Just let that tight beam fry one federally protected raptor, and the whole system goes in the can.
Who ever said the beam had to be transmitted through the atmosphere? A buried light pipe that could be laid around serious obstacles or even suspended from one point to another (like to cross rivers, or mountain ranges). We are not done with developing fiber optics, as just one small example.
And what about room-temperature superconductors? Theoretically, they could serve as capacitors to hold electricity in a continuously traversing loop, until drawn off to provide useful energy at some point. Think of the application of this characteristic to devices in which we now use batteries or portable generators to provide power.
A hundred years ago, television would have been considered wizardry. And probably supernatural to boot.