Revised rocket man

B1: Effect of air and altitude

Depending on higher or lower altitude, effect of air density and force at which the air pushes against the rocket directly affects the descent rate of rocket.

B2: Effect of air pushing against rocket

As descent rate increases. Rocket is getting close to the earth. Hence there is higher force of air resistance on the rocket, which in turn slows down the rocket’s descent rate.

B3: Left over fuel

As throttle setting increase the rate at which fuel burns also increases which results in less remaining fuel then before, which in turn makes the rocket lighter, Once the rocket is lighter the force of gravity on rocket increases which increases rockets downward acceleration and in turn decent rate. If decent rate increases, altitude decreases which increases the goal decent rate. Finally when goal decent rate increases the throttle setting of the rocket decreases.

B4: Fuel control

As throttle setting increases the fuel burn rate also increases, because of that there is decreases in remaining fuel in rocket. If there is a decrease in remaining fuel in rocket, goal decent rate of the rocket increase which in turn decreases the throttle setting.

B5: Safe Decent

Once the descent rate of the rocket increases, altitude of the rocket above the earth decreases. Which brings us close to our goal decent rate. If the goal descent rate decreases then we increase the rockets throttle setting, which also increases the rocket’s fuel burn rate. If the fuel-burn rate increases then the thrust from the rocket burn also increases. Once the thrust from the rocket burn increases rockets upward acceleration from the rocket engine also increases, which in turn decreases the descent rate of the rocket.

B6: Effect of mass and gravity pull

As rockets descent rate increases the altitude decreases, if the altitude decreases then the goal descent rate of the rocket also decreases, which in turn increases the throttle setting of the rocket. Increase in throttle setting also increases the fuel burn rate of the rocket. If the fuel-burn rate increases then the remaining rocket fuel decreases. Which in turn decreases the rocket mass. If the rocket’s mass decreases, upward acceleration from the rocket engine increases. Which in turn decrease the rockets decent rate.   

R1: Effect of gravity

If descent rate of rocket increase then rocket gets closer and closer to the earth decreasing the altitude. Due to which earth’s gravity pull on rocket gets stronger and rocket’s downward acceleration increases. Which in turn also increase the descent rate of rocket. 

• Delay: There might be some delay between fuel burn rate setting of the rocket and thrust from the rocket burn. It might take some time (not much but some) for rocket engine to burn the fuel and effect the rocket thrust setting.
  
  

Behavior of the system at different times through the flight.  

1. I think B3 and B6 loops will help in determining the flight of the rocket early in the flight, because in early stages of rocket descending towards earth rockets engine and earths gravity will do most the work.
2. Loop R1, B2, B4 and B1 will dominate in final seconds of the flight of the rocket, because by now rocket will be close to the earth. Which means rocket will be effected by lots of variables like gravity, air density, air resistance on the rocket and downward acceleration from gravity stronger than before. 

Use of Solar power

There is a sudden awareness among the common masses regarding the ill effects of abusing our natural resources with the rise in global temperatures all around the world and the effects of Global warming being felt. High levels of pollution caused by fossil fuels can no longer be ignored. There is a huge demand for clean and renewable sources of energy. Also, people have become more aware about the various alternatives of energy.

Even with such high levels of awareness and the easy availability of technology, the consumption of clean energy such as solar power has not increased to significant levels. Human dependence on fossil fuels is still very high, and it is predicted that it will take few more decades before humans can wean off fossil fuels. But why is the adoption of solar power so difficult? The reason is related to the cost associated with solar power.

People slowly started using Solar Power as an alternative to fossil fuels as a method to adopt clean and renewable source of energy to replace fossil fuels and in turn reduce pollution. However, the unintended consequence of adopting solar power is that it costs almost 6 times higher than power produced from fossil fuels. People slowly realized that due to high cost of power, their overall home expenses were rising, in-turn further increasing the public stress and outcry.

Mass Implementation of Solar Power

Issues with mass implementation of solar power plants.

Solar Power is one of the cleanest and greenest source of energy available to us. Solar power cleanly converts the Sun’s power into energy that we could use in our everyday life without any harmful emissions.

It is one of the most abundant sources of energy. Only a small fraction of the entire solar power output strikes the Earth, but even that output is sufficient to power more than 10,000 times our current energy demands.

Hence not only is solar power clean but it is also abundantly available on earth. According to National Academy of Engineering, the share of solar power in the total energy market remains rather small, well below 1 percent of total energy consumption, compared with roughly 85 percent from oil, natural gas, and coal. Why isn’t such a clean and abundant source of energy not harnessed by mankind and why are we still dependant upon non-renewable source of energy like fossil fuels to meet all the energy demands?

Solar Power is one of the fastest growing renewable source of energy. According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, more solar panels were installed in the third quarter of 2011 than in all of 2009 combined. Even though solar power is growing at a rapid pace in the United States, there are various problems associated with the mass implementation of Solar Power.

Variables that should be tracked over time

• Contribution of Solar Power to the total Power demand
• Growth in number of solar plants around the world over the years
• Cost efficiency study of those plants as compared to plants based on coal or other resources.

Projected contribution of Solar Power

It is estimated that the contribution of Solar Power towards the total energy production is expected to grow by leaps and bounds, and it is estimated to overtake fossil fuel demand by the year 2080.

Following are the problems associated with implementation of Solar Power

Hard Elements associated with implementation of Solar Power

1. Efficiency
Most of the Solar Panels present today are made from Silicon. Silicon can convert sunlight into electricity with an efficiency of around 10-20%, although recent technology has increased this number slightly. However, the biggest shortfall in using silicon for solar panels is that there is a theoretical maximum of 31% which we can achieve. Hence only 31% of sunlight falling on the panels can be effectively converted into usable electricity.

2. Manufacturing cost
Solar panel are currently manufactured mainly from Silicon. These silicon based solar panel are extremely expensive to manufacture. Intense research and various government subsidies have significantly brought down the cost of Solar Panels over the past decade, however the largest cost of using solar power is the initial setup cost. The power generated from the solar panels is roughly 3 to 6 times higher in value than the current price of electricity obtained from fossil fuels.

3. Storage cost
Even after discovering cheap ways to manufacture solar panels, one of the major barriers to widespread use of sun’s energy is the need for storage. Even though Sun is abundantly found all over the Earth, cloudy weather and nighttime darkness cannot provide us with uninterrupted source of solar power. Hence Solar Power needs to be stored for times when sun is not present in the sky, which increases the cost of Solar Power.

Soft Elements associated with implementation of Solar Power

1. Social acceptance of high energy cost
As we have mentioned above, the cost of power generated from solar panels is roughly 3 to 6 times higher than the current prices. Hence the acceptance of solar power by everyone as a single source of energy is difficult. Everyone wants a cheap source of power and paying extra just to obtain clean and a green source of energy is not acceptable by most.

2. Political backing
Assisted by continual support of the government and years of subsidies, the cost of solar power has fallen sharply over the years. But the solar power companies are unable to stay truly competitive and keep creating jobs without few more years of government support. Hence continued government support is one of the reasons that solar power is even a bit competitive as compared to other fuels. Without this political backing, solar power is still not cost effective for mass implementation.


Conclusion

As observed above there are a lot of engineering challenges associated with the mass implementation of Solar Power. There is an immediate need of developing better engineered materials for the manufacturing of solar panels. There are a few dyes, and nano-particles which are capable of giving almost 70-80% of theoretical efficiency than the current widely used material silicon which give only 31% theoretical efficiency . However, none of these nanoparticles have been mass manufactured. Also, various efficient ways need to be developed to store the power from solar panels in various photovoltaic cells.

The United States accounted for $1.6 billion of the world’s $29 billion market for solar panels; California is by far the leading solar state. Still United states is lagging behind countries like Germany and China in Solar Power.

The Desert sunlight solar farm is a 550 MW solar power plant under construction in Riverside County, California, that will use thin-film solar photovoltaic modules. Gujarat Solar Park, a group of solar farms at various locations in the Gujarat state of India, with overall capacity of 690 MW.

Hence the future for Solar Power looks bright, but there are yet a lot of engineering and technical challenges to be achieved before a successful mass implementation of Solar Power is accomplished.

HELLO!

Hello Everyone!!