Is The Answer To Our Energy Shortage In Space?
As a means of combating the high cost of energy, researchers are looking at the feasibility of space based solar panels for electricity.
The other piece of the space based solar powered solution consists of converting the energy from the sun into electromagnetic energy and beaming it back to earth where converters would convert it to alternating current.
The drawback to implementing a space based solar powered solution, as always, is the cost. It will take billions, and no one knows exactly how many billions, just to get the program off of the ground. With the burgeoning fossil fuel crisis, however, this may become a moot point. The rising fuel prices are being fueled by three converging factors:
– There are still billions of dollars worth of fossil fuels stored in the planet. But it is merely becoming more difficult and more expensive to extract them from the earth. Most of the “easy pickings” are gone. The higher extraction costs will be passed on to the consumer.
– There is increased contention for the limited supply of oil that we can find on earth. For example, China’s consumption of crude oil and refined oil products both hit record highs in the first quarter of this year. Result – rising oil prices.
– The value of the dollar is continuing its plummet. Until it stabilizes, energy prices will continue to rise.
Conversely, as the prices of fossil fuels continue to rise, the cost of making solar panels and other solar energy components is decreasing. Sometime soon, this alone may be enough to start a groundswell of people and nations shifting energy sources from fossil to solar.
Furthermore, even though the increasing oil prices are inconvenient to us, a far more significant danger may possibly be the long term effects on the environment of continuing to use fossil fuels . When you combine all of these factors, the billions of dollars needed to implement a space based solar program may be the best idea for using the money that’s been suggested in a while.
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