A Brief History of Solar Energy

Hello World! Welcome Friends! Please welcome Jessica Kane to the blog tonight. Many people think that the utilization of solar energy to generate electricity is a technology of recent origin. Indeed, the use of solar energy to generate electricity has come into wider use in more recent years. However, the idea of using solar energy as a means of generating electricity is something that can be traced back over 200 years.

Source

Solar Energy in the 19th Century

In 1839, a researcher named Alexandre Edmond Becquerel discovered that certain materials were capable of producing small amounts of electric current when exposed to light, including sunlight. About 15 years later (in 1876) William Grylls Adams and his student, Richard Evans Day, discovered that selenium produced electricity when exposed to light. At that juncture in time, selenium photovoltaic cells converted light to electricity with a 1 to percent efficiency rate.

Photovoltaic, or PV, is the term used to describe the conversion of sunlight to electricity.

Solar Energy in the mid-20th Century

It wasn’t until the mid-20th century that the concept of converting sunlight into electricity moved from being an occasional experiment to something more significant. In 1954, three researchers at Bell Laboratory, D.M. Chapin, C.S. Fuller and G.L. Pearson, patented a method of making electricity directly from sunlight. The process utilized silicon-based solar cells.

The following year, the Hoffman Electronics-Semiconductor Division announced the first commercial photovoltaic product. This product had a 2 percent efficiency. It was priced at $25 per cell, which translated to $1,785 per watt, using in 1955 dollars.

Within a decade, the all-important efficiency levels were reaching about 10 percent. The U.S. space program increased the development around PV significantly. Nonetheless, the overarching reliance on war, coupled with international tensions (largely associated with the Cold War), slowed advances in regard to solar energy later in the 1960s and into the 1970s.

Solar Energy in the 1970s and 1980s

A major milestone associated with solar energy development in the United States occurred in 1978 when Congress passed the Public Utility Regulatory Policy Act, also known as PURPA. This important law established the right for independent power producers to interconnect with local utility distribution systems.

PURPA paved the way to allow large utility scale applications of PV and different types of solar electricity systems. The law required utilities to buy electricity from private facilities, including solar farms.

Also in 1978, the Energy Tax Act, or ETA, came into existence. This law encouraged homeowners to invest in energy conservation, including solar technology. This was accomplished by providing homeowners with tax credits for investing in solar power at their residences. These tax credits spurred the creation of what are considered utility-scale solar electricity systems.

In 1979, what was then the world’s largest solar farm was built in Camarillo, California by ARCO Solar. ARCO Solar became the first company to produce more than 1 megawatt of what are called PV modules during the course of one year. The company built more solar farms during the coming decade, significantly increasing the amount of power generated via solar resources.

In 1986, what was then the world’s largest solar thermal electricity facility started construction in California’s Mojave Desert. The LUZ Solar Energy Generating Stations concentrate the sun’s energy onto a series or system of pipes circulating a heat-transfer fluid. The heated fluid produces steam. The steam then powers a conventional turbine, which generates electricity.

Solar Energy Into the 21st Century

The first distributed power grid PV installation occurred in California in 1993. This technology essentially passed solar-generated electricity directly into the power grid. Solar Two came into existence in 1996, a project that demonstrated how solar energy can be stored efficiently and economically. This permits the availability of solar-generated power even when the sun is not shining.

Solar Energy Today

In the United States, 10.6 gigawatts (GW) of solar PV capacity was installed in 2017. This brought the total installed capacity in the United states to 53.3 gigawatts (GW). This represents enough solar-generated power for 10.1 million American homes.

Looking ahead, solar growth is expected to continue. In the next five years, the total installed U.S. PV capacity is expected to more than double. In addition, by 2023, an average of over 15 GW of PV capacity is expected to be installed or go online every year. This annual estimate may move upward was well during the next five years. There is no dip in the growth of solar power anticipated to occur in the coming decade, which historically had been the case in the United States from time to time.

Jessica Kane is a professional blogger who writes for Federal Steel Supply, Inc., a leading steel tubing suppliers of carbon, alloy and stainless steel pipe, tubes, fittings and flanges.

Click the links below for any posts you may have missed!

Relax and Let Someone Else do the Decorating

Make it Pretty Monday

Simple Fall Porch

Sausage & Lentil Soup

Fall Mantel

I’d love for you to join my email list! You’ll receive a notification straight to your inbox once a week on Monday which will include links to party posts and my home project posts! Simply enter your address below.