What is Solar: Definition and 1000 Discussions

Solar power is the conversion of energy from sunlight into electricity, either directly using photovoltaics (PV), indirectly using concentrated solar power, or a combination. Concentrated solar power systems use lenses or mirrors and solar tracking systems to focus a large area of sunlight into a small beam. Photovoltaic cells convert light into an electric current using the photovoltaic effect.Photovoltaics were initially solely used as a source of electricity for small and medium-sized applications, from the calculator powered by a single solar cell to remote homes powered by an off-grid rooftop PV system. Commercial concentrated solar power plants were first developed in the 1980s. As the cost of solar electricity has fallen, the number of grid-connected solar PV systems has grown into the millions and gigawatt-scale photovoltaic power stations are being built. Solar PV is rapidly becoming an inexpensive, low-carbon technology to harness renewable energy from the Sun. The current largest photovoltaic power station in the world is the Pavagada Solar Park, Karnataka, India with a generation capacity of 2050 MW.The International Energy Agency projected in 2014 that under its "high renewables" scenario, by 2050, solar photovoltaics and concentrated solar power would contribute about 16 and 11 percent, respectively, of worldwide electricity consumption, and solar would be the world's largest source of electricity. Most solar installations would be in China and India. In 2019, solar power generated 2.7% of the world's electricity, growing over 24% from the previous year. As of October 2020, the unsubsidised levelised cost of electricity for utility-scale solar power is around $36/MWh.

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  1. B

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    Henrik Svensmark and Nigel Calder's Book The Chilling Stars mentions Svensmark's paper and experiments that apparently show that global cloud cover is regulated by cosmic rays which is regulated by the sun or solar and geo- magnetic fields. This fits with remarks by MIT Climatology Professor...
  2. DrClaude

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  3. J

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  4. J

    B Temperature of Solar Wind: Complexities of Measuring Heat in a Stream of Particles

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  5. Alex Torres

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  6. T

    From South Warrandyte Victoria Australia

    No Idea what I am expected to disclose here????
  7. camptent

    B Extracting electrical energy from Orbital motion

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  8. E

    I Solar Calendar -- When was the leap day inserted?

    If the year started on, for example, 1 March(in some places during the 15th century), two months later than our present year, when was the leap day inserted? Thank you.
  9. Salah

    Chosing air blowers to force air through a solar heat storage array

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  10. D

    B Could solar sails be used as turbines for power generation?

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  11. D

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  12. Astronuc

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  13. Borg

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  14. Parziter

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  15. Hoon Sol

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  16. B

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  17. S

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  18. S

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  19. AmericaPacific42

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  20. J

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  21. D

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  22. Astronuc

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  23. M

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  24. J

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  25. anorlunda

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  26. Grinkle

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  27. S

    I Interpreting solar event flux units

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  28. P

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  29. Astronuc

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  30. O

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  31. TheJP78

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  32. camerart

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  33. David Lewis

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  34. M

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  35. D

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  36. amazingjoe

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  37. Cerenkov

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  38. P

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  39. shivajikobardan

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  40. S

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  41. seanduffy

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  42. jedishrfu

    B An Ancient Solar Storm 9200 years ago is Cause for Concern

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  43. Cosmology2015

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  44. B

    Why Are Solar Panels 21-22% efficient? How can efficiency improved?

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  45. brochesspro

    I The centripetal acceleration of the planets in our solar system

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  46. T

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  47. G

    B Exploring the History of Calculating Solar System Body SGPs

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  48. S

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  49. W

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  50. Y

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