Advantages of using solar cells Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Advantages of using solar cells - Research Paper Example The environment has become a big issue around the whole world. During the last decade, it started to change quickly. The earth is becoming warmer and because of that, there are a lot of natural problems and disasters around the world.This is called global warming. People on earth caused this change in temperature. Further, people need energy in their daily lives. They need electricity, fire, hot water, heating and cooling. To produce energy that is enough for all of these activities, we need fossil fuels and coal. All the countries around the world use these two fuels to make electricity and to heat water or air. Many rich countries depend on countries in the Middle East to give them fossil fuels like oil and gas to be able to serve their people. Countries around the world have been using these forms of energy production almost for a hundred years now. The people on earth are increasing every day, and their needs of energy are also increasing. The price of making energy in the old wa ys is also becoming higher and higher. In the past, the effects of the use of fossil fuels and coal were not known. However, we now know what we are doing to our world and to our future generations. Therefore, we have to do something to change this. Many countries and governments have started to look for new technologies for energy production. These new energy technologies should be good for the environment. They should not make our problem worse and they should be cheap. One of the new energy technologies is solar energy.... For instance, nuclear plants, which are referred to as a clean source of energy by some people, produce waste that is very harmful to human beings and the environment. The United States actually faces a serious problem because there are no facilities to store and process nuclear waste. This will be a problem in future as more and more nuclear waste is stored in the nuclear plants themselves. Coal fired plants also produce ash waste that is very dangerous to the health of human and animals. Some of this waste was used in the past to produce building equipment, but these products were found to be harmful as well. Moreover, even hydro plants can make problems for the wildlife and put waste into rivers and lakes. On other hand, solar cells only use sunlight to produce power. There are basically no byproducts or waste from the solar plants. The only waste may be in the form of damaged solar cells. However, the damaged solar cells are usually reprocessed to produce new cells. For example, Doug Smock wrote â€Å"Solar Plane Takes Flight† in 2010 in Design News to show the first solar airplane. The author shows how the airplane was built using over ten thousand solar cells to power it and reduce waste from fossil fuel airplanes (Smock 45). This is an example of how solar cells can be used as an alternative clean energy source as compared to fossil fuels. In addition, pollution from the old energy sources has become an important issue of debate as many scientists have confirmed that our planet is warming very quickly. Solar cells give a good solution to the issue of pollution because they produce no emission into the air. â€Å"Solar energy is one of the cleanest energy resources that does not