A major solar energy breakthrough could possibly save the planet from global warming, climate change, and pollution – as well as create huge wealth and hopefully, reduced costs for all of us.

A startup company that has entrepreneur and billionaire Bill Gates as an early investor has achieved a major breakthrough in solar energy generation which could actually be instrumental in saving the earth.

Essentially,

“Heliogen, a clean energy company that emerged from stealth mode on Tuesday, said it has discovered a way to use artificial intelligence and a field of mirrors to reflect so much sunlight that it generates extreme heat above 1,000 degrees Celsius”.
“Heliogen uses computer vision software, automatic edge detection and other sophisticated technology to train a field of mirrors to reflect solar beams to one single spot”

So what? You and I may well ask. after all, Solar energy isn’t a new invention.
Well in this case, there’s a big difference compared to the way its been used in the past.
Apparently, they’ve built a solar oven that can reach temperatures 1/4 the heat of the Sun.
If I recall my school physics, the temperature at the surface of the Sun is about 10,000 Fahrenheit (5,600 degree’s Celsius) so that’s quite hot.
So what value is this to us, or how is that better or more important than what we had previously?
Well, this is a major game changer because it means that:

“for the first time, concentrated solar energy can be used to create the extreme heat required to make cement, steel, glass and other industrial processes. In other words, carbon-free sunlight can replace fossil fuels in a heavy carbon-emitting corner of the economy that has been untouched by the clean energy revolution”.

Cement, accounts for 7% of global CO2 emissions, but in the past concentrated solar couldn’t get temperatures hot enough to make cement and steel.

Heliogen’s founder and CEO, Bill Gross, told CNN Business,

“We are rolling out technology that can beat the price of fossil fuels and also not make the CO2 emissions, and that’s really the holy grail.”

While bBillionaire Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong, another investor said, “The potential to humankind is enormous. … The potential to business is unfathomable.”

To learn more visit the article source on CNN’s business site.