Over the years, humans have developed a number of ways to produce electricity but they have relied on one simple idea. That idea is turning water into steam to power a turbine. Photovoltaic cells do it in a whole different way. Read on to learn more about that and about other interesting solar energy facts.
On a trip to Africa, John Herschel devised a box that concentrated sunlight on the food at the center, creating a solar cooker. In so doing, he began a whole science of solar energy. That science is divided into two parts, heating and electricity.
We have used the sun to heat our houses since we first had houses. With our greater technological knowledge, we now build special greenhouses to trap sunlight and keep tropical plants alive in harsher climates. Sunlight can also heat water for bathing or recreation.
Photovoltaic cells are grouped into panels and then set into a frame on a grid. When they are in sunlight, they can create electricity without any other apparatus. The amount of electricity is very small, but it can be stored for later use.
Solar generating power plants still use the traditional method of heating a liquid to a boil and then running the steam through a turbine. Giant mirrors are used to focus the heat. The heat source is different, but the principle is the same one that functions in every other power plant on the planet.
While solar power is found wherever there is sunlight, only in California will you find the world’s largest solar power plants. They are in the Mojave Desert and each produce 80 megawatts of power, enough to power 80,000 houses for one hour. Not only that, but California also boasts 9 out of the 11 American solar plants.
In Europe, where vast swathes of desert are few and far between, they have proved more likely to adopt the photovoltaic technology. Portugal and Germany both brought huge solar arrays on line in 2008. While the amount of power generated by each cell is very small, when you gather a bunch of them on a panel and set that panel alongside thousands of others, you get a fair amount of power.
Because it is available everywhere, solar power can be used for a large variety of tasks. Solar collectors can even heat your home! I will leave you with something to think about. Among the many solar energy facts, consider this: if we covered 4% of world desert lands with photovoltaic cells, we could produce enough power to completely meet current demand.
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