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Can you imagine getting electrical power from balloons? This is what Cool Earth of Livermore, California, has designed the next generation of solar collectors to look like. The basic concept hasn’t changed; convert sunlight into electric power using solar cells; but the packaging has changed, and this is where the solar balloons are unique.

The current installed solar plants use flat-panels. Each panel is heavy, large, easily damaged, and costly to repair. This means the cost to produce a watt of electricity is 5-7 times greater than using natural gas and is not a feasible alternative to fossil fuels. This is no longer true with the Cool Earth solar balloon system.

One side of the balloon is made from reflective silver Mylar plastic. The other half is transparent to allow in sunlight. The silver material is parabolic-shaped to concentrate the sunlight on to a single point to achieve maximum light concentration. This is why high performance solar cells are used.

The orb’s design will concentrate the sunlight 300 to 400 times better than traditional roof mounted solar panels. By design, this reduces the cost of each balloon and greatly increases electrical output per cubic inch of solar cell material. This means that the cost of the electricity produced will be on par with current natural gas power plants.

The orb has a simple circular metal frame that is used to hold the Mylar in the proper shape. An arm extends from the ring to the top center of the orb. This holds the solar cells that produce the electricity at the proper focal point. The shape of the balloon and consequently the focal point is altered by adjusting the internal air pressure.

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Alternative energy seems to be all the rage today, but a lot of people have are unsure of what it is or have different definitions. I hope this article clears things up,

One way to approach a definition of alternative energy is to consider what “regular” energy is. Ever since the mid 19th century, fossil fuels such as coal and oil have provided an increasing proportion of our energy needs. Fossil fuels have become the energy standard against which other forms of energy are considered alternative.

However our reliance on fossil fuels is relatively recent. It wasn’t that long ago that ships were powered by sales and horses move goods and people on land.

A windmill by a ranch house is an icon of the American west because thousands of windmills were used to provide power to pump water before electricity was available.

Another example of earlier uses of what we now consider alternative energy is solar hot water heating. Several progressively better and more convenient solar water heating systems were available commercially in the early 1900s. At one point nearly 1/3 of the homes in Florida use solar hot water.

As you consider the above and similar facts I think you can see that the dominance of fossil fuels has been very brief and very recent. As it becomes harder and more expensive to meet our energy needs with fossil fuel, we need to return to other sources.

So for now we’ll consider alternative energy to be any source of energy that doesn’t rely on fossil fuels to create it.

When most people think of safe and clean energy, what comes to mind is usually basic information that’s not particularly interesting or beneficial. But there’s a lot more to safe and clean energy than just the basics.

Solar is comically unsuitable for baseline power generation. Even forgetting it’s 4X or more expensive than traditional power, you have the problems of energy storage and generation. Solar panels — whether photovoltaic or thin-film — are primarily a glass product.

The most advanced automobile glass uses the same thin-film technology to deposit microscopically thin layers of materials between layers of glass — which, for example, allows a windshield to respond to changes in glare. Solar cells are coming along fine on their own, although it makes sense to explore the new arena of generating electricity from the infra-red spectrum; the key is rectifiers. There is no need for hydrocarbon fuel subsidies given today’s prices.

You may not consider everything you just read to be crucial information about safe and clean energy. But don’t be surprised if you find yourself recalling and using this very information in the next few days.

Fuel cell technology is a particularly important enabler for biomass utilisation offering high efficiencies of conversion in fairly small unit sizes and is essential to the new distributed energy economy. Fuel cells can then convert hydrogen to electrical energy to power anything from vehicles and homes to electronic devices.