The National Academy Of Engineering: Solar Energy Future

The earth receives extremely large amounts of energy coming from the sun. Solar energy has become a number one option for a future reliable, greener energy source. An article by the National Academy of Engineering, Make Solar Energy Economical, has proposed this issue as one of the many challenges engineers face this 21st century. The academy emphasizes, the sun’s “availability far exceeds any conceivable future energy demands. It is environmentally clean, and its energy is transmitted from the sun to the Earth free of charge”. So, we ask ourselves how much energy is actually getting to us from the sun? In his book, Physics for future presidents, Richard A. Muller exposes the magnitude of the sun’s energy by saying: “watch a sunrise and experience