energy to these locations seems to give direct and substantial benefits to the population: basics like drinking water, cooking, irrigation and telecommunication. As well, the environmental benefits are important, since using wood as main fuel resource leads to deforestation. Availability of power for this user segment seems the priority rather than high reliability or continuous delivery, and no competing systems are yet largely installed. This market segment is therefore suited for relatively new technologies of which the long term reliability still needs to be demonstrated. As far as price is concerned, developing locations are similar to developed remote locations and we think the value of $0.22/kWh can be used. The power demand per location can range from 10 kW to 10,000 kW, or an energy demand ranging from 60,000 through 60 million kWh per year. The total market size is estimated at 350 billion kWh or an equivalent $77 billion per year. Much of the world energy demand growth is predicted in developing regions, and since we do not expect immediate large installation of grids, the segment of remote developing locations should grow in the near term. Quantitatively, this segment could grow to 1000 billion kWh per year. For estimation of the power demand we again use the comparison with the generator alternative. Delivering power at 10 kW seems a reasonable low end, since no electrical energy could be available now, while providing more than 10,000 kW (or 10 MW) seems no longer to justify the relatively high price of $0.22/kWh. In energy this evaluates from 60,000 through 60 million kWh per year for one location. The total market size is estimated as follows. Electrical energy use for all developing countries is currently estimated at 3.5-1012 kWh yearly [Chapter 2], and let assume that 10% of that could be used in remote locations, giving a demand of 350 billion kWh for this market segment. With the previously mentioned demands per location, this would mean in the order of 10,000 to 1,000,000 locations. In the time frame unto 2020, the energy demand in the developing world is currently predicted to grow by a factor of 3, hence this market segment is also expected to grow by a factor of 3 in this period, growing to 1000 billion kWh per year. At a price of $0.22/kWh, the yearly monetary market size grows from $77 billion to about $230 billion. Although the present market size should be as large as $77 billion a year, a problem is the lack of hard currencies in these locations and it is questionable whether this amount of money is available there. But the benefits are large: a large number of people would have direct improvements of their standard of living, and we expect substantial benefit to the sensitive tropical environment, which is of global concern. Even though the end-users probably can not pay directly for the power, it seems worthwhile to develop this segment and look for alternative financing mechanisms, for instance reallocating aid funding to generate electricity and donate electrical energy instead. Since these areas are found at low latitudes, Earth based solar power could be a good first step, provided that the climate is not too cloudy. The area that is allocated to become the rectenna site could first be covered by low-cost solar cells, and deliver discontinuous power e.g. for heating water boilers. In a next step, the area could be transformed to rectenna for space based power. This could be helpful to phase the implementation of solar power. Power Relay Relaying power from one location on Earth to another is another segment. As long as there exist locations with large natural energy resources but with a low demand, the energy could be generated and transported to high demand areas. This is especially useful for clean renewable resources like wind and water. For cases where this approach is presently not viable because of transportation losses of the electricity, relay of power via a microwave beam reflected by a satellite in orbit may be considered. As an example: supplying power generated in the Amazon region in Brazil to cities like Boston or New York in the USA 4000 miles away. [Brown, 1992] The users of relayed power would be the electricity companies operating the power grid, typically requiring a high reliability. For the near term, these markets are roughly located between 40 and 55 degree latitudes, basically North America, Europe and Japan, but start to spread in the developing world as well. The market size is in the order of 2400 billion kWh, showing near term growth to a maximum of 3600 billion kWh especially in the developing world. A price level for energy transfer over 3000 miles is in the order of $0.01/kWh; this does not account for costs of the energy itself nor of the installed capital for the transmission system. Estimating the market size of this segment, we refer to the total yearly generated electricity in these places, roughly equivalent to 16,000 billion kWh (30% of 54-1012 kWh, refer to Chapter 2),
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