History of Solar Energy
Human race have always known the vitality and the power of sun and what it can do for us. It is to no wonder that the prevalence of a sun god had been coterminous in both ancient Greek and roman civilizations as well as Asian Aryan traditions. The sun seems to have a lot of power and be it for drying regular clothes or for ripening of fruits, human beings have always esteemed the potential of solar energy and have exploited it like no other thing.
From the ancient Greco-Romans building their huts in such a way to trap solar energy and warm them up to the modern high-tech ultra-thin photovoltaic cells that are available today – the history of solar energy is as varied as that of human civilization. However, the basic logic behind all these efforts being harnessing the sun’s unending source of energy to make our lives a lot easier. What the Greeks and the Romans devised was mastered architectural setup capturing the passive solar energy. The same logic can also be found in the Aryan tradition of the Indies as well as of China (the art, which today is known as Feng Shui).
Eventually, long stretches of history have passed without much alteration in the passivity with which solar energy was trapped until in the nineteenth century, post the industrial revolution, that Auguste Mouchout designed the first ever active solar motor. This motor broke away with all the conventions and moved the assumption that was so much a favorite of industrial revolution, that is, fossil fuel on which the motors run will never run out. Not only that this assumption was baseless but also the invention proved to be a great success that was going to change the future of mankind for ever and ever.
However, the story was not yet over. Scientist all through the twentieth century made efforts to develop the technology and the topic of solar energy can boast of quite a few contributions in the field during the early parts of the twentieth century. The early later half of the century witnessed major innovations in the technology, however they were beyond any common man’s reach. The validity of solar energy as a wasteful source of energy gained prominence only in the seventh decade of the twentieth century and wide researches started to be conducted.
By the time the history of solar energy reached
the last decade of the twentieth century,
much advancement have been begotten in the
domain and the cost of photovoltaic cells
dropped by large making it a commonly viable
option. Technologies have changed since then,
with photovoltaic cells being replaced by
thinner ones, and they by even thinner. The
validity of solar energy as a non-polluting
renewable source of energy is not unknown
to anyone today. It is therefore gaining much
prominence all around the world, with several
panels and batteries being installed everywhere
each day the sheer statistics can tell the
tale of success that solar energy deserved
and eventually got. |
