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Solar Energy Fact 1

Posted by admin in Solar Energy Facts on January 6, 2008 | 8 responses

Fact 1: With only two hours the earth reflected back more sunlight than what is used by the entire population in one year.

According to Wikipedia, the earth receives 174 petawatts (=1.74×1017 Watts) of incoming solar radiation at any given time. Only 89 petawatts is absorbed by land and oceans. The rest is radiated back into space. In 2004, the average total worldwide power consumption of our planet is 15 terawatts (=1.5 x 1013 Watts).

Doing basic math:

- (1.74×1017 Watts) – (.89×1017 Watts) = .85 x 1017 Watts x 2 = 1.7×1017 Watts
- (365 day/year) x (24 hr/day) = 8760 hr = 8.760 x 104 hr/year
- (1.5x1013 Watts) x (8.760×104) = 1.314×1017 Watts

- 1.7×1017 Watts ≥ 1.314×1017 Watts.

Solar Energy Flow Diagram

This shown that the total amount of solar energy reflected is vast. With a proper use of photo-voltaic technology, we can harvest this untapped energy supply to fulfill the world energy demand.

Earth Energy

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_energy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_resources_and_consumption

8 Responses to “Solar Energy Fact 1”

  1. Sankey Diagrams » Blog Archive » Sun Energy Reloaded (or: Make it Look Nicer) says:
    July 1, 2008 at 1:21 am

    [...] diagram of sun radiation being absorbed and reflected when hitting earth (from Solar Energy Facts website) is a rather weak remake of the original Nasa [...]

  2. laynee says:
    November 14, 2008 at 3:11 pm

    wow that’sz intertesting

  3. Solar power – Sustainable green energy to protect our economy and environment « PARTHA DAS SHARMA’s Weblog on “Keeping World Environment Safer and Greener” says:
    February 2, 2009 at 12:21 am

    [...] 6. http://sunenergyfacts.com/2008/01/solar-energy-fact-1/ [...]

  4. Dunton Cove says:
    March 25, 2009 at 5:50 am

    Hi Love you blog , this is an etremely informative overview! Keep up the great work!
    Dunton

  5. Jacey says:
    March 26, 2009 at 9:28 am

    Hi ppl

  6. Jacey says:
    March 26, 2009 at 9:29 am

    this is boring

  7. Alexander M. Batishchev says:
    July 2, 2009 at 1:12 pm

    Thanks a lot for your site. Fact #1 is awesome! Thank you very much for this information!

  8. Georgiana Boykin says:
    March 30, 2010 at 1:42 pm

    I’ve enjoyed reading these types of blogs. Intriguing stuff! Solar energy has constantly been a fascination with me.

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