Atmospheric Sunshade: The Black Cloud over the Solar Industry

The more I learn about climate change, the more I feel like we are just cycling in a downward spiral. On the one hand, scientists, politicians and we laypeople alike are still arguing whether or not the situation even exists. On the other hand all of the people who do believe in its reality are arguing amongst themselves as to what to do about it.

Apparently a group of experts (you know them, they are formally known as They), decided that it would be a good idea to artificially cool the earth’s atmosphere by releasing small particles into the stratosphere (our upper atmosphere). The idea is to synthetically create the same type of situation as a volcanic eruption, which blasts sulfur into our atmosphere, causing a cooling effect.

Honestly, I’m not too sure about anything designed to fool Mother Nature – she’s one pretty smart cookie and somehow I believe she’ll see right through our shenanigans and send us to the naughty step for a time out. But then again, we might just be doing that to ourselves. This new idea, which may or may not help alleviate global warming for a period of time, will also negate the progress of solar powered technology.

Many solar powered mechanisms operate and get their strength either all or mostly from direct sunlight. By injecting particles into our atmosphere much of the sunlight that reaches the earth will be diffuse sunlight. Smaller systems, like the solar panels used to store energy in our homes, use some direct sunlight and some diffuse sunlight. This means that they will still probably work, though not as efficiently.

Much larger and commercial systems, like power-generating solar plants, can use only direct sunlight. The project that They have planned will make these types of plants and other larger systems very ineffectual, reducing the amount of energy they can produce by one-fifth. And while one-fifth may not seem like a big chunk, think of it this way – it’s 20 percent; what if They proposed a concept that may or may not make your family healthier for a short period of time and all it would cost you was 20 percent of your household income for that period of time? Kind of sketchy, don’t you think?

While I get it, there are no guarantees in life (save death and taxes, but let’s not go there) and sometimes it’s better to do something rather than nothing; maybe if we put our heads together a while longer we can come up with a more likely plan to help the earth on one level, while not negating our headway to save the planet on another level.

Posted on March 30th in Solar News by Jennifer.