50 More Things That Made the Modern Economy

Things That Made the Modern Economy

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Inventions, ideas and innovations that have helped to create the modern economic world

Tim Harford introduces inventions, ideas and innovations that have helped to create the modern economic world

Things That Made the Modern Economy: Series 2: Solar Photovoltaics

Solar Photovoltaics

Series 2

BBC Radio 4 - Things That Made the Modern Economy, Series 2, Solar Photovoltaics

Solar power: an old technology now more advanced and disruptive to the oil energy order.

How quickly is solar photovoltaic energy becoming affordable? And how will the world change if, or when, the cheapest source of power is solar power?

Solar power is a very old technology: Socrates explained how to use it to heat a house, while the Romans, the Chinese, the Puebloans all used houses to be shady in summer while trapping sunlight in the winter. All very elegant: but in recent years, solar power has come to mean something altogether more technologically advanced and disruptive to the oil energy order. So just how quickly is solar photovoltaic energy becoming affordable? And how will the world change, asks Tim Harford, if, or when, the cheapest source of power is solar power?

Producer: Ben Crighton
Editor: Richard Vadon

Things That Made the Modern Economy: Series 2

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More inventions, ideas and innovations that helped to create the modern economic world.

More inventions, ideas and innovations that have helped to create the modern economic world.

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Things That Made the Modern Economy

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Solar Photovoltaics

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