The Znamya project was a series of experimental orbital mirrors, designed to beam solar power to Earth by reflecting sunlight. It consisted of two experiments – the Znamya 2 experiment, and the failed Znamya 2.5 – and the proposed Znamya 3. The project was abandoned by the Russian Federal Space Agency after the failed deployment of the Znamya 2.5.
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Znamya 2
The Znamya 2 was a 20-metre wide space solar mirror. Znamya-2 was launched aboard Progress M-15 from Baikonur on 27 October 1992. After visiting the EO-12 crew aboard the Mir space station the Progress T-15 then undocked and deployed the reflector from the end of the Russian Progress spacecraft on 4 February 1993, next to the Russian Mir space station. The mirror deployed successfully, and, when illuminated, produced a 5 km wide bright spot, which traversed Europe from southern France to western Russia at a speed of 8 km/s. The bright spot had a luminosity equivalent to approximately that of a full moon. Although clouds covered much of Europe that morning, a few ground observers reported seeing a flash of light as the beam swept by.
The mirror was de-orbited after several hours and burned up in atmospheric reentry over Canada.
The Znamya mirror had originally been designed as a prototype of a solar sail propulsion system, but was repurposed as a space mirror for illumination when interest in solar sails flagged.