The Benefit of Solar Power Over Electricity

>it’s connected with alienation of big territories for
The energetical potential of solar energy is great, bytransformation of them into reservoirs. Hydroelectric
nowadays calculations it’s approximatelypower stations break the ecological aqua systems,
1,57*10^18 Watt peak a year. The science that studiesmore over they are quite often begin to silt and
the methods of collecting and transformation of solarbecome ineffective in some 50-100 years. In the dry
energy to another kinds of energy is solar energetic.areas evaporation from the surface of water
There are several priorities of transformation andreservoirs is dozen times higher than evaporation from
usage of solar energy. The first one is transformationthe surface of the land.
of solar energy into heat and using of it for heatingNuclear energetics has been seen recently is one of
buildings, air conditioning, heating or distillation of water.the most promising trends in the electricity production
The basis of such generators of heat energy is planethat united cheap energy produced (one pound of
solar collector that allows transforming solar energy toradioactive fuel substitutes two million tons of coal) and
the energy of heat with a temperature of 160-180 F. Ita small influence on the environment. But the tragedy
looks like a metallic frame with special pipes orthat happened on the power plant in Chernobyl,
it’s a plane box-like device that let pass the air,Ukraine proved that nuclear energy has a high potential
water or special liquids. This collector is put into heatrisk.
isolation cover, with the exception of it’sThe exploitation of solar energy can be useful in many
working part that is subjected to the sunrays. A 9 ft.ways. First by substituting the fuel that is used on heat
sqr. collector gives up to 20 gallons of hot waterpower stations it reduces the air and environment
(150-170 F) per day. This solar water heats have a lotpollution, it reduces the usage of oil and other fuel that
of perspectives to be used in remote desert areas orcan be used in more important purposes, by
in the areas with a big number of sunny days. Thesubstituting nuclear fuel it reduces the radiation threat,
prime cost of the hot water produced by the solarand at the same time solar energy generators can
heaters is much lower than one produced by electricmake us more secure, by reducing the dependence
boiler or gas boiler. It doesn’t require any fuelupon uninterrupted fuel supply.
and doesn’t pollute the environment. So theBut still there are many obstacles that prevent mass
advantages of using solar water heaters are obvious.spreading of solar energy usage. One of the most
The second priority of using solar energy isobvious is low intensiveness of solar radiation even in
transformation of it into electricity. If to cover a siliconthe sunny weather. Another obstacle is high initial price
crystal with a thin, pure for light layer of metal, than theof solar energy generators.
photons stream, while passing through a metal layer,The primary value for making a plane collector solar
will release free electrons from the crystal of silicon.heater is 1000$ per 1 Watt peak. First looking, it may
Those electrons will start to concentrate in the metalseem that because of the high price solar energy
layer. This will cause a potential difference betweengenerators are not competitive with traditional electric
crystal and a metal layer. If to connect thousands ofpower plants, where this index is low as 100$ per
such crystals in series or in parallel (to increase voltage1Watt peak. Even small diesel generators are not so
and current), we’ll get a solar battery thatcostly. But if to include the fuel price to the coast of
produces direct current.each kilowatt than this comparison won’t be so
Also there exists another trend of using solar energystriking. Even it’s thought that solar generators
for electricity production, which is similar to the heatare cheaper in the technical exploitation and lifetime is
power plant. It assumes using of glass pipes cover bylonger than that of tradition sources of electric energy.
the semiconductor layer from inside. Such pipe will letThe calculations show that the price of the electric
pass the sunrays but still collects 80% of them.energy produced by solar generators can be reduced
Sunrays are collected into a narrow beam of light within future to .05-.01$ per kilowatt, and for solar water
a help of conversion lens. Then this heat is transmittedheater approximately to .02$ per kilowatt.
to the pipe that is inside of the glass pipe and it heatsTo be more specific in costs of solar electric systems
the working pipe up to 1000 F, which is more thanlets refer to International Energy Agency data: “The
enough to melt metallic natrium, that melt near 197 F.type of system defines the components you need for
Incandescent heat conductor is transmitting to thea solar system and therefore the costs. The overall
underground reservoirs, where the heat collected forsystem prices for grid-connected systems vary
the solar energy makes salt to melt. The heat energybetween 7.8 and 24.0 USD/Watt peak. The price
form the salt is transmitted to water pipes, where therange for solar systems not connected to the grid is
water boils and then the energy of water steam is5.5 to 25.2 USD/Watt peak.” But still there even
used as a moving energy for electric currentmore disadvantages of solar electric systems. First
generators.one is that they can be used locally, because the direct
The transformation of solar energy into another typescurrent produced by solar systems is effective for
of energy doesn’t bring any visible pollution totransmission on long distances (not more than 70
the environment, which makes it very beneficial. Othermiles). In addition if to refer to MySolar; information on
ways of electricity production are tightly connectedsolar energy and solar systems says:
with the pollution of environment. 80-85 percent of”A solar electricity system causes little extra risk for
energy used by man is got by burning fuel (oil, gas,lightning when normal precautions (earthing, or lightning
different kinds of bio resources). Even so that theeprotection at places that a prone to lighting such as
portion of heat power plants is decreasing now, still lotshigh towers etc) are taken. Lightning can cause
of countries use it as a primary source for gettingdamage to equipment such as inverters and
energy (75% power plants in China and nearly 40% ofbatteries” (available on web:
power plants in Russia use oil, coal and gas). HeatEven despite all the disadvantages of solar systems,
power plants produces 50% of carbonic gas, 35%this kind of alternative source of electric energy is
sulphur and nitrogen oxides released into atmospherespreading all over the world. The leading place in
and nearly the same amount of dust. Recentproduction of electricity by solar systems is taken by
researches also show that heat power plants twicethe USA (40% of world’s production) with total
more pollute the environment with radiationpower 450 megawatts and with a total square of
contamination than do nuclear power plants.solar heat collectors in 100 million sqr ft. And the
The influence of the hydroelectric power stations ondevelopment of this power industry will be rapid in next
the environment is also a subject of concern, becausedecades.