Surface area required to power the whole world by solar power

The area needed is not really a problem for solar power. It's storage. We need power when it's dark, probably even more then than when there's daylight.

So anyone who thinks we can manufacture nearly 500 billion square meters of solar panels by 2030, raise your hand.<p>It seems clear that if we were to do this it couldn't be all photovoltaics. Even with concentrating solar cells that's a lot of silicon and/or more rare elements (indium etc.).<p>With solar-thermal added into the mix it becomes potentially feasible, but who is going to fund a huge solar farm in the middle of a politically unstable region like north africa?

Let's just go ahead and start on the Dyson Sphere.

Finally, a good use for Arizona.

The infographic claims it will take about 500000 square kilometers of solar panels.<p>1 square kilometer is one million square meters (1000x1000).<p>At a cost of $100 per square meter, that's $100,000,000 (one hundred million dollars) to complete 1/500000th of the project.<p>Did I make any mistakes?

There has been some pretty interesting research in to storing energy in molten salts. This is a bit different than the photovoltaic cells which I believe this map is referencing; It involves capturing heat and turning it in to electricity rather than light. This is mainly just research right now, but if it pans out it could potentially be much more practical than photovoltaic cells because it doesn't require as many precious materials to manufacture and stores energy at night. See: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_tower" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_tower</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_energy_storage" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_energy_storage</a>

I can't get the original to load, but at least this page links to it:<p><a href="http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/09/surface-area-required-to-power-the-whole-world-with-solar-power-wind.php" rel="nofollow">http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/09/surface-area-require...</a>

The linked page on what will happen in 2012 [1] doesn't increase my confidence in the information presented herein.<p>[1] <a href="http://www.2012officialcountdown.com/?a=osn2003" rel="nofollow">http://www.2012officialcountdown.com/?a=osn2003</a>

This surface area is roughly equivalent to the size of Montana (or the size of Germany).

Not "with solar panels alone" but with lots of batteries.<p>Seawater Uranium and Thorium from Monazite are much more credible energy resources.