by Garvin Nelson

Created on: November 29, 2008

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The multiple uses of solar energy

The sun is humanity's largest renewable resource. There is more solar energy hitting the earth in one day than all the fossil fuel sources put together will ever produce. Why you may ask is solar not being fully utilized? The biggest hurdles of utilizing solar energy are the relatively high cost, intermittent power generation and politics. At this point in history with high energy cost, looming environmental catastrophe, peak oil and other issues solar power along with other sources of alternative energy may come into their own.

Solar Energy can utilized in several different ways.

Solar lighting: The use of sun light to provide illumination inside buildings without windows has been used in ancient Egypt. Now there are several technologies that can bring sunlight into buildings. These systems can filter out infrared and ultraviolet spectrum of sunlight and are proven to have positive health benefits.

Passive Heating : Sunlight can be utilized by proper building design to keep homes and business warmer during winter months and thus reducing heating costs.

Solar To Electric: voltaic direct conversion of solar to electric. The use of photo voltaic devices that convert sunlight into electricity have been available commercially since the 1950's where the price was $1500 per watt of power produced. Today the price has dropped down to about $4 per watt and there are many more technology options.

Solar To Thermal: Conversion solar radiation to heat and work. This is probable the area of solar energy utilization that had the lowest cost and the widest applications from simply heating water for domestic use to generating electricity. Solar Water heating for home use has been around decades and are reliable and are low maintenance.

Solar heating for industrial use can vary from low temperature application such as solar drying to desalination of seawater. By concentrating the sunlight temperatures in excess of 1000 Celsius can be obtained concentrating solar radiation this concentrated heat can be used in distillation, refrigeration and electricity generation.

Solar To Fuel: Conversion of solar energy directly into fuel. In this from of solar energy use where is the intent is conversion of solar energy directly into fuel. There are two different approaches to solar to fuel technologies. One approach modifies algae so that they produce hydrogen or methane from photosynthesis instead of sugar. The other uses inorganic
nano-particles that generate hydrogen when exposed to sunlight. The hydrogen generated n the process can then be stored to be used in fuel cells or burned in conventional engines with some modification.

The utilization of solar energy to power our home, business and transportation will provide benefits to us both economic and environmental. It is in our best interest to invest in and utilize such technologies. Although the cost are high at the moment is high at the moment, refinements in the technologies involved are rapidly reducing costs and make the use of solar power a viable alternatives to the polluting current methods.

Below are websites that may be of interest.

http://www.nrel.gov/learning/re_solar.html
h ttp://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/246/
http://www1.e ere.energy.gov/solar/sl_basics.html
http://www.natura llighting.com/articles_effects_of_lighting_on_school _children.php
http://www.power-technology.com/project s/Seville-Solar-Tower/

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