Figure 5.3: The Management Structure for the Space to Space Beaming Demonstrator ($80M) 5.3 Legal Framework A space solar power program, with the development and construction of a solar power satellite system would necessarily involve a number of challenges: technological, financial, institutional and legal, among others. The space solar power program has relevance to international law, especially to space law , because the utilization of solar power satellites implies the use of a variety of space resources. In effect, to become operational, solar power satellites will require power from a celestial body, the Sun, the utilization of the geostationary orbit, lower Earth orbits, or Lagrangian points; and the radio frequency spectrum. This is true both for communications purposes and for the transmission of energy to Earth by microwave or laser beams. Placed near the Moon, solar power satellites could also serve as a power station providing energy for a lunar base or for return to Earth. It may be very useful to take lunar materials or other non- terrestrial resources for the manufacture of the satellites, which would have legal implications. Other considerations include protection against the possibility that microwave or laser beams and receiving antenna, built as part of solar power satellites, could be used as strategic weapons, and the generation of some unconventional environmental and health hazards which at present are poorly understood. The legal implications of the circumstances quoted above are wide ranging. Thus, the presence of jurists is required in the space solar power program. Before the exploitation of solar energy in space can commence, the legal status of activities involving solar power satellites must be clearly established. There is no doubt that the implementation of a space solar power program will be a challenge to the abstract and generic principles prescribed in the existing outer space treaties and other agreements and principles of international law. To be operational, a space solar power program will need legal solutions to very specific problems. Hence, it will facilitate new reflections and developments in general international space law. 5.3.1 Some Legal Aspects Of Outer Space In this paragraph we are going to cope with various specific issues of outer space law which are relevant to a space solar power program. But, first of all, we have to determine that outer space law is applicable to activities carried on by solar power satellites.
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