Blog 1 Solar Energy Becoming the Main Source of Energy.

In less than five days, the Sun provides more energy than all proven reserves of oil, coal, and natural gas on the planet, 36 zettajoules of energy. What this means is that if humanity could capture a small percentage of the energy that the sun provides us, we could provide ourselves with energy that we could use for hundreds of years to come.

Now, scientists are saying that we can apply Moore’s law to solar energy.  Moore's law dictates that the number of components that can be placed on a chip doubles every 18 months. This is why the iPhone has more computing power than supercomputers a little over two decades ago had. If this law applies to solar energy that we will eventually reach the iPhone equivalent of Solar energy. Meaning we will have cheaper, more efficient, more powerful, solar energy producing items, and because Solar energy produces little-to-no greenhouse emissions, this could be a very large turn-around in a drastic and dangerous future humanity is currently moving towards.

This also means for meaning countries such as the United States, and countries in Africa near the equator, where the sun is shining nearly 24/7, large scale infrastructures could be more easily accessible as this technology becomes cheaper, allowing them to develop and catch up to post-industrial countries.

Humanity is currently on the path to a very dangerous future with as much harm as our current sources of energy to do the environment. Harnessing the power of the sun provides both a future for our children, and a present for those less fortunate, and while we still need a here-and-now solution knowing that our future can still be bright and better can lead many people around the world to do better now. We still need to have voices teaching those around us of the problems that we face today.

While solar energy won’t be the savior of humanity and all of its problems, on terms of energy this is a huge step in the right direction while keeping the environment cleaner and accessible in the future.

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/03/16/smaller-cheaper-faster-does-moores-law-apply-to-solar-cells/