bite again.

        The real reason is lack of government support. Large scale public projects can rarely succeed until they receive government subsidies. In other words, 300,000,000 Americans all need to pitch in so that a large project can make it. As a prior proof of this, consider hydroelectric (and irrigation system) dams in America. They were privately funded prior to USACE/Bureau of Reclamations taking over and during that period they all failed - economically s

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          by OrangeTide (124937)
          So we pay the power company and they profit, then we have to pay higher taxes to fund a project because the power company was not willing to invest their profits into turning the technology into something cheaper? You'd think if the power company could produce cheaper energy they could

          Hydropower is proven to be cheap, even though the initial investment is quite large. And building them is an engineering feat, rather than a technological breakthrough. At the time we built dams we were doing very well with fe

  • Wait... (Score:5, Funny)

    by kmac06 (608921) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:39PM (#19499149)
    So the one place where greenhouse gas emissions don't matter uses renewable energy? :P

    • Re:Wait... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by rednip (186217) <<rednip> <at> <gmail.com>> on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:48PM (#19499239) Journal

      So the one place where greenhouse gas emissions don't matter uses renewable energy?

      If you think that the price of gas is expensive at the boat dock, you should see the bill for delivering a tankful 200 miles in the sky.

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by joek1010 (980753)
        And you have to send the oxygen too. Its tough to make green house gases without any oxygen rich environment to burn it in.

        • What does his comment have to do with the price of gas[sic]?
          Solar is much cheaper than delivering fuel, that is why they use it.
          • Sure, but his comment is about green house gas emissions, not the price($) of anything.

            It's obvious *why* they use it, but it's still somewhat ironic... ...that is, assuming that using fuel that does produce green house gases (rocket fuel?) would actually not affect contribute to the green house effect.

            Are we sure that it wouldn't? It's a fair assumption, I guess, but I wonder...

            • Re:Wait... (Score:4, Insightful)

              by Original Replica (908688) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @08:47PM (#19500157) Journal
              Sure, but his comment is about green house gas emissions, not the price($) of anything.

              The main reason to not want to emit greenhouse gases is the "cost" of global warming. You will notice that people who view that cost as very high: already use solar panels and live "off the grid", and people who think that cost is a joke: drive Hummers with the A/C on and the windows down. NASA, like everyone else, is going with the lowest percieved cost.
          • I don't use the word gas when referring to a liquid (unless I also use the word 'not').

  • Off Grid? (Score:5, Funny)

    by QuantumRiff (120817) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:40PM (#19499153)
    So when do they get enough Solar Panels to go "Off Grid"?

    <ducks>

    Thank you, I'll be here all week!

  • Well (Score:4, Informative)

    by rbanffy (584143) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:41PM (#19499161) Homepage
    Didn't the ISS already run on solar power?

    I mean... Tree-huggers everywhere would have been screaming for years if it did run on nuclear (and, quite probably, we don't have the required technology anyway).

    • Re:Well (Score:4, Informative)

      by Jugalator (259273) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:42PM (#19499173) Journal
      Yes, it did, but now it has more power than ever before!

      To give sufficient power for the upcoming components and experiments.

      • Re:Well (Score:4, Insightful)

        by ari_j (90255) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @08:14PM (#19499937)
        That's just it ... "goes solar" implies that this is the first set of solar panels on the station, which is patently false. Nothing in the blurb corrects the misstatement, either. That's annoying.

    • Nuclear power and spacecraft (Score:5, Informative)

      by Fuji Kitakyusho (847520) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @07:01PM (#19499381)
      The required technology:

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioisotope_thermoel ectric_generator [wikipedia.org]

    • Solar panels in near orbit have never been a problem, because for all practical purposes the orbital platform is exactly at the same distance to the sun than the surface of the Earth.

      Interestingly enough, NASA has already unveiled plans for a deep space probe called Juno [wikipedia.org] that will use solar panels exclusively for the first time ever. Apparently they've become so efficient that the enormous distance to the Sun ceases to become a problem. This also bodes well for civilian uses of solar panels, I imagine. He

      • Re:Well (Score:4, Funny)

        by Dunbal (464142) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @08:54PM (#19500201)
        Apparently they've become so efficient that the enormous distance to the Sun ceases to become a problem.

              Or at least that's what the manufacturer says. And if you had a $40 M contract you'd say the same. We'll only really find out in 30 years when the guy in charge of the probe suddenly goes "where the hell did my probe go?" one Wednesday morning.

              All your voltage are belong to us.

      • Re:Well (Score:5, Insightful)

        by confused one (671304) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @10:12PM (#19500779)

        Juno is slated to go into Jupiter orbit. Solar may be useable out to Jupiter. The panels have to increase in size proportional to the distance from the sun squared... The weight increases exponentially. To reach past Jupiter it becomes impossible (practically) to launch that much mass from the ground. If you want 1kW of power at Saturn or maybe the Kuiper belt you have to use nuclear. If Voyager 1 and 2, launched in 1977, were powered by solar, even using these new panels, we would not still be receiving telemetry from it. Voyager 1 is currently is currently 18 times farther from the sun than Jupiter. Voyager 2 is currently 15 times farther from the sun than Jupiter. Both are studying the boundary of our solar system.

        Yeah, I suspect much of the advances in solar technology have come out of NASA's budget. This is the kind of area where NASA and DOE spending feeds back obvious results.

        I get frustrated as well when people protest launching nuclear powered spacecraft. The probability of an accident is extremely small. The probability of that accident affecting populated areas is smaller. The effect would be insignificant barring an explosion at the launch tower; and, that would be contained to the area around the base. If people are going to make the argument against, I wish they would do it with real numbers. If you're going to argue that "it's bad" then show me how bad and show me how that level of "bad" compares to the safety standards...

        I do like this link

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:RTG_radiation_m easurement.jpg [wikipedia.org]
    • Nuclear power makes sense in the outer solar system and it is used there for unmanned exploration. It makes little sense in the inner solar system where the Sun's power is easier to harvest. The whole thing is about launch mass. At the distance of Saturn you need about 100 times more in solar panels for the same power so nuclear power becomes competitive.
      --
      Apropriate technology for the third rock: http://mdsolar.blogspot.com/2007/01/slashdot-user s -selling-solar.html [blogspot.com]
    • Since we are talking about kilowatts there is no practical nuclear solution. Nuclear "batteries" work by using the photoelectric effect anyway, weigh a bit and you would need a lot of them - and steam power is just a little bit too heavy for space and overkill when you don't need gigawatts.

      Since a few seconds thinking like an engineer or physicist rules this out - how did a nuclear troll who mentions their favourite energy whenever electricity gets mentioned get modded insightful?

  • Make them bigger.... (Score:4, Funny)

    by camperslo (704715) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:42PM (#19499169)
    ...a giant shade to reduce global warming

  • What was it running on before? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:43PM (#19499189)
    Steam?

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      No, a really long extension cord. Kept getting tangled on Everest though.
    • Astronauts on the ISS have to train each day on those bicycles. Now you know why...

  • Here's a real link. (Score:5, Informative)

    by pavon (30274) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:50PM (#19499253)
    Here is a link to a story [space.com] with a little more content and pictures of the new unfurled solar panels.

  • Odd there's no mention of the computer hack (Score:5, Informative)

    by Nymz (905908) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @06:52PM (#19499275) Journal
    During the installation, one the navigation computers had a glitch that caused false fire alarms and a loss of gyroscope control, which sent the station spinning [slashdot.org] out of control. Only thanks to a hack were they able to bypass the Russian functions, and get the gyroscopes working again.

    If the station couldn't align the solar panels toward the sun for each days charge, then it would only be a matter of time before the batteries died, and without power nothing on the station will work, nothing.

  • The international space station's newest power source, a set of solar wings, made its debut yesterday.

    Glad to hear it. That 200-miles-long extension cord [nasa.gov] was becoming a real hassle!
  • The new solar panels were unfolded like an accordion window blind, their orange and black colors reflecting the sunlight.

    Is it just me, or are solar panels that reflect sunlight not a good thing?

  • The best source of information. (Score:5, Informative)

    by GreggBz (777373) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @07:29PM (#19499589) Homepage
    So why do these stories about NASA, the ISS etc.. so rarely link to nasa.gov?

    You can go here [nasa.gov] and get much better, more detailed information about the solar panels, the crew, the rest of the mission, watch live video, etc. Your tax dollars pay for it, you should use it.

    It is the most comprehensive site for news in information regarding, imagine this, NASA. The only instance where it's probably not appropriate is when there is some requirement for investigative reporting, otherwise, things like the Boston Globe are likely to give the watered down, science lite AP version of what NASA tells them.

    • Due to the previous 6 or 7 years of republican stranglehold over the government and diverting all funds from where the nation needs them to pointless, yet strikingly bloody wars, NASA's had to make some budget cuts. In addition to purses for technological competitions that can solve real-world problems, they've had to downgrade from a DS3 connection to an IDSN line.
    • Well, if you think about it, the bandwidth from Nasa is paid by the citizens being taxed; so, instead of linking to a page in which you are charged per view some way or another, they link you to a page full of ads and you don't pay a dime.......or someone just wants a big check from getting the slashdot crowd visiting and viewing (or in some cases blocking) ads.
  • That's either the most expensive tank of gas in the world or a really fucking long extension cord.
  • 17.5 tons. I'm thinking about increased amount of propellant needed to keep the ISS in the correct orbit with this new "power source". Yes we can give you more power, but now we need to spend twice as much fuel to keep you in orbit, so your total flight time is decreased by 8 years...

    That's the beauty of physics, everything is connected. And I'm not even a physicist.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I agree, you're not a physicist. The mass of the array doesn't at all influence the amount of fuel necessary to keep it in orbit. What matters is its cross sectional area.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Dunbal (464142)
        Hmmm ok, I'll grant you that (from what I remember from high school) the "g" part of a sattelite in orbit gets canceled out. However I think that the basic laws of motion - specifically F=ma still apply when it comes time to turn on the engine and give the station more velocity to bump it back up into a higher orbit. If m increases and the "a" that I need to increase the velocity is the same, I need more "F", which means a longer burn, which means more fuel.

        I agree that mass has not

  • A far cooler aspect. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Lumpy (12016) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @08:54PM (#19500195) Homepage
    Check when the ISS will be overhead and illuminated by the sun. You can with a pair of good binoculars and SEE the ISS as a shape now instead of a dot of light with the Panels Deployed.

    Incredibly cool to be able to see something in space and visually identify it.

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Me thinks you are talking out of your rear aperature

      Its damn hard to image ISS _details_ (even with the shuttle attached) with an 8inch (200mm) telescope let alone a pair of binoculars. I've seen the ISS (with and without attached shuttle) naked eye, thru binoculars (7x50), and an 8 inch Meade LX-90 using a 12mm eyepiece (many times naked eye, many times with the binoculars and a few with the scope). Binoculars (that you can hand hold) are going to show you a blob - a blob which (in my opinion) got more o

  • Tax (Score:3, Funny)

    by adrian727 (968395) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @09:47PM (#19500605)
    Did they pay fuel tax yet?

    • Re:For once, I read the article, and I see... (Score:4, Informative)

      by Boilermaker84 (896573) on Wednesday June 13 2007, @07:48PM (#19499721)
      The blanket doesn't pose a risk of catastrophic failure to the vehicle (i.e. no repeat of Columbia), but the Mission Management Team is trying to minimize any damage to the OMS pod that would delay processing for the next mission. If they leave the blanket as is (without stapling it back in place, which is what they plan to do), there is a risk of doing damage to the pod that would delay processing for Atlantis's next mission in December.
    • lol yeah, at least on earth you can get a good 12 hours out of solar panels. But what can you do with just 45 minutes? :-)

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by teridon (139550)
      All of the solar arrays on ISS are about the same.

      The dimensions of each panel (total 4 panels per truss) are 111.6 ft x 15.2 ft. Behold ASCII art skillz! (cut, because /.'s fucking lameness filter)

      Source [ieee.org]: "Photovoltaic Power for Space Station Freedom" by Baraona, C.R. in "Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, 1990., Conference Record of the Twenty First IEEE"

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