Alternate Power DIY

Posts Tagged ‘cheap electricity’

There’s a lot more news about alternative energies recently. Different people have different ideas about just what it is. They also have different ideas about how long alternative energy has been around. I wrote this article to give my perspective on

alternative energy is commonly used to refer to sources of energy that are an alternative to coal, oil and natural gas. These fossil fuels have been the most common source of our energy for generations.

Our current perspective blinds us to the fact that the emergence of fossil fuels as the dominant form of energy happened only recently in world history. Wind, animals and hydropower were the dominant sources of energy until the mid-19th century.

I’m sure you seen a picture of a ranch house in the American West with the windmill next to the homestead. They originally were used to pump water. Later they were actually used to generate a small amount of electric power (say, enough to power of crystal radio) in the days before rural electrification

Early in the 20th century nearly 1/3rd of homes in Florida used solar hot water. The availability of cheap electricity in the 1940’s changed that. At one point electric companies were even giving away hot water heaters to encourage consumption.

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.

With that background, here’s my working definition of alternative energy: energy from a source other than the burning of fossil fuels (again coal, oil and its derivatives and natural gas).

Although some people use the phrase alternative energy and renewable energy interchangeably that really isn’t the case. Well many even most forms of alternative energy are, in fact, renewable some aren’t.

Most sources of alternative energy have less environmental impact and burning fossil fuel. And most are renewable, meaning we don’t have to worry about running out of them. These considerations have led to the increased interest in exploring alternative energy today

The alternative sources people most commonly think of are solar power, wind power and hydropower. However, researchers are eagerly exploring other innovative sources as well. These include things such geothermal, biomass and tidal power.

I think we can safely expect that the use of all forms of alternative energy will increase until they become the new standard.