....I don't think you get it honestly. Over the years, means of gathering Solar Energy have been more and more worked on.. Meaning, we've developed better and simpler ways to gather the energy of the sun on Solar Panels.. Solar Panels of today are much more reliable and produces more than those of when I was a child (15+ years ago) because of how technology has allowed for us to create things at the microscopic level..

I support Solar Energy development as a way to get us away from Oil and the greed and corruption it brings to humanity.. Maybe not as a finalized search for alternative energy, but a great start to ween us away from our dependency on Oil Corporations and Oil in general.

Just because you can throw fancy statistics out, doesn't mean you know what you're talking about, that goes for anyone not just the creator of the thread.

There's still a limit, Kelly. We'll never have photovoltaic cells with 100% or greater efficiency, and probably never greater than 70%. And coupled with the fact that human energy consumtion is increasing faster than photovoltaic efficiency, they'll never be viable as a primary energy source.

Woah woah woah. Hang on guys.

Anyone see the first episode of Discovery Project Earth on the Discovery Channel? There's a proposed plan that would send multiple solar energy collecting satellites into space, where the energy would be at its maximum power instead of weakened due to the Earth's atmosphere and weather conditions. The energy would then be converted to microwaves which are beamed down to dishes on the Earth's surface.

As radical and expensive as that may seem, I think that we could overcome many disadvantages of solar panels mentioned using this method.

Didn't they also list the flaws with it? It's been a while since I watched that.

Wouldn't the very weather problems they were trying to avoid just come back again with the microwaves?

I have no idea. I'm just repeating what I saw on the show.

It's not that the renewable energy is not plentiful enough. We just don't have proper ways to gather it. The way to be serious about collecting solar energy is by placing the collectors outside of Earth's atmosphere. For instance, let's consider a civilization that wants to qualify as Type II on Kardashev scale, meaning that they are able to harness all available power from a single star. Obviously, covering a planet's surface with solar panels is futile in this case. The most plausible way to go about it would be by constructing an array of solar power satellites, known as the Dyson sphere. There are some interesting resources on that topic on the Internet, some more serious than other. I liked the one here.

But then, humanity is aeons away from even remotely considering achieving Type II. As of 2007, we're approximately 0.72, where Type I means being able to harness all power available on a single planet. Fusion power is the way to go for now, if we consider the scale of our energy needs.

That's exactly what I was talking about when I mentioned satellites in space and the whole microwave thing.

As for the "aeons away" part, it's not a matter of technological advancement - it's a matter of economics. Who builds these satellites considering the costs? Who controls space territory considering every nation will want to send out satellites? Who is willing to risk years of recession if it fails? Technologically, we can do it. We just choose not to. Another example: The US spent $717 million in 2006 on alternative fuel research out of the annual $5.5 billion research budget. The US also spends a minimum of $18.75 billion on gasoline every year. Is anyone going to say that that's ridiculous? Sure. Is anyone going to do anything radical about it? We only started throwing alternative fuels as a major issue a few years ago.

Lastly, fusion won't happen in the US unless every other major world power chooses to have primary reactors as fusion.

You may be correct there.. But don't you think that if companies pushed for further development on more energy efficient products, Solar Energy could be a primary source to get us away from Oil until we develop more stable means of gathering energy?

Do you have any idea how expensive that is?

EDIT:: Do you have any idea how impractical Solar E is for main food line of our energy consumption?

I don't see why building solar power plants on the ocean is so infeasible. Given that the the more surface area used = more gains, the ocean is the most logical place in my mind if the panels can be protected. Doesn't water magnify light or something too; could they be submerged to provide even more energy...? (Ignore if that's completely wrong, I'm no scientist.)

Tidal power is interesting.

Random question: Energy can neither be created nor destroyed. Gravity is a spacetime curvature, rather than a force, according to General Relativity. The tides move as a result of passing gravity from the Moon, and to a lesser extend the Sun. We can harness that movement into electrical power. In other words, we're harvesting energy from gravity. Where, then, does this energy "come from"? Does it have entropy? Would it ever expire, like how a star runs out of fuel?

Einsteins theory of Relativity (which it seems is where you have came up with your definition of Gravity) can only work on a 2d plane of existance, not a 3d plane of existance like Space is.

So the definition of gravity is flawed still.. But anyways:

We would be getting energy from the sun and if they put tidal harnesses or whatever you call them, underneath the panels you could harvest the waves as energy as well.

No, no, Gravity is a force.

The catch is, though, unline the other 3 fundamental forces, it has no 'range'. We could be interacting with gravity from Alpha Centeri for all we know.

Which is why the theory of relativity only works in a 2d plane, not a 3d plane like Space.

Technically, it's not. The theory of relativity explains that gravitational force is a byproduct of the space/time curvature when there's mass. If we completely disregard the theory though, it's a force (force = stuff that moves other stuff).

The theory of Relativity is wrong when applied to 3 dimensional Space...

After doing more research it does appear that if we were to only build solar panels only in the areas with the greatest amount of sunshine (instead of areas with average sunshine) then we'd need to cover much less than ~0.13% of land.

Perhaps a world run off of renewable energy is feasible after all.

EDIT: I don't have the exact data yet, but from the pictures I've been looking at I wouldn't be surprised to see something like "70% of the energy from the sun falls on 20% of the earth's surface."

EDIT AGAIN: Nevermind actually, if we look here and then assume that the sun is powering solar stations at a rate of 300 watts per square meter (the maximum any land surface gets according to the picture). Then factor in efficiency we get 300 *(31.25/100) = 93.75 watts per square meter, or 93.75 megawatts per square kilometer.

15.79 terawatts / 93.75 megawatts = 168426 square kilometers needed to supply mankind's energy, which is still ~0.11% of landmass.

I am ignoring what Kellimus says in this thread from now on.

Post has been edited 6 time(s), last time on Jan 4 2009, 4:04 am by scwizard.

That shoutbox save has nothing to do with the argument, why are you trolling?

Well, the shoutbox save has something to do with the thread, it was my way of saying what I'm just about to say explicitly:
I am ignoring all further posts Kellimus makes in this thread, and perhaps SD in general.
I meant to retract the above because it was rude, but I was too late. It's left here for the record.

The united states would need a solar power plant half the size of Vermont to meet its electricity needs.

To compare it would only need 666 modern nuclear reactors covering at most 2000 square kilometers to meet its energy needs.

Post has been edited 4 time(s), last time on Jan 4 2009, 4:38 am by scwizard.