Renewable energy has the ability to play a major role in the energy industry of the twenty-first century. Shell and other big oil companies are ironically investing in renewable energy sources. Environmental experts realize that renewable energy helps reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. They also predict that by the year 2050, renewable power may grow to supply half the world’s energy. It may seem unreachable, but generating electricity by using the constant power of the sun and wind is already a reality. Solar power relies on the energy produced by the sun, storing energy for nighttime as well. “This energy can be converted in many ways, such as simple water heating or by the direct conversion of sunlight to energy using mirrors or boilers” (Riley).
The concept of solar energy is not a new one. We have seen it in practice from solar powered calculators, garden lights, watches, and a wide variety of other novelty products. However, the idea of solar energy as a sustainable, renewable form of electricity, is on another level completely. Solar energy is one of the most popular and fastest growing sources of alternative energy not only in the country, but in the world.
Solar energy is defined as the transformation of the sun’s rays into useful forms of energy, for instance, electricity and heat. The capacity of solar radiation a place receives depends on a variety of factors such as geographic location, time of day, season, and local weather. According to Knier (n.d.) photo voltaic and concentrating solar power cells are the two forms of sources to produce electricity. Photo voltaic cells generate electricity directly using solar cells and concentrated solar power cells generate electricity using steam. According to The World Bank - for the past three years, India has taken a enormous step in forwarding and in implementing the green growth agenda by producing 2,000 MW of solar power at the world’s cheap tariff. Solar power is likely to reduce India’s usage of imports of diesel and coal. A number of measurements are probably taking to generate 20,000 MW of solar power in future by 2022. The Solar industry is likely to create 200-400 jobs in the industries like research, development and installation, for every 10 MW of solar power generated. Hence, the government of India had taken enormous steps to increase the productivity of the solar energy. This research report will discuss the effectiveness and the limitations of solar power in India
Solar energy is rising throughout the United States. This source is mainly used in remote locations, but is becoming popular in urban areas. In 18 days of sunlight the earth receives an equal amount of energy stored in all of the earths reserves of oil, coal, and natural gas. Solar energy is produced by collecting sunlight with large, flat panels, made up of individual solar cells, and converting the sunlight into electricity. Solar energy is an alternative to fossil fuel and it is important to know the advantages, disadvantages, and the overall price.
Today, many people are talking about energy production and all the new and old ways to go about it. There are many different modes of energy production that is available or is becoming available to us in the future. The constant debate about what energy production is best for the environment and which is not. In my essay, I will be describing the advantages and disadvantages of coal, oil, and Solar energy.
In today’s society, we have an almost immediate demand for an alternative source of energy. This is due to the gradual depletion of our finite sources of fossil fuels as well as due to the damage of the burning of fossil fuels to our environment. All of these alternative sources, such as solar, wind and nuclear power come with their upsides and downsides. The most controversial of which, nuclear power, also manages to have the most potential in the near future due to its lack of a carbon emission output.
Solar energy has its ups and downs with advantages and disadvantages. A few advantages of using solar energy are that it is a renewable energy source, the development of technological advances, different applications for its uses, and a reduction on the electric bill. The idea of using solar power began around the 1960s and hasn’t stopped growing since. It is such a good idea that the president of the United States of America had solar panels installed at the White House. “On June 20, 1979, the Carter administration installed 32 panels designed to harvest the sun’s rays and use them to heat water” (Biello, David). Although the panels did not get a chance to stay in the White House for very long, they served their purpose very well. “By 1986, the Reagan administration had gutted the research and development budget for renewable energy at the then-fledgling U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) and eliminated tax breaks for the deployment of wind turbines and solar technologies—recommitting the nation on reliance on cheap but polluting fossil fuels, often from foreign suppliers” (Biello, David).
Recently, the price of unrenewable energy resource such as oil, coral and natural gas is increasing by time because of rare and more and more usage for individual and industries. Solar panels which use energy from Sun are considered as renewable energy through the form of solar radiation, UV. Solar technologies are broadly characterized as either passive solar or active solar depending on the way they
Solar cell or photovoltaic (PV) systems usually transformed energy from the sun in to electric current. It can be measured in terms of ‘‘conversion efficiency’’, the proportion of solar energy transformed to electricity. (Henderson, Conkling, & Roberts, 2007) Sunpower primarily focused on the production of solar cell. But by moving in to wafer manufacturing it soon incorporated in to manufacturing of solar power module units. In general Sunpower manufacturing process needed approximately two times as many steps as the usual solar manufacturing process need and many of these steps were distinctive to Sunpower. Sunpower has nearly 15 -20 established cell manufactures, a handful of silicon – based cell manufacturing upstarts and a number of thin film solar companies offering potentially unsettling technologies.
Innovation is the core principle behind the consistency in energy today. Throughout history, various intellectuals have revolutionized the world through their creative methods of cultivating energy. In recent years, people have witnessed some of the greatest advancements and have reached unprecedented levels in technology. These technological advancements are only possible using energy sources. An energy source is a system which creates energy in a certain way. The lifestyle of the future is determined by the energy sources practiced today. Each energy source has distinct characteristics making it more valuable than others. Examples of positive characteristics in energy sources are availability and environmental friendliness. Thus, the most viable energy sources for the future are natural gas, nuclear power, and renewable resources. These energy sources possess the best attributes for an improvement in mankind’s lifestyle.
As humans continue to generate more carbon emissions and other harmful gases to the atmosphere, climate change and global warming slowly happens. People have sought ways to reduce carbon emissions by switching to other sources that are both renewable and clean. Over the centuries, people were able to harness energy from other resources besides coal and petroleum. Alternative energy resources produce little to no carbon at all thus, reducing carbon emissions. Alternative energy sources include wind energy, solar energy, hydroelectric energy, biomass energy, and nuclear energy. Only twenty-two percent of the world’s electricity is from renewable energy leaving seventy-eight percent to fossil fuels. Although all alternative resources reduce carbon emissions, most of these energies are not affordable, efficient, or portable, making alternative resources not able to fully eliminate all fossil fuel usage. Out of all the renewable resources, it seems nuclear energy rises to the top with the lowest land and location usage,and highest availability and efficiency.compared to other alternative energy sources. Nuclear energy is the best. (Toshi)
Solar energy and its use isn’t new to the world. It has been used by various societies beginning from 7thCentury B.C, when the sun’s heat was concentrated by glass and mirrors to light fires. Today, we have everything from solar-powered buildings to solar-powered vehicles. By and large solar technology has some environmental, economic, psychological and ethical implications for our society. Actions taken by companies and individuals to increase the use of solar technology will create good local jobs, improve our environment and reduce our dependence on foreign oil while doing what’s ethical and moral for our society.
Since fossil fuels have become such a concern for our environment, alternative energy has become a source of energy that is an alternative to the problem that these fossil fuels have caused our Earth. Alternative energy are renewable and is considered to be free energy sources (Alternative Energy). All alternative energy sources have lower carbon emissions when being compared to conventional energy sources. These sources include Biomass Energy, Wind, Solar, Geothermal, and Hydroelectric Energy (Alternative Energy). With the use of recycling, the clean alternative energies such as the use of solar power systems will benefit in the survival of these energy resources beyond the 21st century (Alternative Energy). Alternative resources
Someday, our energy sources are going to run out. What will we do? What can we do? Our major source of energy now is fossil fuel. If that were to run out, there must be an alternate way to get energy. Because of this problem, there has been a lot of research going on. Through that research, alternate ways to get energy have been developed. They include wind energy, solar energy, nuclear energy, tidal energy and many more. In this paper I will focus on the aspects of solar energy. I will look at the history of solar energy, cover the advantages and disadvantages of solar energy and then finally I will talk about the concept of solar energy (how it works) and ways that solar energy can be used in your everyday life.
Energy conversion has been essential in every human activity since the prehistoric age. A basic extent of the evolution of society is directly associated with the changes in the fundamental sources of energy and its uses. Through the last 250 years, people have learned how to harvest and deal with energy in different forms to make work easier and live more comfortable. Nevertheless, this human activity is overloading the atmosphere with greenhouse gases emission, which make the temperature higher, trap heat and generates serious and harmful impacts on the environment and on climate. Therefore, the governments all around the world are making an effort to promote and develop renewable energy as the new main energy source.