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This company wants to sell you sunlight at night from space (www.vice.com)

submitted 3 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Reflect Orbital, a California startup, has opened applications for anyone who wants to use a satellite with a mirror on it to reflect sunlight to a specific location on Earth after dark. You might be wondering: What?

A few years ago, VICE spoke with Reflect Orbital’s founder and CEO, Ben Nowack, about his plans to generate solar power at night.

“I had an interesting way to solve the real issue with solar power. It’s this unstoppable force,” Nowack said in the interview. “Everybody’s installing so many solar panels everywhere. It’s really a great candidate to power humanity. But sunlight turns off. It’s called nighttime. If you solve that fundamental problem, you fix solar everywhere.”

The company’s orbital mirror is set to launch in 2025, and you can “apply for sunlight” for the next few months. There’s “limited availability,” and already supposedly over 30,000 applications. It really just sounds like a one-time test, though: you only get four minutes for a diameter of 5km. No price is listed.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 months ago

I made this comment in another thread about this, but this would be an amazing way to screw with someone on a camping trip. Fifteen minutes of daylight would be just enough for someone to get up, get dressed, start going about their morning routine, only for the sun to go out.

Bonus points if they don't check their watch and notice it's 2am.