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Online Journal of Space Communication

Visualizing Space Solar Power (Fall 2012 / Fall 2014)

Introduction

The Journal publishes here fourteen original “Creative Visualizations of Space Solar Power.” These designs are all student productions that have been professionally mentored, peer-reviewed and presented at the National Space Society-sponsored International Space Development Conferences in Chicago Il in 2010, Huntsville AL in 2011, Washington D.C. in 2012, San Diego CA in 2013 and Los Angeles CA in 2014.

These designs were commissioned by the Journal to give greater public visibility to next-generation satellite technologies and applications that will enable all countries in the world to have access to a ready source of clean and abundant energy from space.

Most of these designs were produced by undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in an Ohio University course entitled “Creative Visualization of Science and Technology,” but collaborative design partnerships were also developed with the Georgia Institute of Technology and the University of North Dakota, each with strong aerospace programs. In addition to a visual story, each design is accompanied by a Technical Brief and a preliminary Business Plan, with a good bibliography.

Issue No.17 follows the Space Journal’s largest and most widely noticed Issue No.16 on the topic of Solar Power Satellites. Each of these issues set the stage for our current issue No.18 that is in the process of publishing the international winners of the 2014 and 2015 SunSatDesign Competition.

The International SunSat Design Competition is an initiative of the Space Journal being managed by the Ohio University Game Research and Immersive Design (GRID) Laboratory in cooperation with the National Space Society and the Society of Satellite Professionals International, the sponsor of this Journal.

The Competition is generating imaginative and plausibly workable designs by scientists, engineers and other space professionals, assisted by advanced digital media labs who are helping them to illustrate their ideas. Cash prizes are being given.

The Journal will launch a follow-on Indiegogo funding campaign in November 2014 to raise the monies required to increase the number of incentives and size of prizes to be awarded at the May 2015-ISDC to be held in Toronto, Canada.

For your information, the Ohio University GRID Lab is in the process of wrapping several of these visualizations into an SSP App to be made available free-of-charge from the Apple store and globally distributed via Social Media under the title and logo of Sol Invictus, the “unconquered sun.”

Don M. Flournoy, Professor of Telecommunications
General Editor, Online Journal of Space Communication
School of Media Arts and Studies
Scripps College of Communication
Ohio University, Athens, Ohio 45701
Tel: +1 740 593 4866
Fax: +1 740 593 9184
Email: don.flournoy@ohio.edu