Welcome to Green Options! To help you begin greening your good life, my blog will feature a 3-part series on the basics of solar power. I’ll start today with a simple background and history of solar energy, then on Friday I’ll cover why we may be at the dawning of the Solar Age, and then finally on Saturday I’ll plug this all into Green Options and how we can help you take advantage of this limitless resource.

Believe it or not, humans have been trying to harness the sun’s incredible power to make electricity for years. Some visionaries, at the height of the industrial revolution, questioned what the world would do after using up all the fossil fuel supplies and began exploring solar power. Frank Shuman, a solar engineer in the early 20th century, declared that the sun is “the most rational source of power.”

Today, the most common type of solar power you probably see – whether on roofs or yard lights – use photovoltaic cells or “PVs” to convert sunlight into energy. PV cells are small, square semiconductors made in thin film layers, mostly from silicon. When the sun shines on the cell, a chemical reaction releases electrons, generating direct current (DC) electricity. The current is then fed through an inverter to make alternating current (AC). For a more detailed description, click here to see a short video from the U.S. Department of Energy.

Currently there are 475 megawatts of solar power installed in the United States, enough to power about 240,000 homes. The U.S. used to be the global leader in PV manufacturing, but has been surpassed by Japan and is barely ahead of China. However, no country has even begun to tap the sun’s potential: The amount of energy from sunlight that hits the earth every hour is more energy than humans can use in an entire year. But with the right government incentives like we're seeing in California, combined with entrepreneurs and a good business climate, many are predicting a sunny outlook for solar technologies.

Boston Museum of Science
DuPont
History of Solar Energy
Investors Business Daily
The Solar Depot
U.S. Department of Energy