Solar Power: From Saving money to Saving the World

The term solar power instantly recalls images of a seventh grade science text book, solar cookers, and a futuristic fantasy.  This future is becoming reality. 

Solar power is taking the sun’s light and converting it into usable energy. Think of a plant using sunlight to grow.  The sun hits the Photovoltaic (PV), or solar panels, and disturbs electrons giving enough movement to be harnessed as an electrical current.  The amount and the intensity of the sun’s rays is directly linked to how much energy can be produced. 

Although the technology has been available for more than fifty years very few strides have been made, partly because the initiative and concern have been absent.  That is until now.  Recently, MIT professors have hit a long anticipated milestone where solar power can be stored.  Now solar power can be used when the sun goes down, if the proper amount of energy was stored during the sunlight hours.

 The advancements made coupled with the efforts to “go green,” rocketing electricity prices, and government incentives have many businesses and institutions looking for solar powered alternatives.  These alternatives reach far beyond the solar panels on houses, unpractical solar powered cars, and your old calculator from 1994.

Electrify your Underwire

Now woman, and the adventurous male, can sport the new Japanese made solar powered bra.  This bra will enable people to sunbath, absorb some rays, and keep their phones or iPods charged.  Maybe not chic, subtle, or stylish but for those who cannot afford to be without a phone, even while relaxing, it could prove invaluable.

Solar Cookers to Save Lives

On the more humanitarian front the classic solar cookers are making a revival.  In places like the Sudan the solar cooker is a coveted commodity.  Because of the dangers in the region, many women and children are forced to stay indoors for fear of their life.   With inexpensive solar cookers, the task of risking one’s life to gather wood so a family can cook is eliminated.

Artificial Self-sustaining Oasis?

The most ambitious solar powered project is called the Sahara Forest Project.  Sound like an oxymoron? Give it a couple years and it may be as real as jumbo shrimp.  The project’s goal is to use solar power to evaporate sea water creating cool air, pure water, and the possibility of naturally operating.  If this project succeeds it will turn an immeasurable amount of unusable land into fertile grounds.  This is piquing the interest of many African and Middle Eastern countries.

With its booming possibilities and growing necessity, solar power can change the world.  The ability to use a replenishing source of energy could be the most precious secret to the survival of people across the world. 

A mega 200 ton per day waste to energy plant will be going on line late in 2008 in Panama.  Startech Environmental Corporation, the only public company building these biomass conversion plants, already has 3 five ton plants in operation and several others in production.  This will be the largest plant of its kind by far. The company uses plasma arc technology to efficiently convert ordinary garbage to hydrogen gas.  This gas is burned as fuel or used to create hydrogen fuel cells for creation of electricity. 
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Wind power, with its economy of scale and a price tag in the range of more conventional electric sources, is in use all over the world to generate the electricity that powers our lives. Centuries ago, windmills were used for mechanical power to pump water from wells and grind wheat to flour. This is an already practical and affordable alternative energy source that is currently quite underutilized.


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A 20 year purchase agreement between Southern California Edison and Stirling Energy Systems (SES) will culminate in a 4,500 acre solar power system with an over 20,000 dish array.  The new plant will generate an amazing 500 MW—more electricity than all other present U.S. solar projects combined.

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