OK, so I may not be the world's sole expert on solar power, but I believe passionately that this is the way of the future, if we, as a species, want to survive on this planet. The sun's energy has been hitting this planet for billions or years and will continue to do so long after we've all gone to Dinosaurland. So let's try to stick around for a few more "galactic time seconds" by stopping the needless decomposition of fossil fuels, and taking advantage of what has enabled our existence here in the first place.

I'm a firm believer that trying to do this on a small scale is the real answer to our energy problems. A single household that can become self-sufficient is better than any number of expensive large scale projects trying to harness energy from the sun's rays. This can be achieved by first examining the "energy hogs", and trying to replace or eliminate them as much as possible, and secondly by trying to find ways of generating as much as possible of the remaining power consumption from the sun.

The idea here is that you can start small. We all have a few electricity users that use small amounts of electricity, and not all the time. Think of yard lights, battery chargers, shed and garage lights, etc. Many of these are available using solar power (blatant plug) for energy. Once you have a few of these hooked up and start using them, you become hooked (at least I did!) on the idea that "free" power is something really, really neat. You can then start looking at others.