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Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center

Buildings and structures in Merritt Island, FloridaKennedy Space CenterNASANextEra EnergyPhotovoltaic power stations in the United States
Solar power system at Kennedy Space Center
Solar power system at Kennedy Space Center

The Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center is a 10 megawatt (MW) solar photovoltaic (PV) facility at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida. Commissioned in April 2010, the center is the result of a partnership between NASA and Florida Power & Light. The facility has approximately 35,000 solar photovoltaic panels from SunPower covering an area of 60 acres. The facility provides slightly less than one percent of the power needed to keep Kennedy Space Center up and running. A 1 MW solar photovoltaic array is also located at the Kennedy Space Center. The Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center was the second largest-scale solar facility in Florida, with the 25 MW DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center being the largest, until the construction of the 75 MW Martin Next Generation Solar Energy Center.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center
North Courtenay Parkway,

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Latitude Longitude
N 28.485277777778 ° E -80.681388888889 °
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North Courtenay Parkway

North Courtenay Parkway
32953
Florida, United States
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Solar power system at Kennedy Space Center
Solar power system at Kennedy Space Center
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Space Mirror Memorial
Space Mirror Memorial

The Space Mirror Memorial, which forms part of the larger Astronauts Memorial, is a National Memorial on the grounds of the John F. Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex on Merritt Island, Florida. It is maintained by the Astronauts Memorial Foundation (AMF), whose offices are located in the NASA Center for Space Education next door to the Visitor Complex. The memorial was designed in 1987 by Holt Hinshaw Pfau Jones, and dedicated on May 9, 1991, to remember the lives of the men and women who have died in the various space programs of the United States, particularly those of NASA. The Astronauts Memorial has been designated by the U.S. Congress "as the national memorial to astronauts who die in the line of duty" (Joint Resolution 214, 1991). In addition to 20 NASA career astronauts, the memorial includes the names of a U.S. Air Force X-15 test pilot, a U.S. Air Force officer who died while training for a then-classified military space program, a civilian spaceflight participant who died in the Challenger disaster, and an Israeli astronaut who was killed in the Columbia disaster. In July 2019, the AMF unanimously voted to include private astronauts on the memorial, recognizing the important contributions made to the American space program by private spaceflight crew members. The first private astronaut to be added to the wall was Scaled Composites pilot Michael T. Alsbury, who died in the crash of SpaceShipTwo VSS Enterprise on October 31, 2014. His name was added to the memorial on January 25, 2020.

Kennedy Space Center
Kennedy Space Center

The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten field centers. Since 1968, KSC has been NASA's primary launch center of American spaceflight, research, and technology. Launch operations for the Apollo, Skylab and Space Shuttle programs were carried out from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39 and managed by KSC. Located on the east coast of Florida, KSC is adjacent to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS). The management of the two entities work very closely together, share resources, and operate facilities on each other's property. Though the first Apollo flights and all Project Mercury and Project Gemini flights took off from the then-Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, the launches were managed by KSC and its previous organization, the Launch Operations Directorate. Starting with the fourth Gemini mission, the NASA launch control center in Florida (Mercury Control Center, later the Launch Control Center) began handing off control of the vehicle to the Mission Control Center in Houston, shortly after liftoff; in prior missions it held control throughout the entire mission. Additionally, the center manages launch of robotic and commercial crew missions and researches food production and in-situ resource utilization for off-Earth exploration. Since 2010, the center has worked to become a multi-user spaceport through industry partnerships, even adding a new launch pad (LC-39C) in 2015. There are about 700 facilities and buildings grouped throughout the center's 144,000 acres (580 km2). Among the unique facilities at KSC are the 525-foot (160 m) tall Vehicle Assembly Building for stacking NASA's largest rockets, the Launch Control Center, which conducts space launches at KSC, the Operations and Checkout Building, which houses the astronauts' dormitories and suit-up area, a Space Station factory, and a 3-mile (4.8 km) long Shuttle Landing Facility. There is also a Visitor Complex on site that is open to the public.