Efficient Conversion of Solar Fulx Into Rural Energy Sources

An important problem facing rural America is the lack of job opportunities. This is particularly true in much of the arid southwestern U.S. These rural communities have little that they can export into commodity priced markets. Hence, this region has among the highest incidence (% of county population) of poverty in the U.S. Yet, the southwestern U.S. has abundant solar energy which could provide the comparative advantage for rural economic development - creating new business and job opportunities. Historically, the collection and conversion of sunlight into usable forms of energy has been too expensive and too inefficient to take advantage of this abundant, renewable resource. Mathematical modeling of a new proprietary process indicates very high conversion efficiencies from sunlight into usable forms of mechanical heat energy. The purpose of this research is to construct a test apparatus to rigorously quantify the overall solar flux-to-heat energy efficiency and validate the mathematical models for a new solar-thermal technology. This new technology can be constructed of simple, inexpensive materials to efficiently generate raw heat. This heat can be used in numerous industrial, commercial, manufacturing or other agricultural processes or to generate electricity. These advances promise to make solar energy a competitive alternative to fossil fuels and create a supply of affordable energy, one of the pillars in economic development: to power renewal in rural southwestern communities.