Space-based solar power: Correlation
Prices it moves with, and why
Space solar power would collect sunlight in orbit and beam it to Earth as microwaves. Its cost would depend mostly on launch prices, the mass and cost of space-grade solar cells and the size of ground receivers.
No public price Space-based solar power has no public monthly price series: Only demonstration missions so far; no market for the power.What its price moves with
Sunlight in orbit is stronger and almost constant, with no night or cloud, which is the whole case for the idea. That advantage must outweigh the cost of lifting hardware to orbit and the losses in beaming power down.
No public price for sunlight, so the link is explained in words only.Orbiting panels use the same physics as ground solar, but ground panels keep getting cheaper. Every fall in ground solar and storage costs raises the bar that space solar must clear to deliver power at a competitive price.
No public price for solar photovoltaics, so the link is explained in words only.High-efficiency space cells are multi-junction devices made of gallium arsenide and related compounds. Gallium comes mainly as a by-product of alumina refining in China, and export controls there could raise cell costs.
No public price for gallium, so the link is explained in words only.Multi-junction space cells are usually grown on germanium wafers. Germanium is recovered from zinc ores and coal ash and is also subject to Chinese export controls, so supply risk would affect any large orbital array.
No public price for germanium, so the link is explained in words only.Launch cost per kilogram is the biggest single cost driver. Reusable rockets have cut prices sharply, and studies of space solar treat further falls in launch prices as the condition for the idea to work.
No public price for rockets and human power, so the link is explained in words only.Each launch burns large amounts of propellant, such as liquid oxygen with kerosene or methane. Propellant is a small share of launch cost today, but with fully reusable rockets it would become a much larger part.
Not enough overlapping price history to measure.How to read these numbers
Correlation of monthly changes (the number in the coloured pill) compares how much each price moved, month by month, since 2006 or the first month both series exist. It runs from −1 to +1: near +1 the two usually rise and fall in the same months, near 0 there is no link, and a negative number means they tend to move in opposite directions. Above 0.7 is strong, 0.4 to 0.7 moderate, 0.2 to 0.4 weak.
12-month changes compare year-on-year moves, which shows whether two prices share the same cycles even when the month-to-month noise differs.
Price function is a straight-line fit of the two prices on logarithmic scales: price ≈ k × (partner price)β. β is how much this price moves, in per cent, for a 1% move in the partner over the whole period, and R² is the share of the variation the fit explains. Two prices that both drift up with inflation can fit well without any real link, so read it together with the monthly correlation.
Lead or lag checks whether the monthly correlation is clearly higher when one price is shifted by 1 to 6 months.
Correlation is not cause. The reasons on each card explain the economic link; the numbers show how strongly it has shown up in prices. Proxy series are US producer price indexes or related prices and can blur the real link.
Data: World Bank Commodity Price Data (Pink Sheet), October 2026; US Bureau of Labor Statistics producer price indexes, IMF primary commodity prices and US EIA prices via FRED, Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, retrieved November 2026. Calculations by this site.