DARPA program reports record-breaking power-transmission distances
NewsJune 09, 2025
ARLINGTON, Va. In a series of recent tests held at the U.S. Army White Sands Missile Range, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Persistent Optical Wireless Energy Relay (POWER) program reported setting several new records for transmitting power over distance, with the POWER team recording more than 800 watts of power delivered during a 30-second transmission from a laser situated 8.6 kilometers (5.3 miles) away; over the course of the test campaign, more than a megajoule of energy was transferred.
Before the recent DARPA tests, the greatest reported distance records for an appreciable amount of optical power (>1 microwatt) were 230 watts of average power at 1.7 kilometers for 25 seconds and a lesser (but undisclosed) amount of power at 3.7 kilometers.
According to the agency's announcement, the technology is scalable to higher power levels and can be integrated into different platforms, such as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and is an important step for revolutionizing power delivery at the edge, including on the battlefield.
