Saudi Arabia is investing in a ground breaking British plan to beam solar power generated in space to Earth for a round-the-clock supply of renewable energy.
Business Secretary Grant Shapps met the Kingdom’s communications minister, Abdullah al-Swaha, last week and discussed the state providing future finance for a UK-based space solar project.
However, the Times has learned that Saudi Arabia’s £409 billion Neom development, has already supplied some of the millions raised by a British company, Space Solar.
The idea of using solar panels in space to provide electricity on the Earth’s surface is almost a century old. It featured in a 1941 short story by Isaac Asimov and the aerospace engineer Peter Glaser published an influential paper on it in 1968.
Source: thetimes, Shafaqna English
www.shafaqna.com