So, a terawatt would require 5 billion square meters of 15% cells. By my math, that is five thousand square kilometers (just about 71 km by 71 km, or an 80 km diameter circle.). Be advised that large power plants are built to generate only 1 gigawatt (1/1000 of that terawatt), so these replace roughly 1,000 large power plants, worldwide. (I guess, with all that power being used for artificial intelligence, it seems silly to keep turning off the lights around the house. Or maybe we could stop asking AI silly or unimportant questions,)

Ultraviolet light degrades solar panels, so eventually they need to be retired or replaced. A space-based power generation station may end up needing constant maintenance of the solar cells and panels, like large bridges here on Earth are constantly painted.

There are more efficient generation methods than solar cells and longer lasting hardware, but not many of these have been used in space, so they may not be economical alternatives. Transmitting power to Earth is still largely theoretical, although a few tests have been performed.
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Joe,
I hope you can let us know how well your satellite works. I love its name.

It was exciting while it lasted, last night, with two attempts within half an hour. I don’t see it on the launch schedule for tonight, but when it does launch, good luck!

sippin-bourbon: I just watched the live stream. The first abort occurred at about T-2 seconds, apparently because of some ground equipment related the “release system.” The second launch attempt was then scrubbed at just under 8 minutes for apparently the same reason.

From the article;
“For example, power usage. In 2022, data centers consumed 460 terawatt-hours (TWh) of electricity globally, which could rise to over 1,000 TWh by 2026”

How many solar panels would make one terawatt?
https://www.pv-magazine.com/2022/03/15/humans-have-installed-1-terawatt-of-solar-capacity/

OK, will need to install 500 times as many solar panels as the entire world put together. Linked together, it could be an artificial ring around earth. Perhaps the intent is to block the sunlight? (Would much prefer this over throwing dirt from the moon around the earth.) Covering the skies with Chem trails hasn’t worked out so well either… (Speaking of which I haven’t seen any in a month which is very unusual.)

What could happen? A satellite, meteor or malfunctioning booster could smash and drag the whole thing back out of orbit? Obviously they can’t be linked together or one catastrophe could doom the entire project.
So each processing center is independent. That is until a solar storm blows against the solar panels like a sailboat… which is good! They won’t need thrust to push themselves to a higher orbit! Unless the gyroscopes go out which never happens… The radiation will be a huge factor, for both the processing chips (cosmic radiation) and the panels themselves which will receive 5% degradation with one solar storm.
Great job replacing solar panels every 20 years. At least they don’t have to worry about hail storms.
https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/green-energy-beaten-black-and-blue-video-shows-massive-hail-damage-texas-solar-farm
(Picture doesn’t do justice, watch the short video to see mile after mile after mile of destroyed solar panels with damage in the billions of dollars)