Solar Balloons To Harness Solar Power

By Nick April 29, 2008

Sunhope Solar Balloons

Solar energy is an enormous source of power but the solar panels that we rely on are expensive and not so efficient therefore many researchers are trying to find better ways to harvest Sun’s power. Joseph Cory, an environmental architect from Geotectura, has teamed up with Dr. Pini Gurfil, aerospace engineer from Technion, and they designed an interesting system.

The project is called Sunhope and it’s based on helium-filled platforms covered in photovoltaic solar cells. Sunhope is low-cost deployable and it maintains little environmental footprint. The idea of the developers was to design a system that would be spread vertically, not horizontally and they succeeded as you will need two solar balloons at the most to power up one home.

Sunhope Solar Balloons

The infrastructure of the solar balloons consist of a control panel, a helium supply cable and a power cable therefore they are low-impact just like power plants.

Sunhope can produce a kilowatt of energy with a 10 ft solar balloon which costs $4,000 and when you think that for the same amount you need 25 square meters of solar panels and $10,000 for the solar field, then you must be impressed.

Sunhope Solar Balloons

According to the developers, the balloons can work one year without any maintenance, but they are working hard to make them more wind resistant by testing sizes and structures. In the future, the solar balloons could be used to harness power in deserts, isolated islands and into heavily forested landscapes.

Sunhope Solar Balloons