Hold onto your tinfoil hats: space-based solar power just got a little less sci-fi. Startup Overview Energy strapped near-infrared beaming tech onto a bumpy Cessna flying through wild Pennsylvania crosswinds and successfully zapped power down to ground receivers—for the first time from a moving aircraft! It’s a baby step toward the grand dream: giant satellites in geosynchronous orbit slurping unlimited sunshine, then laser-beaming (well, infrared-beaming) clean energy to regular solar farms on Earth. No new receivers needed, safer wide beams, and ex-DARPA pros are betting it could actually work. Forget microwaves clogging the spectrum—welcome to the era of orbital power UPS.
Researchers Beam Power From a Moving Airplane
