Reported recently through a study at Duke University (Durham, North Carolina), solar energy has officially reached a crossover point known as "Reaching Grid Parity" . 2010 is the year New Solar Energy became cheaper than New Nuclear equivalent.
The magic number per Kilowatt Hour (energy needed to power 10x100w bulbs for an hour) is 16cents (US).
Don't get me wrong, this is dependent on a couple of factors and most certainly pertains to economies of scale! But, essentially, a large PV (photo-voltaic) plant can be created which produces cheaper energy per KW than Nuclear. If only I could say that Wales would be the ideal candidate country for such a project......but with our history of weather and this awful summer, we'd have no chance :).
North Carolina is not a Sun-rich State either, so places like Southern California, New Mexico, West Texas, Nevada and Utah would see even greater savings and rate of production per cell.
The Technology in solar cells has progressed quite rapidly in the last decade. The multi-layering of silicon compounds which capture different parts of the spectrum has been broached of late, allowing for an increase in efficiency from around 15% of the suns rays, so a whopping 41.6% roughly. This is known as a Multi-junction system. Add to this the recent development of a different silicon compound which uses (less of something) making it significantly cheaper to produce AND more efficient and we can start to see a real place in the future for mass production of Solar energy.
Also, recent developments in Silicon production have found a way to make silicon melt at lower temperatures than before, which overall would lead to a reduction in costs for all Silicon using gadgets and products (like PV cells for solar energy production).
A German Built Solar Village, has been completely designed from the foundations up to be solar reliant. BUT, the big whoop with this is it actually produces more electricity than it consumes!
Also, the South facing houses have perfect building geometry for the different sun levels of summer and winter. The relative height of the Sun in the sky changes from Summer to Winter. As such, the architect has taken this into account. Shown in the diagrams on the link.
Future developments in clean and renewable energy are coming thick and fast as incentives, research calls and general interest spikes. I can't wait to see what comes next....
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