Newton's Laws

Author: Thomas Newton

We are embroiled in an energy problem. The recent trend to make consumer appliances, electronics and cars more efficient has helped ease the pain, but the underlying ailment remains. Compact Fluorescent Lights, hybrid cars and energy-saving appliances are all gaining in popularity and lowering energy consumption.

No matter how energy efficient any electronic product is, it still consumes energy - energy that is getting harder to come by. The world at large has been developing technologies at an almost frenetic pace, except those related to energy production . A simple focus on research aimed at developing cleaner energy production could solve many of our energy woes.

It's no secret that one of the primary energy issues is oil consumption. We use on average 21 million barrels of oil a day. To put that somewhat mind-boggling number into perspective, envision, if you will, 1,100 Olympic-sized swimming pools on a vast field. Fill each of them to the brim with oil and that's the amount consumed per day. Add the fact that two-thirds of U.S. oil is imported, and that the U.S. oil reserves can only support the country for 60 days by themselves, and you see that alternative energy sources are not only needed to curb global warming but also to keep our nation running.

What sort of technologies will be created to help our energy issues? Many start-up companies have strong funding and solid plans to create and distribute new, cleaner and more efficient means for harnessing energy. Solaria, a solar electric start-up company is working on enhancing the traditional solar panel. Through a distinct production technique, Solaria uses silicon to reflect light and magnify its intensity, thereby harnessing more energy. Their current panels use 50 to 60 percent less silicon than normal solar panels, making them more cost effective, and doubling the amount of energy they produce. Future panels are expected to multiply the energy produced 100-fold, not only by reflecting and magnifying light, but also by being mounted on rotating poles that would maximize their exposure to direct light.

Once alternative sources of power are viable ways of producing mass amounts of energy, electric cars will be able to replace existing gasoline and diesel-run engines, and reduce our need for oil. The vast majority of the 3,339,000,000 liters of oil used in the U.S. every day is for transportation. If cars could run on electricity, and if electricity could be produced cleanly, our dependence on oil would slowly and steadily decrease, as would our emissions. The clean energy produced would also power all of our current electronics, which, if the current trend continues, should continue to become more energy efficient.

The amount of research and development in the area of energy technologies has been lacking, to say the least. Our current dependence on oil and our of clean methods of energy production is a direct result of this lack of devotion to alternative energy technologies. Our electronically-driven world is dependent on electricity as well as oil. A simple shift to more technological innovations in the energy field will go far in curing our current energy crisis.