Category:	Science and Technology
Domain:	Energy
Keywords:	Energy - solar, alternative energy, air pollution, photovoltaic, renewable
Outlook:	Solar is the wild card of all energy sources, offering the potential to meet most of our energy needs once technological breakthroughs make the cost competitive.
Summary Analysis:	Solar energy has been the great potential answer to the world’s energy problems for decades now, but the technology to harness the sun has yet to arrive. If technological advances and rising oil prices continue apace, solar’s potential might finally be realized within the next 20 years. The sun is the one source that can supply most of the world’s energy indefinitely. Other renewable sources can only partially help to meet our energy needs, as they lack the potential to scale to terawatts of electricity (nuclear is a partial exception, but the supply of uranium is finite as well). For all the promise of solar energy, it remains inhibited by economics -- it is currently not cost effective enough to compete with other energy sources. It has thus far been generated using expensive silicon-based solar cells, which produce the highest efficiencies but at the highest cost. Using cheaper organic materials or plastics improves the cost equation significantly but leads to much lower efficiencies and essentially the same unattractive cost-efficiency ratios. New advances, however, in thin-film and “dirty” silicon manufacturing -- in which lower-grade silicon is made more efficient -- indicate future economic parity between solar and other, non-renewable sources of energy. Over the past few decades, solar’s manufacturing costs have been falling at more than three percent per year, but even at the elevated energy prices of 2005, solar energy still has a long way to go before becoming cost competitive. One problem with solar and other intermittent renewable energy sources (like wind) is their inability to generate power around the clock and at the same levels in all locations. These challenges point to the need to capture or store energy at the production site and then transport it elsewhere for later consumption. Currently, the best medium to store and transport solar energy is hydrogen, used not as an energy source per se but as a storage medium that can be unlocked with a fuel cell. Special solar facilities that create hydrogen via hydrolysis, once cost effective, will bring new levels of cost, storage, and transport efficiency to solar power. More significantly, they will usher in the hydrogen economy. Until then, no other energy source can provide the massive energy production potential to power the hydrogen economy. In the near term, solar energy production is likely to continue to be tied to the prevalence of government subsidies. Given its cost, even if subsidised, solar will still make up only a small fraction of the world’s total energy production. Nearly all of these subsidies will be in the industrialised world. The largest consumers of new energy, the emerging world, will continue to follow the cheapest energy sources for growth. In the longer term, this could mean widespread use of decentralized solar systems as growth economies realize the cost benefits of a distributed power grid. The emerging world has the potential to leapfrog the industrialized world in developing more efficient and reliable energy infrastructures.

	Implications:	Potential for the energy industry to undergo a revolutionary transformation when solar power becomes cost competitive Decreasing cost of other energy sources when more solar capacity comes online, continuing to make them financially attractive Potential for the global hydrogen economy to become a reality when solar energy becomes cost competitive
	Early Indicators:	Infusion of government funds into solar energy research during the Carter Administration in the US, followed by research coming to a standstill as a result of budget cuts in the programme during the Reagan years
	What to Watch:	A renewed focus on solar research in the media indicates technological breakthroughs are being made to bridge the cost gap. Government subsidies are once again pumped into solar production. California's new million solar roof legislation, which would require that half of all new homes in the state come equipped with solar cells. The project is expected to bring online 3,000 MW of power by 2018. Research breakthroughs bring down the cost of silicon-based solar cells and increase the efficiency of organic-based cells.
	Parallels/Precedents:	The Manhattan Project, ushering in a new era of large-scale energy production via nuclear sources
	Enablers/drivers:	Increased spending on research, resulting in technological breakthroughs in solar energy production and storage Increased government subsidies Dwindling oil supplies
	Leaders:	Regions: Germany, Japan Institutions: University of Southampton Solar Energy Group [link] Centre for Renewable Energy Systems Technology (CREST), Loughborough University [link] BP Solar [link] Japanese Agency for Natural Resources and Energy [link] Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy, Germany (ISE) [link] University of Toronto (Professor Ted Sargent's work on applying nanotechnology -- quantum dots -- to solar cells) [link] UC Berkeley Nanosolar, Palo Alto, CA
	Figures:
	Sources:	"2005 International Energy Outlook." Energy Information Administration. [link] "International Energy Agency" International Energy Agency [link] "Power from the Sun" Chemical and Engineering News, June 21, 2004 Volume 82, Number 25 pp. 25-28 [link] British Photovoltaic Association [link] "The Costs and Impacts of Intermittency: An Assessment of the Evidence on the costs and impacts of Intermittent Generation on the British Electricity Network" UK Energy Research Council, April 5, 2006 [link] World Renewable Energy Congress/Network [link] U.S. Department of Energy "U.S. Department of Energy Basic Research Needs Consortia." [link] "About Thin Film Potovoltaic Solar Power." The Energy Blog. Aug 2005 [link] Yang, Sarah. "Researchers develop technique to use dirty silicon, could pave way for cheaper solar energy." UC Berkeley News. 15 August 2005 [link] Dixon, Chris. "Shortages Stifle a Boom Time for the Solar Industry." The New York Times. 5 Aug 2005. S. Abu-Sharkh, R.J. Arnold, J. Kohler, R. Li, T. Markvart, J.N. Ross, K. Steemers, P. Wilson and R. Yao "Can microgrids make a major contribution to UK energy supply?" Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 10, 2006, 78–127 [link]

	At A Glance:	When:	11–20 years
		Where:	Global
		How Fast:	Years
		Likelihood:	Low
		Impact:	High
		Controversy:	High

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