Our lack of will to fully exploit the sun’s power for our energy uses has always stunned me. I understand that wind patterns vary, but that sun is always hot (and will only get hotter). It seems like in addition to harnessing the potential on Earth, we could situate structures in space that could relay power to us.

In India, those who weren’t affected by the recent mass power outage because they’re not even hooked to the grid, are harnessing solar for their basic needs. From Vikas Bajaj at the India Ink blog at the New York Times:

“The Energy and Resources Institute, or T.E.R.I., along with others, has been working on a model to increase the use of solar lanterns in rural India. Though these devices are incredibly simple to understand – a solar panel charges them during the day so they can be used at night – they are still too expensive for many. (Basic lanterns cost as little $5, but hardy and more useful models can cost as much as $80.)

T.E.R.I., which is based in New Delhi, is trying to make these lanterns more affordable by making them available for rent for durations as short as one night. The institute’s ‘Lighting a Billion Lives‘ campaign does this on a franchise model.

‘You train one woman in the village,’ said Rajendra K. Pachauri, the institute’s director general. ‘She charges all the lanterns during the day, and she rents them out at night.’

So far, the campaign has reached 1,488 villages in 22 Indian states, according to its Web site. But Mr. Pachauri, who is also the chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, told me this week that this and other similar ideas have significant potential to bring electricity to many millions of people.”