Solar roads

Economical strain.The solar highways industry is an economic strain and it has even been proven by many people that no matter how much money you put into the program it still fails. According to Investors Business Dailey, "Three years ago, when Obama's Department of Energy started approving roughly $16 billion in federal loan guarantees for solar energy companies, the DOE agreed to put taxpayers' money behind startups that were working on ways to make solar panels cheaper. Two, Solyndra and Abound, have now gone belly-up." (http://news.investors.com...) We also know that the US is starting to come out of an recession, but we can't go around throughing away money like that. Especially since the the companies of which we are currently funding for this program have gone bankrupt even with the lump sum of money the project is getting. How much would a solar highways system cost you may ask. Well according to Brusaw (the man who invented the solar highways) stated that it would cost $4.4 million per mile of road. http://www.cnn.com... to make things even worse he even stated that there is a high possibility that it will be a failure! http://www.treehugger.com...But if you think that's bad you should see how they're made and the effect on the envirnment. which brings me to my next contention (sorry I have to use debate cards on this contention because I have to hurry) Jellyfish overfishing hurts the economy. ____Jellyfish Proteins are the cheapest solar cell for solar panels. Energymatters.com 10 (Energymatters.com, written September 10th, 2010, http://www.energymatters.com.au..., accessed October 10th, 2012, AL) As the world switches on to solar power more than ever before, a Swedish research team has come up with a novel solution to comparatively high cost of producing silicon-based solar photovoltaic cells. A research team headed by Zackary Chiragwandi at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg have isolated the protein that makes the bioluminescent jellyfish Aequorea victoria glow in the dark; and by placing it between two electrodes, the team have been able to produce solar energy from animal matter. The method is quite complex, but biologically amazing: the green fluorescent protein (GFP) is placed on a wafer of silicon dioxide between two aluminium electrodes. The protein then transforms itself into strands between the electrodes. When ultraviolet light is directed onto the electrodes the protein absorbs the photons and emits electrons, which flow through a circuit and produce electricity, effectively becoming a miniature photovoltaic cell. ____Solar Highways uses Solar cells in the solar panels Jacquot 07 (Jeremy Jacquot, PhD in Marine Science, written August 20th, 2007, http://www.treehugger.com..., accessed October 10th, 2012, AL) Brusaw theorized that paving the country's interstate highway system(which incidentally covers close to 1.7% of the nation's land surface) with glass panels that could collect and distribute solar energy would accomplish that goal. The solar cells would create enough energy to light the road at night, heat it in the winter and power buildings — each mile could supply as many as 500 homes, according to Brusaw. His system of roadways — which would consist of three superimposed layers— would contain a revised version of the nation's electric grid (complete with a distributed network of independent power sources) and a network of fiber optic cables for television and communication. In addition, a "smart" system would be able to reduce gridlock by reconfiguring travel lanes, warn drivers of impending construction, accidents or adverse weather events and even protect wildlife by keeping them off the road. ____Overfishing leads to Jellyfish boom. CBS 12 (CBS written April 10th, 2012, http://www.cbc.ca..., accessed October 10th, 2012, AL) Among the spineless creatures of the world, the Nomura’s jellyfish is a monster to be reckoned with. It’s the size of a refrigerator — imagine a Frigidaire Gallery Premiere rather than a hotel minibar — and can exceed 450 pounds. For decades the hulking medusa was rarely encountered in its stomping grounds, the Sea of Japan. Only three times during the entire 20th century did numbers of the Nomura’s swell to such gigantic proportions that they seriously clogged fishing nets. Then something changed. Since 2002, the population has exploded — in jelly parlance, bloomed — six times. In 2005, a particularly bad year, the Sea of Japan brimmed with as many as 20 billion of the bobbing bags of blubber, bludgeoning fisheries with 30 billion yen in losses. Why has the Nomura’s jellyfish become a recurring nightmare? The answer could portend trouble for the world’s oceans. In recent years, populations of several jellyfish species have made inroads at the expense of their main competitor — fish — in a number of regions, including the Yellow Sea, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Black Sea. Overfishing and deteriorating coastal water quality are chief suspects in the rise of jellies. _____Jellyfish population increase leads to collapse of Japanese fishing industry. Casey 12 (Michael Casey, author, written April 3rd, 2012, http://www.globalrp.org..., accessed October 11th, 2012, AL) Over fishing has also contributed to the current problem, the increased demand for fish and advancement in technology has encouraged over fishing, over fishing has resulted into a decrease in the number of jelly fish predators, this has resulted into an increase in the number of jelly fish given that the factors that control their population is depleted. The other reason why over fishing has resulted into an increase in jelly fish population is due to the decline in species that depend on the microscopic plankton for food, this means that as over fishing increases fish that depend on microscopic plankton for food decline and this increases the food supply that increases jelly fish population. There are some economic consequences as a result of this increase in the number of jelly fish, they include Japanese industry revenue losses, unemployment, endangers fishermen and beach goers and a decline in fish prices. Opponent's flawsI would like to point out a few flaws before I turn the reins back over to him. Firstly he states that Solar Power doesn't create pollution. Well he is incorrect. According to Envirnmental impact. The Solar Power impact on the world is a 52.38 which to put in perspective of everything else: Wind- 8.55 and Hydro- .49 http://envimpact.org... you can see right off the bat that solar power produces way more pollution than the other uses of clean energy. Plus it's going to take tons of energy to remove the existing roads and put in the solar roads. Here's some more scarey facts for you. Did you know that solar panels are actually deadly? It uses NF3 which if it escapes into the atmosphere it can be truely deadly. NF3 warms the atmosphere 17000 times more than CO2. Now how are we going to fix the envirnment with something that bad. http://www.renewableenergygeek.ca... you have the solar power gives humans radiation posioning which leads to cancer.ConclusionSo we can see here that Solar Roads are dangerous since they cause cancer and hurt the envirnment more than CO2 by 17000 times! Now if we do this plan which will kill the ecosystem, kill the envirnment, and it will hurt our economy and sink the US back into a recession.