Orbital Power: Meta plans to harvest solar energy in space to run its data centres

 One of the biggest challenges that came with AI is how to meet its insatiable appetite for energy. Its data centres require enormous amounts of energy, and this demand is expected to rise exponentially. Meta is now looking to space for an answer. The social media giant announced that it has signed agreements with two energy startups—Overview Energy and Noon Energy— that would potentially allow it to tap into solar energy beamed directly from space to its data centres.

According to this deal, Overview Energy’s satellites, which will be located 22,000 miles above the Equator, would collect sunlight, convert it into near-infrared light and beam it to solar farms on Earth, and Noon Energy’s technology would allow for solar energy storage. The technology isn’t there yet. Overview Energy plans to con­duct an initial orbital demonstra­tion in 2028, with commercial power delivery expected in 2030.

Meta isn’t the only one look­ing to space to meet its data cen­tre needs. Elon Musk is pursuing this too, and in fact, his vision goes a step further. He doesn’t want solar energy sent down, but instead wants to move data cen­tres into space. His SpaceX and xAI are designing massive orbital “AI sats” that would host computing hardware in low- Earth orbit, and rely on solar energy for energy needs.

There are still many unknowns—whether the cost of putting data centres in space would come down enough to make this feasible or whether the technology to collect sunlight and beam it to Earth would even work. But faced with this challenge to find new energy sources, these firms are betting on new ideas, even those that lie in space.