Celebrating Lightkeepers, Satellites & Space Solarized Orbital Data Centers

It was still dark and quiet at 5:30 am in the morning on Sunday, August 2^nd, 2026, when CBS New’s truck arrived with John Elliott, the award-winning meteorologist, and his team to broadcast live for three hours the upcoming week’s weather forecast from the National Lighthouse Museum on Staten Island (NLM). The forecast would be somewhat similar to the severe environmental crises NY experienced in mid-2023, featuring hazardous Canadian wildfire smoke turning skies orange, followed closely by catastrophic, record-shattering torrential rain and flash floods in July 2023 that prompted a federal disaster declaration.

For three hours, talented John Elliott hosted a live television feature for CBS News from the NLM, where he interviewed the museum's Executive Director, Linda Dianto^[1], Chairman of the Board Captain Joseph Ahlstrom, curator Stevie Peters, intern Daniel Wills, Treasurer Eleanor Dugan, Esq and artist of Ocean Lovers – Angel Fish Flag CCL Selva Ozelli, Esq, CPA.

Mr. Elliott skillfully weaved into his weather forecast impacted by Canadian wildfire smoke, which caused hazardous flash flood conditions in New York, with the rich maritime history of the site, which originally served as the U.S. Lighthouse Service General Depot from 1864 to 1939—effectively the central hub where all American lighthouses were designed and supplied. Satellite-based systems like GPS largely replaced physical lighthouses as the primary tool for marine navigation, giving rise to NLM’s ongoing mission to preserve the technical and social history of American light stations.

His segment showcased various museum artifacts, including a 1920s French foghorn, a newly donated gas-powered weather signal buoy, Fresnel lights, and the museum's famous "Wall of Lights," which features over 160 miniature lighthouse models.

He spotlighted the Statue of Liberty Art Show currently being hosted at the museum to celebrate the country's upcoming milestones, highlighting the Statue of Liberty's history as an operational lighthouse featuring artwork by esteemed artists Hunt Slonem and Selva Ozelli and a historic Statue of Liberty photo of when she first arrived in New York.

Mr. Elliott noted structural updates surrounding the NLM property, including a promenade under construction to repair damage originally caused by Hurricane Sandy and ongoing damage by torrential floods, some of which were helped along by the Canadian wildfire smoke which significantly impacted New York in 2023 and 2026, bringing widespread haze and dangerous air pollution, followed by torrential rain and flash floods to the state.

Moratorium on Hyperscale Data Centers in NY

Intense smoke and hazardous air quality choked New York City and the surrounding Northeast region throughout July 2026, originating from massive, uncontrolled wildfires burning in Canada, in tandem with the apocalyptic wildfires in Europe which began escalating sharply in early July 2026, heavily impacting France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, the Scottish Highlands, and Greece, forcing over 330,000 evacuations. The widespread haze and dangerous air pollution were followed by torrential rain and flash floods to the state as accurately forecasted by Mr. Elliot throughout July and August.

Some good news arrived on July 14^th, 2026, when Governor Kathy Hochul signed an executive order halting state agencies from issuing discretionary permits to new hyperscale data centers (drawing 50 megawatts or more of power) for up to one year to study their environmental and grid impacts.  

Hyperscale data centers require massive resource inputs, typically drawing 100 megawatts (MW) or more of electrical power and consuming 1 million to 5 million gallons of water per day for cooling and operations. The United States is the leader in data center hosting, commanding over 40% of the world’s facilities [over 5,000 facilities as of 2026], driven by a head start by US tech giants such as such as Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Oracle, and Google Cloud, which made high-volume investment in AI.

Recent reports and state data show that New York ranks 12^th in the U.S. in building data center hubs, with roughly 50 massive data centers currently operating, 3 under construction, and over 72 additional hyperscale projects actively stalled or proposed in NYS's power queue.  The pause targets massive energy and water demands, aiming to protect NY’s power grid.

Ranked: The U.S. States Building the Most Data Centers

More info:

Data Center Moratoriums
National Conference of State Legislatures

New York is the first and the only U.S. state to enact a full, statewide moratorium on large data center construction, as NY is one of three states that enacted a constitutional green amendment to its state constitution to ensure environmental rights environment as a basic civil liberty — like clean air, pure water, and a stable climate. These rights can require government officials like Governor Kathy Hochul to prioritize environmental protections in energy policy, with courts playing an important role in enforcing environmental rights. As they are recognized and protected at a fundamental level, setting a legal foundation for environmental protection, often allowing citizens to sue for environmental harm and hold the government accountable for preserving natural resources. While no other state in the U.S. has implemented a statewide ban, dozens of state legislatures and municipalities across the country have introduced or passed temporary bans and restrictions. 

Are Space Solarized Orbital Data Centers (ODC) the Future?

Space solarized orbital data centers (ODC) present a trade-off to terrestrial data centers as they eliminate land and water use by using solar power and space vacuum cooling, but they risk severe upper-atmosphere pollution from space junk, rocket launches, and satellite re-entries^[3]. Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX, has positioned ODCs as a key component of SpaceX’s future. Musk explained that energy and water constraints on Earth are becoming the primary limiters for artificial intelligence compute scaling, making space-based data centers a “logical extension, especially with reduction in launch cost and advances in solar efficiency”.

By placing data centers in orbit, these facilities aim to harness continuous solar energy and the natural cooling of space to create a more sustainable AI computing infrastructure to convert massive amounts of electrical power into intelligence, measured in tokens. Musk has predicted that within two to three years, the lowest-cost way to generate AI compute will be in space, bypassing terrestrial environmental impacts.  Already last year on December 10, 2025, PowerBank Corporation (Canada) launched the inaugural  DeStarlink Genesis-1 satellite, marking Orbit AI’s (Singapore) first step toward building its space-solarized Orbital Cloud network — an architecture where AI compute, connectivity, and blockchain (Ethereum) verified processing occur directly in low-Earth satellites^[4].

Terrestrial Solar Power Harvesting (Space-to-Earth Energy)

The surging power demands of AI workloads have put immense strain on the domestic energy grid, forcing US technology companies to seek unconventional energy sources. Meta’s data center footprint consumed over 18,000 gigawatt-hours in 2024 alone.

Instead of putting servers in space, this approach keeps the data centers on the ground but uses satellites in geosynchronous orbit (GEO) to capture sunlight without the hindrance of weather, clouds, or nighttime, then transmit this energy to terrestrial receivers located directly at or near data center sites. This GEO positioning yields up to 5 times the energy of standard ground-based solar farms, bypassing terrestrial power grid constraints, eliminating interconnection bottlenecks, and providing instantaneous, 24/7 clean energy to highly demanding data center hubs.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) indicated that it remains focused on terrestrial data center expansion and has entered a partnership with Orbital Materials to focus on terrestrial data center infrastructure. The collaboration utilizes artificial intelligence to design and test new synthetic materials aimed at making traditional data centers more sustainable through targeted carbon removal and optimized cooling systems.

Meanwhile, with a first-of-its-kind commercial agreement, Space-based solar power (SBSP) in GEO is transitioning from theory, as explained by Dr. Paul Jaffe, to commercial implementation. Meta announced an agreement with startup Overview Energy to secure up to 1 gigawatt (GW) of space-based solar power capacity for its AI data centers. By beaming continuous energy via near-infrared lasers from geosynchronous orbit, the technology bypasses grid constraints by illuminating terrestrial solar farms at night to provide round-the-clock generation.

“space solar can be beamed to receivers placed anywhere there is space for them and the receivers can be connected directly to large users, or to a local microgrid or the Grid for further distribution”

explained Sanjay Vijendran, Co-founder & CTO of TerraSpark.

With the Hyperscale Data Center Moratorium in Place for a Year, Will New York Remain the Financial Center of the World?

Supporting AI inference and blockchain tokenization of the financial markets requires massive terrestrial data center power.  New York's statewide moratorium on new hyperscale data centers will temporarily hinder large-scale infrastructure deployment.

However, the SUNNY Act (Solar Up Now New York Act) is currently on Governor Kathy Hochul's desk awaiting her signature to legalize window solar panels for commercial and residential buildings, including terrestrial data centers. The state legislature passed the bill, and NYC officials are urging her to sign it so that New York can "remain the financial center of the world by embracing change but also demanding that change uplift our people,” Hochul said at a press conference announcing the order.

To celebrate this good news for our future, join us at the NLM’s Gala on August 7, 2026, Where Light Meets Liberty!