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Ever since the creation of the MIGs in 2002, the Sophia CEP hosts a module in which students reflect on the many problems inherent to our future energy supply. The ALEF MIG (ALternative Energies for the Future) tackles a new question every year. The 2007-2008 ALEF MIG studied the methods of producing solar energy, the way they might evolve and what they could offer us in the future.
ALEF MIG 2007 team.
Nowadays solar energy is insignificant when compared to the massive use of fossil-fuel-based or nuclear-based energy. Despite these energies being polluting and non-renewable. It seems that, in the face of climate change, and a growing demand in energy, the use of clean and renewable solar energy is essential. However for this to happen, many technological hurdles have to be overcome to be able to increase the profitability of solar infrastructures.
What role will solar energy play? Will it remain insignificant or will it have an important role in the energy mix in the next decades?
Solar-based energy has many advantages. In the first place, solar energy is renewable, which is not the case of energies from nuclear fission, coal, oil or gas which all depend on finite supplies. Moreover it is a rather clean energy, which is to say that its impact on the environment is quite small as it does not produce any waste, the plant structures can be fully recycled and the only CO2 emissions are produced when the materials are manufactured.
Another important advantage of solar energy development is its effect on geopolitics. Indeed electricity production allows for more energy independence from oil gas or coal exporting countries, which in turn allows for a greater geopolitical stability. The important solar resource of African or Arabic countries can also allow for solar-powered desalination plants which will help solve the drinkable water problem in these countries which will be one of the major geopolitical issues in the years to come.
Moreover, even though solar energy is not very competitive economically it promises to become very cheap in the years to come when some technological hurdles are jumped. This would supply the very large energy markets which are being created in countries with very much sunlight and industrialize the techniques for creating solar plants. These advantages encourage many research laboratories and industrial research groups to intensify researches in this field, which heralds many technological breakthroughs in both the manufacturing and composition of materials used. These evolutions will allow for solar energy to take an important place in the energy mix.
Thanks to the many visits and conferences held during the first week, the ALEF MIG team managed to accomplish a real research task during the next two weeks on the feasibility of a 12 MW thermal solar plant.
