XPost: sci.space.policy   
   From: hopd@cunews.info   
      
   Fred J. McCall wrote:   
   > "Jeff Findley"  wrote:   
   >   
   > :I'd imagine that at a sufficiently large scale, SPS could help eliminate   
   > :long distance electricity transmission lines.  Makes you wonder how much   
   > :money you could save by eliminating them, both in terms of cost to build and   
   > :maintain the lines and in terms of the energy you lose by sending   
   > :electricity over hundreds of miles of wires.   
   >   
   > I'd think you'd lose more in the energy translations from sunlight to   
   > electricity to microwave to electricity that you'd lose in line   
   > losses.   
      
   Line loss is proportional to  R * I^2 where R is the resistance of the   
   wire and I is current.   
      
   Seems to me wire resistance scales with wire length.   
      
   I believe line loss is large over large distances.   
      
   Hop   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)