The History of Solar
The idea of harnessing the sun's
energy is not a recent phenomenon. The Indian Pueblos of the
American southwest were designed using the concept of thermal
mass. This technique use the thick adobe mud and rock walls to
gain the sun's energy in the winter, passing this energy to the
interior at night. In addition these structures were placed and
built to be shaded in the summer and allow heat in the form of
sunlight to enter in the winter. Again the thick walls provided
year round thermal comfort. The Greeks also built structures to
maximize the natural energy of the sun. Xenophon wrote in 400 BC
of how to design the openings and placement of a given structure
to allow for the natural heating and cooling of the building. The
Roman architect Vitruvius wrote about solar architecture in
detail in The Ten Books on Architecture (before 30 BC).
The ancient Inca city Machu
Picchu, the ruins of which lie 7675 feet (2340 meters) above sea
level, was built with east facing walls to gain heat using the
morning sun, retaining this energy for later comfort of the
inhabitants. Additional site planning allowed for natural
seasonal comfort, minimizing the need for combustible fuels
difficult to obtain at this altitude.
In an interesting adaptation the
early Greek navies used highly polished metal to focus the sun's
energy on enemy vessel sails, often resulting in fire consuming
the ship.
The use of adaptive architecture
was needed by these early societies to offset the limited supply
of fuel for fire that supplied essential comfort. These
techniques became less needed as the use of fire became more
technically advanced. With coal and then in addition oil being
plentiful in the late 17th into the latter part of the 20th
century, building design became less important in terms of energy
and esthetics became the overriding concern. With the advent of
large electrical generating plants in the mid 20th century, the
use of coal and oil to provide electricity for heating and
cooling to achieve environmental comfort became the norm.
In recent history experiments by
the Frenchman Augustin Mouchot (1825-1911) included a solar
powered steam engine built to assist in operating a printing
press in Paris around 1882. The Swedish American inventor John
Ericsson built a highly efficient solar powered hot air engine.
Dr. Charles Greenly, an American, is considered by many to be the
father of modern solar energy usage. Many of his pioneering
projects in the 1920's were done along side of Robert Goddard,
the father of American rocket science.
The 1920's and 1930's saw
extensive use of solar energy in south Florida due to a lack of
energy infrastructure and continued into the 1950's. The
construction of large energy plants and the appearance of "
Ready Kilowatt" the marketing creation promising low
electric rates and all electric home convenience lulled the
consuming public into visions of low cost energy with no supply
side problems. The promise of cheap and constant power remained a
dominant factor until the 1970's.
In 1973 the Organization of
Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) declared an oil embargo
against the industrialized world in a bid for massive price
increases. It worked. Oil shot up some 1000% , close to it's real
value. The price and supply shock gave all developed nations,
especially Japan and the United States a real period of serious
thought concerning their dependence upon foreign oil reserves.
Solar became an obvious choice for a clean, safe energy source
and the weight of the federal government was thrown behind
massive research and development projects. Unfortunately, like
most things the government does it was directed at large projects
that didn't really have a direct impact on the average residence.
It wasn't like the oil companies
and the governments of the world didn't have it coming. The price
and logistical control of oil had been established as early as
1928 in a largely unknown document called the Achnacarry
Agreement. Mobil, Shell, Exxon, and British Petroleum (as they
are now known) agreed to fix the prices, supply, distribution,
and fees paid to the countries where the oil was drilled.
Needless to say, these arrangements were unfair to the consuming
public, and larcenous in nature for the countries whose natural
resources were being sucked out the ground at an ever increasing
rate. The advent of Arab and Persian nationalism and rising
Islamic fundamentalist resentments towards the perceived rape of
the national coffers made OPEC and it's strategy of global price
revenge a logical outcome of over a hundred years of exploitation
by the large multinational corporations and their cohorts in
government offices.
The Gulf War of 1990-1991 (also
called The Oil War) only served to reinforce the idea that
relying on Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, United Arab
Emirates, and other such nations (being currently friendly or
not); is a basically flawed national energy strategy .
The 1980's and 1990's found
Florida's population growth to be among the highest in the
nation. People all over the country and even the world were
flocking to the "Sunshine State" and a perceived
quality of life. A natural environment and vibrant economy
attracted new hordes to be fed, housed, and moved from place to
place. The State of Florida realized that this influx would fast
out grow the infrastructure of energy, and made provisions to
implement energy conservation measures and alternative energy
sources. The Governors Energy office and the Florida Solar Energy
Center represent two obvious results of these legislative
mandates. Florida even went so far as to legislate that no
homeowner's association, deed restrictions or any other measure
would have the effect of prohibiting the residential use of
solar. A true solar "bill of rights".
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Sunday August 01, 2010 - 12:10 AM
