Solar+Power+and+Cloud+Seeding

Ryan Gorman Nathan Hallowell Dr. Reich Chemistry II 1300 June 6, 2011

**Solar Power and Cloud Seeding **



__**SOLAR ENERGY**__

  "Because we are now running out of gas and oil, we must prepare quickly for a third change, to strict conservation and to the use of coal and permanent renewable energy sources, like solar power."  JIMMY CARTER, televised speech, Apr. 18, 1977   **The Problem** Energy is one of the most essential things to humans, think of a day which you never used any energy operated device, it’s impossible because it has never happened. A world without fuel to power its essential needs like heat, light for your home, or fuel for your car is something that many people don’t think will happen. But the truth is that there aren’t enough fossil fuels to power the world for much longer most experts say that there is at most 1.1 trillion barrels. When one hears that number 1.1 trillion they may think that is a lot but truth is that it really isn’t. At the rate of 24 billion barrels a year there the supply will only last into the 2040’s. If America could create their own independent source of energy then they wouldn’t have to go through a 3rd party vendor like the Middle East to get fossil fuels, and it would help the fossil fuel deficiency because the US uses a large amount of the world’s supply of fuels. Not only are we using up our world supply of fuel but using fossil fuels is also hurting the environment. With the emission of carbon dioxide which is released when burning fossil fuels it increases greenhouse gas concentration. Infrared radiation occurs when the greenhouse gas concentration is high and this raises that temperature of the earth surface. When the earth is heated there are many side effects such as the melting of the ice caps. That is why it is important more than ever to seek renewable energy. Renewable energy is something that many scientists and environmentalists have been striving to find for the past couple decades. But so far there hasn’t been a credible source of energy that has been affordable and effective. But in the terms of alternative energy solar power has been very effective in high energy output for relatively low cost. Also the energy that solar power produces is free; it comes from the most quantitative source of energy in the solar system which is of course the sun.

 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">**How it Works** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">Solar Power has been around since 1958 when they used the photovoltaic effect to power satellites orbiting the earth. The photovoltaic effect is the process in which a solar cell converts sunlight into electricity. So when light strikes a solar cell a certain portion of the light is absorbed through a semi-conductor material usually silicon. Silicon is usually picked because of its unique chemical properties. The atom of crystalline silicon has 14 electrons is 3 clouds which forms the crystalline structure which is important to the solar cell. Although silicon is ideal, the amount of protons it has make it a bad conductor, so elements like boron and phosphorus are added. The process of adding these elements is called doping; doping causes the silicon to become negative with more free flowing electrons. When the sunlight hits the semi-conductor it knocks the electrons loose and makes them flow easily. The flow of electrons then turns into a current; the solar cells usually have one or more electric fields to force the electrons to go in a single direction. On the top and bottom of the cell there is metal which draws the current for external use. The angle of the solar panel is the most important thing when using a solar panel. The solar panel must be as close as possible is the latitude of the earth. Based on what time of day and season it is the solar panel must be placed at the appropriate angle to be in direct path of the sun. When finding the correct place for the solar panel it is essential that there are no obstructions such as trees or buildings in the way of the panel.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">**The Benefits** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">Solar panels are a great choice of renewable energy because it is good for the environment. Solar panels do produce some carbon dioxide which is harmful for the environment but it produces it in an amount of thirty times less than coal power. If more solar panels were used then there would be less carbon dioxide emissions into the atmosphere, and that would help progress to a safer environment.

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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;"> Solar panels are also a dependable source of energy, there is no limit to how much solar power is produced. The sun is the most dependable source of energy in the solar system, it is the reason there is life on earth and without it earth would just be another lifeless wasteland. Even though weather may dictate the effectiveness of the panel, the sun will always come back out and power the panel. Not only is the sun always there but it is also free, meaning that there are no electrical prices to pay for them. Solar panels last a long time and they don’t move, so they require little to no maintenance which saves a lot of money. Solar power is very versatile anything that is powered by electricity can also be powered by solar power including but not limited to cars, homes, buildings, and street lights. Many people are now putting solar panels on their roofs to save money on their energy bills. Solar panels are good to use in places that are remote from power plants and other sources of energy. They can power areas in remote locations that would cost way too much money to have power lines sent to.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">**The Cons**

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">Although there are many benefits to solar power there are also cons along with it. Solar panels are very hard to make and require a lot of energy; it can take up to eleven years for the solar panel to generate the energy to enough energy it took to make it. If the solar panel required less energy to make it would be a much more efficient energy source to run. You can also run into the problem if you live in a place that has traditional long periods of cloudy weather. Investing in solar power would be better if you lived in somewhere like Arizona opposed to somewhere like New England. When powering a house there are only some panels that can harness a power to efficiently sustain a house. Most panels will only compensate for a percent of your home energy. One of the worse parts of having solar panels on your roof is that the panels are often a spot where birds muster, and you often find yourself cleaning bird crap off of your panel.

<span style="color: #000000; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; font-size: 33.6px;">__**CLOUD SEEDING**__ <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;"> <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;"> The problem at hand that Cloud seeding is trying to address is the lack of rain in a geographical area. With this added amount of rain water people will be able to grow more food which will also aid in the decline of world hunger. The driving force of the problem is that there are areas of this planet that experience great periods of drought which causes food production to come to a halt in that area. This causes starvation and death which we all can agree on is very bad. This starvation is what ultimately drives the need for a way to regulate the amount of rain that areas get. People are currently trying to raise money or have food drives to help those who are starving in the world. Ultimately this is not a very effective way to address this problem is it takes a lot of time and energy to gather food and transport it to where it is needed. This makes even more problems in the world as having to transport food causes the energy crisis to become greater. This only substitutes one problem for another one which is not an effective way to make the world better.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">The Problem **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">**How it Works** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;"> Cloud seeding seems like a possible answer to the problem of starvation and climate control. People are beginning to use cloud seeding to regulate the amount of precipitation an area receives. Cloud seeding is a very basic way to create rain as it uses basic principles that most people know about. Cloud seeding uses the principal of condensation as the ground point to create rain or snow. Dry ice or Silver iodide is spread into a cloud to allow water particles to condense upon them. As the water particles come together and get heavier they begin to fall to the ground as rain. This is just a way to speed up what naturally happens when a cloud become saturated enough. This process also occurs naturally as trees release Terpenes which as a natural nucleus for a water to come together and form clouds, which shade the trees from sunlight and allow them to in a way regulate the temperature of a forest. There are three different types of Cloud seeding: Static, Dynamic and Hygroscopic. Static Cloud seeding is the process of introducing Silver iodide or (another particle for water to condense

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<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">**The Benefits** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">A seeded cloud does not produce CO2 but the process of seeding a cloud very well might. Clouds are often seeded by planes which burn fossil fuels to give them a means of propulsion. Anything that burns fossil fuels must release CO2 seeing as it is a combustion process. The amount of water that this process can create is not exact by any means as it depends greatly on the amount of water that is in the air a given time. However with that said studies have shown an increase of up to 10% annual rain fall in an area that practices cloud seeding. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">The best aspects of cloud seeding would have to be the potential to grow more crops or even grow crops in places that normally couldn’t sustain them. With this increase in food production it would be easy to end world hunger and produce ethanol which we use in conjunction with gasoline. We could also produce more alcohol in general and that would stimulate our economy and help pull us out of our current depression, seeing as people refuse to go without their booze. (Joke) All these things will aid the world and the global economy. Cloud seeding could open up more jobs as people are needed to fly planes or operate equipment.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">**The Cons** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">Ok naturally with every good idea comes a person who is ignorant to how much it could benefit humanity. Many people would argue that this is an unnatural process of “creating” rain and should not be permitted because it goes against divine law. Another feasible complaint to this idea would be that the chemicals used to seed a cloud will harm humans in the consumption. This is a possibility but it is a very small one as the amounts of silver nitrate needed to harm a human being far exceed those that would be ingested by eating crops grown with “seeded” water or even drinking the water itself. However since this is an idea that has not been tested extensively it may turn out that over time these chemicals could build up in the soil and eventually make it difficult to grow crops, causing the exact opposite effect as is desired. Also the process of seeding clouds is a pricey one due to the amount of fuel used in planes, man power and ingredients involved. To keep up a successful cloud seeding process a great deal of money would have to be invested into the project with little promise of gaining that money back in the short run. This means that people willing to invest will not gain anything during the beginning of the process and it would be difficult to gain sponsors or investors with little promise of making money. Another interesting complaint about cloud seeding is that it does not work. Prof. Pinhas Alpert, Prof. Zev Levin and Dr. Noam Halfon of Tel Aviv University (Israel) have done extensive studies that seem to prove that cloud seeding is not an effective way of inducing more precipitation. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">[]

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">**World's Fuel Energy**

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif; font-size: 140%;">Cloud seeding does not produce energy immediately but can rather be used to grow more corn which can be used with in conjunction with gasoline to make a hybrid fuel of sorts. It is hard to determine exactly how much can be produced as there are too many factors that are involved with the farming of crops. Cloud seeding has the potential to help solve a lot of world problems such as world hunger. It can also help diminish the hold the fossil fuels have on the populace as it can help produce and excess of organic materials which are being experimented with to create new fuel sources. (bio diesel) To make this a better source of water production would have to invest a great deal of money in order to do it on a larger scale. This process is not used much as it a very low key idea and does not get a lot of publicity especially because some scientist think that it may not be able to cause the rain fall predicted. Also it is a very imprecise process as there are many factors that contribute to how well it works. It may be more effective to spend research on better fertilizers and green houses as it is a more controlled aspect of growing plants.

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