While there is tremendous potential for solar emergy, why it is not fully tapped?
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If you're talking about electricity generated from solar panels, it's not widely done because of how expensive it is to build and construct panels. The material (Germanium or Silicon) alone costs a lot to synthesize.
Wind power turns out to be a better alternative, if you consider the costs and benefits. Ocean-tide power may be good source of power too.
Now look up "Dyson Sphere." This is another aspect of tapping solar power; Solar power tapped to the extreme, not for electricity, but for life; A solution for the evergrowing population of mankind. A Dyson Sphere is impossible to construct, but a few hundred years from now it may be possible to create a Dyson Belt, a collection of inhabitable planetoids built and placed in orbit 93 million miles from the sun (the same distance as the Earth).
Solar energy is actually very expensive to begin producing. Once all the solar panels and plants were in place then it would be cheaper, but right now it would have a massive start-up cost. In addition, solar energy is reliant on the sun being out and (to some extent) warm weather. So we would also have to store the energy obtained during the day is huge batteries for solar power to be effective.
Check out what the governments of Germany and Sweden are doing to promote solar energy before you say no governments are giving adequate financial assistance to solar energy. A short-term problem for solar is a shortage of solar cells because Europe is buying them so fast.
I can't speak for the rest of the world but the US government doesn't put much priority on solar energy. Most of the effort is for maintaining the oil status quo, with "alternative energy" mostly for talking points and demonstration projects.
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