Final Essay

Carbon is the rudimentary building block of life. On land, plants remove carbon from the atmosphere through photosynthesis. Animals eat plants and either breath out the carbon, or it moves up the food chain. When plants and animals die and decay, they transfer carbon back to the soil. (Carbon Emission, 2015). The ocean holds large amounts of carbon, 50 times more than the amount found in the atmosphere. The ocean is sometimes called a carbon sink, meaning that it absorbs carbon from the atmosphere. It takes up carbon through physical and biological processes. At the ocean’s surface, carbon dioxide from the atmosphere dissolves into the water. Tiny marine plants called phytoplankton use this carbon dioxide for photosynthesis (Sea Basin, 2015).

Greenhouse gases act like a blanket, and trap heat in the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas (Climate change, 2015). In the past 20 years, humans have increased atmospheric carbon dioxide by more than 30%, by burning fossil-fuels and cutting down forests. The Earth has not experienced carbon dioxide levels this high for the past several million years (Carbon Levels, 2015). Researchers are learning that future climate change will depend on carbon levels in the land, atmosphere, and sea, and how these levels respond to human disturbance (Carbon in the Economy, 2015). Solar panels are an efficient way as to reducing the amount of carbon produced, as solar panels use energy from the sun to create electricity, not energy from burning fossil fuels that creates carbon

One solar panel is made up of many small solar cells. Each of these cells uses light to make electrons move (Making of Solar Panels, 2015). The cell is made up of two different layers that are stuck together. They are covered with a heavy duty piece of glass and framed using an aluminium frame. On the back of a solar panel are two leads. These leads are used to connect individual solar panels together to form an array of solar panels which are connected to the solar inverter (Solar Panels- Broken Down, 2015). The first layer of the cell is loaded with electrons, so that electrons are ready to jump from this layer to the second layer. The second layer has some electrons removed, so it is ready to take in more electrons. When the light hits an electron in the first layer, it jumps to the second layer. That electron makes another electron move, which makes another electron move, and so on (Solar Panels Learning, 2015).

This ongoing cycle is how solar energy is created. Solar panels help to solve the problem of the continuing carbon fall out, as in Australia the energy payback time for solar panels in terms of carbon consumption of the solar panel itself, was under 2 years. (International Energy Agency, 2015). When using solar panels the carbon based ‘fossil fuelled’ energy is not being used, therefore no carbon is being released into the