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Solar Power: Solar energy
powers the world, causing living things to grow, driving the wind and
waves, and drawing water into the sky to fall as rain and run to the sea.
The sun has supplied almost all of humanity's energy: the wood for the
first fire, the wind and water that powered mills, and the fossil fuels
the remains of long dead plants that have fired modern economic development. Every year the equivalent of about 60,000 billion metric tons of oil lands on the earth's surface as solar energy: if only 1% could be tapped at just 5% efficiency, the whole of the world's population could achieve the same level of energy consumption as the United States. The difficulty is in exploiting it. Solar energy is spread so widely that it is hard to collect and concentrate in large amounts. Yet its diffuseness can be an advantage; the energy is already distributed free and can be tapped by small-scale installations near where it can be used.
Last updated on Thursday, November 19th, 2004 Copyright © 2004 This site designed by Femina Polina -feminap26@yahoo.com |
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