COULD SOLAR ENERGY BE OUR FUTURE? LITERARY ANALYSIS

As energy consumption increases, the need for an efficient, cheap-to-make, and low-maintenance power converter is increasingly sought after. Solar energy has the potential to fill all these requirements as it is not only the most abundant source of energy on the planet, but the devices themselves require little to no cost post-installation. Solar cells convert photon particles into flowing current, producing voltage by merely remaining stationary, something that fossil fuel production cannot achieve. The efficiency of these devices has drastically improved over the last 30 years, jumping from less than 10% to nearly 30%, and with some of the practices brought up in this talk, those numbers can be pushed up closer to 40%. In this presentation, we discuss the ever-advancing solar panel technology and view its impact on humanity.