S
olar energy has been used by humans since ancient times. Egyptians knew how to warm their homes by heating pools of water by the sun during the day and cycling it through pipes in the palace floors at night. The Greeks and Chinese oriented their buildings toward the south to employ the maximum lighting and heating rays from the sun. Later, The Romans developed glass which trapped the warmth of the sun. The oculus in Rome’s Pantheon provided daylight for the entire building. Roman laws even prohibited its citizens from blocking their neighbor’s access to the sun.
Civilizations throughout time have used various agricultural techniques (row orientation, staggered row height, seasonal planting cycles) to take advantage of the sun in improving their crop yield. The Romans first developed glasshouses to grow the seeds and plants they imported from their vast empire. Arab alchemists in the 16th century created potable water from salt and brackish water by using the sun to distill it.
While the U.S. was fighting a Civil War, Auguste Mouchout developed a steam engine completely powered by the sun. But then came cheap coal … and, later, cheap oil. So, at the time Mouchout developed his solar engine, it cost less to operate an engine by using the newly-discovered and seeming unlimited supply of coal. And, the industrial period turned to the ground for its power. Mouchout posed this prophetic question “Eventually industry will no longer find in Europe the resources to satisfy its prodigious expansion. Coal will undoubtedly be used up. What will industry do then?”
It seems that it is left to our generation to answer. And isn’t the answer obvious? Studies show that the Earth receives more energy from the sun in an hour than the entire planet could use in a year. And the Earth receives twice the amount of energy from the sun in a single year than the energy created from the combination of coal, oil, and natural gas. It should be noted that over 100 years ago (1903), Charles Henry Pope observed in this book, Solar Head: Its Practical Applications that "Sun power is a pure gain to humanity, It subtracts nothing, the world will not be in the last impoverished tomorrow by the fullest use of visible solar heat to-day".
At last Florida, the “Sunshine State”, is going to use its average of 300 days of sunshine a year to create a small amount of power. Recently, Florida Power & Light Company (FPL) broke ground on the world’s first hybrid solar energy plant in Indianville, Florida. It is scheduled for completion as early as 2010 and is the first of three such plants FPL plans to build in Florida. Other plants are scheduled for construction east of Sarasota and near the Kennedy Space Center. Completion of the third plant will make Florida the 2nd largest user of the sun for energy in the U.S, behind California. This plant will utilize approximately 180,000 mirrors to capture the sun’s energy which, in turn, will produce the steam required to generate electricity.
Over the next 30 years, the plant, known as the Martin Next Generation Solar Energy Center, will:
- Provide the power needs of approximately 11,000 homes per year
- Reduce the emission of greenhouse gases Decrease the usage of fossil-fuel
- Decrease the usage of oil.
With approximately 1,000 people moving to Florida every day, providing the power for 11,000 homes a year certainly falls short of earthshaking. However, It is a start. FPL’s Group Chairman and CEO, Lew Hay said “At this innovative facility, each sunrise will be the equivalent of easing our foot off the gas pedal as solar power is being produced. With the continued support of Gov. Crist, the Florida Legislature and the Public Service Commission, FPL will do more – much more – in the coming years to build Florida’s renewable energy industry,” Let’s hope so!
Articles 
TrackBack URI for this entry
Subscribe to this comment's feed
in Welcome Wagon by sterileK, 19-08-09 10:05