Street lights are an essential part of any modern day city to ensure that the city continues to function late in the night with minimal disruptions. Though, the energy demand by all the street lights in any given city puts a considerable amount of toll on the resources of the city if the place in question does not have renewable sources of energy. So, what if we start thinking about replacing the street lights to come up with a better solution. How about making an artificial moon? You heard it right, an artificial moon to replace the street lights.
You may claim that the idea of creating an artificial moon may be impractical or crazy but a new report has surfaced on the internet indicating that China may be working on this idea. According to a report by People.cn, the Chinese city of Chengdu is working on planning an artificial moon, also known as “illumination satellite” in the year 2020. Chairman for Chengdu Aerospace Science and Technology Microelectronics System Research Institute, Wu Chunfeng revealed the plans at the National Mass Innovation and Entrepreneurship activity on October 10. He claimed that the satellite is meant to compliment the moon at night and added that the brightness of the artificial moon is eight times to that of the real moon.
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Wu added that this will be enough to replace the street lights while illuminating the area of 10 to 80 kilometers in diameter. He also claimed that the area can be controlled “within a few dozen meters”. He added that the idea came from a French artist who had an idea of creating a necklace made of mirrors around the earth that would “reflect sunshine through the streets of Paris.”
The testing of the satellite started “years ago” and finally the technology has improved to be used on a large scale. According to the report, the director for the Institute of Optics, School of Aerospace, Harbin Institute of Technology issued a clarification that the light from the satellite will be “similar to a dusk0like glow” which means that it will not affect daily routine of certain animals.
