Why Use Alternative Energy Sources?
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by: OliverSmith | Total views: 27 | Word Count: 684
In a sense all energy is solar energy because all of the energy that we use comes from the sun ultimately. For example, the energy that you use to move, to even read this sentence, comes from the food that you eat. That food will either be plants that have grown from the sunlight they received, or animals that ate plants. However the sense in which we are going to be thinking about solar energy in this article is going to be as one of the alternative energy sources we have available. That is, an alternative to fossil fuels.
Fossil Fuels
Fossil fuels have got a bad name these days, but we shouldn't forget that without them we could never have had an industrial revolution and most of us would still be peasants. Instead, we are living in ways that kings of the past could never have dreamed of. However, there are a couple of problems with it. One is that it is going to run out.
Even if oil and coal could be used forever, however, we probably would not want to do that. That's because we get the energy from them by burning them, and that releases certain substances in to the atmosphere which harmful. The one that is the biggest problem is carbon dioxide because that is what is causing global warming, which could lead to very dire consequences.
Actually though the process of global warming is actually something that allows us to survive on the planet. It's just one of those cases where too much of a good thing can be a problem. Without greenhouse gases though, trapping the heat from the sun as it bounces off the earth, then the world would be far too cold to be able to support life. Too much though promises to cause problems.
The main problem which people have heard about is that of rising sea levels. The theory is that with the earth warming up, the ice caps are going to melt, and this is going to raise the sea level. While this could wipe out communities on coasts, life could become unsustainable if ecosystems are disrupted to such an extent that we cannot any longer grow the food that we need to.
For these reasons then, we need a clean and renewable form of energy if we are going to survive in to the future as a species. This is where alternative energy sources come in.
Renewable Energy
When it comes to renewable energy, there's good news and there's bad news. The good news is that we already have lots of different ways of creating energy in a clean and renewable way. The bad news is that it is still to expensive and inefficient to use on a large scale. That is, it can't take over from fossil fuels.
It's not enough to simply have the technology available though. We also have to produce enough of it so that it can generate all of the energy that we need. That is far from easy. In theory, of course, it's nothing. Just cover some part of the Sahara Desert in solar panels and be done with it. That's not practical though.
In practice, if solar panels are going to be produced in large numbers then there has to be a high demand for them. This means that they have to be cheaper than oil, meaning that it's the most efficient way to actually produce energy.
Another alternative that some people think would be viable is for the government to simply force the issue. That is, that they should invest in alternative energy sources. However that is a socialist option really, and that is not going to work. What they do, then, is try to manipulate the market by imitating conditions.
There is something that lots of governments have got involved in though, which is artificially creating the conditions in which solar panels are going to be more in demand. That is, they have made them a better investment by applying a feed in tariff to energy created by solar panels, meaning that you get paid for every unit of energy produced in this way.
About the Author
To discover more regarding solar power, author William Roberts writes lots more about the issue at Alternative energy sources. Find out additional information about the way all of it works, such as how much money you can make, also you can get a free quotation for a solar installation.
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