Make Solar Energy Economical

We all see the sun light every day, once you step outside on a hot day you fell its power and how destructive and life giving it is. Solar energy is the energy of the future, the main problem we have is making sure it is efficient and cheap. It seems that it would be simple to capture the sun’s rays and make electricity, but the material that “captures” the rays is very expensive due to it having to be a really pure material; if we use materials that are not as “pure” the electric current can’t go through the material easily and it loses efficiency. The sun has been here for billions of years and it is still going to be here billions of years past our generation, it’s been releasing energy since day one. It is our duty and greatest challenge to be able to harvest and use the resources that it gives us. Right now solar energy is not that efficient, only giving a range of output of ten to twenty percent, but for it to be even more efficient you would have to invest more money to make them efficient; but that of course has its pros and cons, making them more efficient makes the more expensive. The energy is already costing roughly three to six more times than current prices so making them more efficient would increase those numbers extremely high. To make commercial solar cells energy efficient and economically efficient we engineers must find a way to lower the manufacturing cost and increase their efficiency levels, so they are able to be mass produced and used as a priority energy source over carbon emitting fuels like Oil, Gas, and Coal. Some of the technique’s that could be used are involving Nano technology “In standard cells, the impact of a particle of light (a photon) releases an electron to carry electric charge, but it also produces some useless excess heat. Lead-selenium Nano crystals enhance the chance of releasing a second electron rather than the heat, boosting the electric current output. Other experiments suggest this phenomenon can occur in silicon as well.”

Solar energy is in a way unlimited, unlike carbon fuels. We must find a way to make it the energy of the near future, our environment is already seeing the impact of what we are doing to it, for example the polar ice caps are melting causing the ocean’s levels to rise and causing extremely hot summers and tremendously cold winters, we must build a better for our children and their children, it is not their fault that we are ruining their environment and future world for them; they deserve to have what we have always had, but the only difference is that heir is supposed to be better, if we don’t do anything about it they won’t ever know or realize what it is the environment is.