What Happens If We Cover the Sahara Desert with Solar Panels?
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Is it possible to power the whole world with solar energy alone? What if we made a giant solar panel? Or what if we covered the Sahara Desert with solar panels, as suggested in hundreds of videos on YouTube? What would happen if each country devoted part of its territory to this task? What do we humans do when we run out of energy? We lie down on a nearby chair, or bench, then sunbathe and rest. We eat plants that feed on the sun, that is, hotosynthesizing, Around us, or the animals that eat them, and turn them into energy. In other words, we humans also work with solar energy. But the vehicles, machines, factories, buildings, cars that we make with our own hands are not like that. They consume tremendous amount of energy. So far, we have tried to meet this energy, which they have spent, mostly with fossil fuels. Fossils that have accumulated, from the age of the dinosaurs, under the ground turned into oil.
And we consumed that black liquid that we extracted from the ground with as much appetite as the dinosaurs had. Why do we always prefer to look down instead of looking up while plants, animals and even us work with solar energy? However, if we look up, we will find that endless source of energy. The solar energy. Do you know what comes out when you calculate the energy emitted from the sun every second? 4x10 over 26 Watts. That's quite a few more zeros than even a trillion has. I don't know what it's called. That's a lot. To put in numbers? That's enough to supply the energy of 17 trillion Earths.
One in 17 trillionth of it is enough for us. If only we could use it all. Because most of this energy coming out of the Sun just goes into space. Only a very small fraction reaches our world and hits it. Even this tiny portion is equivalent to the energy produced by 44 million large power plants. Of course, when you see these numbers, your eyes immediately... It turns out that it was raining gold on us and we couldn't use it! We invented sunscreen and umbrella to protect from the sun, and solar panels to benefit from it. But invention alone is not enough. But invention alone is not enough. It is necessary to make it efficient, widespread and most importantly economical. How much do you think the price of solar panels, which reached $100 per watt in 1975, dropped by 2021? Let's play a hot cold guessing game now. $50 - cold. $20 - cold. $5 Well sort of cool. Even further below? Yes. 0.27 hot. The cost, which was $100 per watt in 1975, is now only 27 cents. So there is a surprising progress in terms of costs. But what about efficiency? The efficiency of the first solar panels was around 1%. In other words, 100 watts of energy hits it, but we can only produce 1 watt of energy. Think about it, someone comes to you with a 1% efficient tool and says that this idea will change the world in the future. Believe it if you can. But science and technology have brought us to this point by advancing with such small steps. You can not run without crawling first. Today, this value has reached to between 15% and 25% with different technologies and methods developed over the years. On the one hand, costs fell almost 300 times, on the other hand productivity increased almost 25 times. So what are we waiting for then? Let's cover the Sahara Desert with solar panels right away! Let's go even further. Let's go up a little higher and get closer to the sun. Many crazy projects have been produced so far to solve the world's energy crisis with solar energy. For example, building a solar panel farm on the Moon. As you know, there is no atmosphere on the Moon. The sun's rays fall directly on it.
So that means more energy. If we transfer the energy we will collect from the Moon to the Earth through lasers and microwaves and stuff.. Why not? It might happen, but let's go to Moon and settle down first, then it will be time for that. What's the point of wasting time on the Moon, let's place the panels directly around the sun. The idea of capturing and using energy with minimum loss. It's called the Dyson Sphere. Maybe there are other civilizations in another part of the universe that are advanced enough to do this, but I said that ours is still in its infancy. So for now, these ideas just decorate our sci-fi fantasies. What about the idea of covering the Sahara Desert with solar panels?
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Researched and Written by: Ögetay Kayalı
Organized and Presented by: Barış Özcan
Edited by: Alperen Çatak
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The full text of the video and the sources used:
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