Fascinating Solar Power Development Fun Facts
Here is a selection of fascinating solar power fun facts. People have used the sun as a heat source for hundreds of years. It is only with the advancements in technology that have taken place in recent years that have helped us to fully harness this energy.
Families in ancient Greece built their homes to get the most sunlight during the cold winter months. The ancient Greeks believed that the sun was the god Helios and he drove his chariot around the earth towards the sky in the morning and in the evening back again.
The discovery of the photovoltaic effect is credited to the French physicist Alexandre-Edmond Becquerel in 1839.
In 1921 the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Albert Einstein for experiments with solar power and photovoltaics.
Back in 1955 The American Solar Energy Society held its first meeting in Phoenix and attracted the first Russian scientist to the US following the second World War. There is film footage exhibiting early photovoltaics which was developed for NASA, solar cookers and solar heating panels.
The first solar flight took place in 1974 in California by an unmanned plane which was developed by two brothers Roland and Bob Boucher.
In 1975 the first solar vessel had been crafted in England and in 1996 Kenichi Horie from Japan made the first solar powered crossing on the Pacific Ocean using a catamaran.
The first World Solar Challenge was held in 1987. This is the solar-powered motor race covering 3021 km through the Australian outback from Darwin to Adelaide.
Did you know that it is actually possible to boost any solar power panel productivity by 75% by simply placing a mirror which is roughly twice the size of the panel on the ground in front of the panel?
PV cells do not need direct sunlight to work - you may still produce some electric power on a gloomy day.
Solar electricity is an eco-friendly, renewable power that does not release any damaging carbon dioxide or other pollutants. An average home Photovoltaic system could save around 1200kg of CO2 per year which is about 30 tonnes spanning a lifetime.
You can store the electrical energy that your solar power system generates in batteries for a cloudy day.
You may sell any extra electricity you produce with your solar power back to the grid and make a bit of money.
It takes no more than eight minutes for solar energy to travel from the sun to the the earth.
About 30% of the radiation we get from the sun at the upper atmosphere is actually reflected back to space. The remainder is absorbed by the clouds, oceans and also land masses here on Earth. Yet even in these types of conditions, the power which our planet gets from merely one hour of sun exposure is equal to the amount of energy that human beings use within a whole year.
Large scale solar projects which are being constructed world wide show that sun powered clean energy technologies are both attainable and also profitable. Solar power plants produce Megawatts (MW) with one MW being sufficient power to supply 1000 homes. One of the most significant solar power projects that the world has ever seen is the "Desertec" plan to utilize the uninhabitable North African desert for a power grid of concentrated thermal power stations which will supply Europe with all of its power requirements by the year 2050. So much progress in such a short period of time let us see where solar electricity will go from here.