Wind Energy

Solar Power

Natural Energy Source

Solar Energy

Solar energy consists of using the sun as an energy source. There are actually various ways that this can be done like using the sun as light source or to heat water but for the most part when people refer to solar energy they are referring to solar power. This is the process of turning the suns rays into electricity. There are a lot of people who think that this may be an ideal source of alternative energy. That being said there are some major challenges that have to be addressed in using the sun as a power source.

In theory using the sun to create electricity is ideal. It is free to use and it produces no emissions. The problem is the practicalities of actually doing it. The biggest problem is that the sun is only there part of the time. That means that you have to find a way to produce power at night or when it is cloudy. There are basically two options, you can find a way to store the energy that is produced by the sun or you can find a way to make sure that the sun is always available to use as an energy source.

The option of storing the electricity that has been produced by the sun is the one that has generally been tried. So far the results have been rather limited. The problem is that electricity does not store all that well. If you don't use it right away you lose a great deal of the electricity that you have created. This means that we need to greatly increase the number of solar cells that are being used which creates its own problems.

The problem with using more solar cells so that we will be able to store adequate electricity is that they are very expensive to produce. The price may come down in the future but this is unlikely, while solar energy is renewable the materials that are required to make the solar cells are not. The other problem is that in order to produce anywhere near enough electricity to meet our needs we would need to cover most of the earths surface with solar cells.

The other option to get around the problem of the sun only being there part of the time is to locate the solar cells in a place where they will always be exposed to the sun. The way you would do this would be to put them in space. A satellite that was covered in solar cells could be located so that it always faces the sun. There would obviously also be no issues with cloud cover. The problem in this case is that the satellite would have to be massive. Given that is currently costs ten thousand dollars a kilogram to put something into orbit the cost would be prohibitive. The result is that solar energy will likely remain a supplement rather than a major source of energy.