HARNESSING THE SUN

Waikato Times, Volume 107, Issue 18024, 20 May 1930, Page 6

HARNESSING THE SUN

' No less than 4000 delegates (representing 48 nations) attended a World Power Conference in Berlin to ■ consider a variety of problems, the chief of which was to estimate the world’s available sources of power, fuel and energy, and how best these may be conserved. It comes as a surprise to learn that coal is still king in that it supplies fouivfifths of our fuel or power needs. Water-power plays a very small part and, although the present has been called the “oil age,’’ oil remains in a subordinate position in relation to coal. It is agreed that coal and oil represent the principal sources of energy utilised by man for the production of mechanical power. It is also agreed that neither source is inexhaustible. If posterity is not to be left to fend for itself, ths

problem is one of conservation or to discover new sources of power. Man’s propensity to live in the present does not augur well for a policy of conservation. In fact Mr J. H. Thomas recently voyaged to Canada and Mr Philip Snowden to The Hague-to try to sell more British coal stocks. The British Government’s Coal Act is also designed to facilitate the disposal to foreigh customers of as much coal as quickly as possible. Meanwhile oil magnates engage in an intensive search for new customers. Since obviously it will be hard to stop the eating away of existing fuel supplies, the solution is to find new ones. Scientists are at work on the problem although practicable results have still to be produced. The starting point is plain enough but quite inaccessible. All energy or fuel, so far as the world is concerned, comes from the sun. Coal, oil, water or wind power—all are primarily derived from the sun. Solar radiation is the source of all power and the sun is no niggard. Far more energy is intercepted by the earth's bulk than man ever uses. The question is how to absorb or store more of this radiant energy and harness it to our uses. One method that is considered hopeful is to obtain energy not from the tides, but from the difference in temperature between the surface and deeper leyers of the ocean. Better results are expected than from tide movements or disruption of the atom. Even more direct is the proposal to take from the sun just as plant life. does. ; Experiments are proceeding in what is called photo-chemistry and it is possible that practical results may be available by the time we begin to worry over an oil or coal shortage. In short, man will have found a new way of doing an old thing—harnessing the sun.