Articles Directory | Free Articles | New Articles Daily | A Look At The History Of Solar And Wind Power

The history of solar and wind power stretches back thousands of years. Wind power has been around since humans have been using sails. The very first introduction of a machine powered by wind was developed by a Greek engineer named Heron. For a long time windmills were by far the most common examples of making use of wind power. The initial windmills appeared in a region of Iran between the 7th and 9th centuries, and then they appeared in Europe in the 12th century.

The first windmill to produce electrical power was constructed in Scotland by James Blyth in 1887. Nevertheless, it was not regarded as economically viable and as a result it was not widely produced. Denmark grabbed the baton and focused on developing the technology. In 1978 a cutting edge multi-megawatt turbine was constructed.

After this, the US federal government worked together with industry leaders to further improve this technology. This led to lots of features available today such as variable speed generators. In recent times the wind power industry has expanded dramatically, as a consequence of concerns over the depletion of non-renewable fuels.

The history of solar and wind power are very similar because both may be traced back to previous civilizations. Greeks and Native Americans both built homes in the sides of hills in order to benefit from the heat. Romans utilized glass to trap the warmth of the sun in their homes. However, in spite of this extended history the first solar collector was not constructed until 1776, by Horace de Saussere. Around a hundred years later Auguste Mouchout developed a solar driven steam engine. It was very expensive and no more were built. Twenty years later the first solar cells were constructed.

Despite this leap it took until the 1950's for substantial strides to be made, as solar power was put to use in the mainstream for the first time. It was still less expensive to utilize oil to power homes, and so it took until the oil embargo of the 1980's to permit solar power to come to the fore. Its global recognition has gradually risen since then, and during the 1990's more than a million homes had some kind of solar power installed.

Wind and solar power has been utilized all through human history. Since the early discoveries of the Greeks and Romans, humans have been improving and advancing the technology. Now that we are mindful of the concerns with non-renewable fossil fuels, a great deal of research money is spent on discovering renewable energy sources. Nature supplies us with a great deal of energy, so through studying the history of solar and wind power experts can improve the capacity to use it effectively.