Renewable Energies: What Future?

“Electricity is just a new agent for the arts and manufactures, and undoubtedly, future generations will look back with interest at this century, in which it was applied for the first time to the desires of humanity.” — Alfred Smee

Just as our generation has looked back at the transformation of the last century through the production of electricity from fossil fuels, future generations will reflect on the adoption of new renewable resources during this century.

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The future should be one where we derive energy from entirely renewable sources. This will lead to a cleaner and less wasteful human reality. Here, we explore 5 of the most promising renewable energies of the future.

1. Space solar farms
2. Human energy
3. Base geothermal energy
4. Quantum Dot solar cells
5. Nuclear fusion
Our next steps

1. Space Solar Farms

The essentials of this:

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Can provide energy anywhere on Earth
Overcomes the current drawbacks of traditional solar energy production
Could be commercially viable within the next 30 years

This technology was first proposed by an aerospace engineer named Peter Glaser in 1968. People also consider him the “father of the solar satellite.”

Since then, the idea of creating solar energy farms in space has been a topic of interest for the scientific community. However, they have never fully realized it.

This model of energy harvesting is based on the fact that sunlight in space is largely uninterrupted. Current solar technology is at the mercy of weather conditions. It can only produce energy during daylight hours.

Space solar farms overcome these obstacles by eliminating nighttime outages and inclement weather. Additionally, sunlight found outside the Earth’s atmosphere is 30% more intense than the sunlight we receive at the Earth’s surface.

To create a functional solar farm, companies would send inflatable modules into space to form a bell-shaped structure that contains mirrors directing and concentrating sunlight onto solar panels. They could then send this energy back to Earth.

However, the challenges associated with space harvesting could hinder the development of this future technology.

The biggest challenge is bringing the harvested energy back to Earth. The energy produced by these solar farms can be sent in the form of microwaves or a powerful laser. The problem is that the cost of the entire process currently outweighs the benefit of the increased energy production it provides.

Energy transfer can also be harmful through weaponization or accidents. Despite these concerns, the possibilities for this technology are tremendous. It will be able to provide energy to remote locations anywhere on Earth, which is of great value.

With the rise of private space companies, some have predicted that this technology could be commercially viable within 30 years. China is currently considering building a space solar farm. They claim to already be testing the technology and aim to have an operational space solar farm by 2050.

2. Human Energy

The essentials of this:

Viable for heavily populated urban areas
Can convert heat and kinetic energy produced by humans into electrical energy
Harvests energy that would otherwise go to waste

Humans gather calories through food consumption, which our bodies then convert into usable energy. In many ways, our bodies are similar to machines, like any other that uses energy to perform work. We use this energy for vital functions, such as keeping our hearts beating or powering our brains.

However, much of the energy produced by our bodies is also used in the form of heat and kinetic energy through movement. A significant portion of this is wasted and remains unclaimed by humans.

This may seem like a missed opportunity given the number of humans on Earth and the amount of land used to feed the vast population.

In fact, for most of human history, human power has been the most important form of mechanical energy at our disposal. Human or animal energy has created and utilized all our structures, homes, farmlands, and tools.

The energy converted by human bodies has been used to push a shovel into the ground when digging a dam and when a hammer was swung by a stone mason. It is only relatively recently that we, humans, have begun to use other forms of energy, namely fossil fuels.

At rest, the average person’s body produces about 100 watts of power. The output is much higher during vigorous activities.

For example, cycling can generate 400 watts of power per hour. However, top-performing cyclists have been recorded generating up to 1800 watts. This was during short bursts of effort.

If you consider the average amount of heat and kinetic energy produced by humans in a single city (energy that is not harnessed), you can begin to understand why scientists are taking note of this promising renewable energy source.

So, with all this energy going to waste, we must ask ourselves: how can we harness this energy? There are two major issues with harnessing human energy.

The first is that current energy harvesting strategies are not very efficient. However, this should change in the future. Scientists are developing technologies that utilize this energy for efficiency gains and at lower costs.

The second issue preventing human energy from being a viable renewable energy source is that of modern battery technology. The battery systems currently available to us are too large, heavy, and bulky to make this kind of technology viable. However, recent breakthroughs in energy storage techniques could soon be on the horizon.

Scientists have envisioned cities capable of harnessing enough human power to run entire buildings through our daily actions alone. In fact, a street in London has been converted with materials that harness kinetic energy as people walk along it.

As part of the Human Power Plant project, Utrecht University in the Netherlands plans to create a dormitory. It will be entirely powered by the students living there.

These 750 students will activate the 22-story building with human mechanical energy. This includes lighting and heating, without the use of fossil fuels.

3. Core Geothermal Energy

The essentials of this:

Is accessible anywhere on Earth
Provides an unlimited supply of energy without pollution
Could produce energy equivalent to that of nuclear power plants

Although we already possess technology to harness geothermal energy in certain areas where volcanic activity is close to the Earth’s surface, it is by no means available in most regions of the world.

However, deep below the Earth’s surface lies its molten core, containing enough energy to meet humanity’s needs in an unlimited supply. If we could drill down to the core, we would be able to access incredible amounts of clean and pollution-free energy that people anywhere on Earth could harness.

The Earth’s core is incredibly hot, around 6,000 degrees Celsius, which is as hot as the surface of the sun. This heat is a combination of the residual heat from the Earth’s formation, heat from the decay of radioactive materials, and heat generated by friction as the dense core sinks towards the center of the Earth.

So, with this incredible amount of energy at our disposal, why haven’t we taken advantage of it more? To access this energy, we would need to drill down to a depth of 10,000 kilometers or more to reach deep geothermal heat. The heat found at these depths is comparable to the energy produced by a nuclear reactor.

However, this incredible depth complicates the drilling process due to extreme temperatures. Another crippling issue is getting this energy to the surface with the materials we have available. Copper melts at these temperatures, as do most other viable materials.

Scientists may have found the answer through a recent development in graphite technology. This is the discovery of graphene.

Graphene is an amazing material, one that is 200 times stronger than steel, and is an excellent thermal and electrical conductor. This material is 100 times more conductive than copper and only begins to melt at around 4,000 degrees Celsius.

Using graphene rods that descend to areas near the Earth’s core could provide us with unlimited energy that is 100% pollution-free, undoubtedly transforming the energy industry.

4. Quantum Dot Solar Cells

The essentials of this:

Will revolutionize current solar technology through solar windows
Significantly converts more solar energy
The technology can be applied to many materials

Not only will the future contain new ways to harness renewable energies, but it will also include very advanced versions of the technologies we currently use. We have been able to harness solar energy for some time, and this technology has not stopped progressing.

More recently, scientists have created quantum dot solar cell technology.

Quantum dots are nanocrystals built with semiconductor materials. A thin coating of these cells can be applied to a solar cell. The quantum dots absorb sunlight to excite the nanocrystal particles.

The bandgap of these quantum dots matches the frequency of sunlight they receive, allowing them to convert more than 65% of sunlight into energy.

This is far more than any solar technology we have today, with the average solar cell in use today achieving an efficiency of about 15%.

This, coupled with the fact that quantum solar cells are much lighter, more versatile, and durable than our current solar cells, means that this technology has the potential to transform many material surfaces.

A promising application for this technology is solar windows. These windows could produce electricity while providing insulation and shading at the same time. The windows are incredibly efficient as the front layer absorbs blue light while the second layer absorbs the rest of the spectrum.

The quantum dots in the second layer of a solar window re-emit photons at a longer wavelength, allowing the solar cells integrated into the window frame to convert the energy into electricity. This technology would be relatively inexpensive and could significantly reduce the cost of solar technology.

5. Nuclear Fusion

The essentials of this:

Has the most potential to change the face of energy production
Nuclear fusion energy is 100% clean, compared to current nuclear fission energy
Small production facilities would be portable

People sometimes view nuclear technology as a “dirty” way to produce energy since the current method of nuclear fission produces significant amounts of radioactive waste.

However, people should make a clear distinction between nuclear fission and nuclear fusion. Nuclear fission splits a large atom into two smaller ones, releasing energy and neutrons, which causes the splitting of other atoms. This results in a possible chain reaction.

Nuclear fusion, on the other hand, occurs when two atoms slam together to create a heavier atom that releases energy, but exponentially more than that of fission. Fusion does not produce long-lived radioactive waste like fission, making it a clean energy source.

Fusion can also be achieved with widely abundant and largely inexhaustible materials. In fact, solar energy is a type of fusion energy because the sun produces energy through a fusion process within its core.

With nuclear fusion’s ability to produce about four million times more energy than that of burning coal, we would only need a fraction of the number of power plants on Earth today to meet the energy needs of the human population. The amount of energy produced by fusion is so great that it could be considered practically unlimited.

Even though fusion is an incredibly promising energy source, it is not without its flaws. The process is incredibly difficult to achieve. This is because the reaction can only take place under extreme conditions. Fusion requires extreme amounts of heat (100 million kelvins) and massive amounts of pressure.

These requirements mean that achieving nuclear fusion on Earth often requires more energy than it produces. However, as technology advances and scientists conduct further research, we are getting closer to creating a viable fusion reactor.

The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) in France is a collaboration of 35 countries. It is seeking a way to harness this potential energy source.

Some predict that ITER could provide nuclear fusion energy to the grid as early as 2045. This is the first pathway to clean and unlimited energy.

Private companies have also been striving to fully harness the potential of nuclear fusion. This includes Lockheed Martin and Tokamak, a company in the UK.

Lockheed Martin claims they could produce a fusion reactor small enough to fit on a truck trailer that would have the capacity to power 100,000 homes. Tokamak could produce nuclear fusion energy as early as 2030.

Our Next Steps

Human technology has progressed at an exponential rate, and the energy sector is no different. Scientists almost unanimously agree that we will transition to a world that relies solely on renewable energy during the lifetime of someone born in the last 20 years.

This transition is an absolute necessity given the threat that climate change poses to us as a species. While people do not always see the future with optimism, when considering the future of energy production, it is certainly a clearer and cleaner forecast.