Letter: Solar power can't cut it to serve our needs

I heard Thom Hartmann, on his radio program, explain how fossil fuels are nothing more than stored solar energy. And since the fossil fuels are nothing but stored solar energy why don't we just skip the middleman, you know, the prehistoric plants turned into oil, and just use the solar energy from the sun?

I can tell you why. God (or nature, if you prefer) has aged, compressed and transformed those prehistoric plants into oil that is concentrated solar energy. You can get a lot more energy out of fossil fuels than solar energy. That's why you need to cover acres of good farmland with solar panels. And solar is expensive.

Without subsidies, solar could not compete with fossil fuels.

Besides, oil/gas is needed to mine all the rare metals needed for solar panels, so solar is not a clean as you think.

We need lots of cheap energy to support our way of life. Solar just can't cut it. We need fossil fuels and nuclear if we are to have cheap, reliable energy.

John Zitkus

Mundelein