Why aren't we only using solar power? - Alexandros George Charalambides
View full lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/why-aren-t-we-only-using-solar-power-alexandros-george-charalambides Solar power is cheaper and more ...
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We have some good reasons to completely switch over to solar power. It's cheaper in many cases, and definitely more sustainable than our dependance on traditional power plants that use resources like coal, which will eventually run out. So why don't we replace these traditional plants with solar energy? Because there's one factor that makes solar power very unpredictable: cloud cover. As the sun's rays move towards Earth, some get absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere, some are reflected back into outer space, but the rest make it to the Earth's surface. The ones that aren't deviated are called direct irradiance. The ones that are deflected by clouds are called diffuse irradiance. And those rays that first get reflected by a surface, like a nearby building, before...
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We have some good reasons to completely switch over to solar power. It's cheaper in many cases, and definitely more sustainable than our dependance on traditional power plants that use resources like coal, which will eventually run out. So why don't we replace these traditional plants with solar energy? Because there's one factor that makes solar power very unpredictable: cloud cover. As the sun's rays move towards Earth, some get absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere, some are reflected back into outer space, but the rest make it to the Earth's surface. The ones that aren't deviated are called direct irradiance. The ones that are deflected by clouds are called diffuse irradiance. And those rays that first get reflected by a surface, like a nearby building, before...
