India and US joined hands on a space based energy initiative. Their aim is to turn both the countries into net energy exporters. This accord was reached 48 hours before US president Barack Obama landed in India.

It has been said that the project is led by India’s former President A.P.J Abdul Kalam. But he was once a strong critic of US and National Space Security (NSS). NSS is a non profit US based space organization. It has got chapters all over the world including India. This initiative was declared on Thursday in Washington’s National Press Club. It was attended by Kalam and T.K.Alex.  He is the director of ISRO Satellite Centre. The initiative is known as the Kalam National Space Society Initiative.  The aim of this mission is to harvest solar energy in space for use on earth.

Alex is the project’s principal investigator from India. It has been reported that Kalam has told US media that a team from ISRO is being formed. They will carry out a feasibility study for this project. K. Radhakrishnan is the chairman of ISRO. Kalam said that he was asked by Radhakrishnan to take the idea forward after discussing the project in details. Kalam also said that both Manmohan Singh and Obama are concerned leaders. He also said that both are interested in “energy related issues and energy independence”. This project is 15 years old. It has been reported that main challenge is to generate methods to transmit solar power from space to earth and its distribution.  To make it economical it is necessary to cut down the cost of launching a space craft.