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Role of radiation‐hard solar cells in minimizing the costs of global satellite communication systems
Author(s) -
Summers Geoffrey P.,
Walters Robert J.,
Messenger Scott R.,
Burke Edward A.
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
progress in photovoltaics: research and applications
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.286
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1099-159X
pISSN - 1062-7995
DOI - 10.1002/(sici)1099-159x(199603/04)4:2<147::aid-pip121>3.0.co;2-f
Subject(s) - photovoltaic system , satellite , computer science , environmental science , remote sensing , aerospace engineering , electrical engineering , engineering , geography
Abstract An analysis embodied in a personal computer program is presented, which quantitatively demonstrates how the availability of radiation hard‐solar cells can help to minimize the cost of a global satellite communication system. An important distinction between the currently proposed systems, such as Iridium, Odyssey and Ellipsat, is the number of satellites employed and their operating altitudes. Analysis of the major costs associated with implementing these systems shows that operation at orbital altitudes within the Earth's radiation belts (10 3 –10 4 km) can reduce the total cost of a system by several hundred per cent, 1,2 so long as radiation‐hard components, including solar cells, can be used. A detailed evaluation of the predicted performance of photovoltaic arrays using several different planar solar cell technologies is given, including commercially available Si and GaAs/Ge, and InP/Si which is currently under development. Several examples of applying the program are given, which show that the end‐of‐life (EOL) power density of different technologies can vary by a factor of ten for certain missions. Therefore, although a relatively radiation‐soft technology can usually provide the required EOL power by simply increasing the size of the array, the impact upon the total system budget could be unacceptable, due to increased launch and hardware costs. In aggregate, these factors can account for more than a 10% increase in the total system cost. Because the estimated total costs of proposed global‐coverage systems range from $1 billion to $9 billion, the availability of radiaton‐hard solar cells could make a decisive difference in the selection of a particular constellation architecture.