With the inflating oil prices, the other optimal and viable alternative suggested is : “ Solar power” which though was once considered as a minor power source compared to mighty oil.

Comparing oil and solar energies

There was tremendous industrial revolution when we were able to find the power of oil and coal. And after the solar cells discovered in 1950s, the quest for more and more energy at cheaper rates is still going on!!

The very obvious advantage of solar power is that you don’t have to pay for it and the power of solar, the sun, is free. It is freely available as a resource in every country, regardless of location, economic strength and so on since the sun shines everywhere. The entire process of translating sunlight into electricity or heating produces no greenhouse gases. This results in zero pollution and nil global warming.

Now considering oil, that has still more advantages over solar. The total cost of converting industry, vehicles and such to solar or any other power source would be huge. Another factor to be considered is that oil also has an advantage in that it is easier to use in a wide variety of applications, such as vehicles. One simply can't power a vehicle with solar power, not on a practical level.

If the area is large then certainly oil is still a superior choice to solar as energy resource. The technology simply does not exist to provide solar energy solutions for vehicles, national electrical grid systems and so on. Advancements in solar technology, however, may be changing this fact in the very near future.

Ongoing research is going on such as quantum dots, essentially microscopic solar panels that could exist in the paint on your home, may make oil a thing of the past.

Though presently oil is strength of power industry upon which our energy needs sit, but certainly in the next 5, 10 or 20 years, solar power is going to take over this with its USP’s ranging from zero expense and free availability!!