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Ellis Abel Learns.

In my own words · Smyth County, VA

Why I love the sun

The last of four gold solar array wings is lowered into place on the Orion spacecraft's European Service Module. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Solar Power" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.
The last of four gold solar array wings is lowered into place on the Orion spacecraft's European Service Module. NASA · Public domain
  • Sunlight goes in and electricity comes out.
  • There are no moving parts at all.
  • The fuel is free and it shows up every morning.

You can love the sun in Smyth County.

What it really is

A solar cell turns light straight into electric current, with nothing spinning.

Three things to try today

  1. Find a solar calculator or garden light and cover it.
  2. Uncover it slowly and watch.
  3. Count how long it takes to work again.
A technician holds a light rig against an Orion solar array wing panel during an illumination test. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Solar Power" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.
A technician holds a light rig against an Orion solar array wing panel during an illumination test. NASA · Public domain

For the grown-up reading this

A child in Smyth County, VA who loves the sun is not unusual. A child in Smyth County, VA who is told that loving the sun is unusual — that is the problem. Smyth County is one of 134 counties in Virginia.

No moving parts is the astonishing fact. Every other generator on earth spins something.

If the kid who loves this is a girl

Read what one popular teacher said to one little girl who took out the classroom trash without being asked — and what that girl did with the rest of her life.

Girls are great at math — Smyth County, VA →

Love something else too

Two large gantry 3D printers extrude curved concrete walls of subscale habitat structures side by side at NASA's 3D-Printed Habitat Challenge. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love 3D Printing" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love 3D printersPale rock outcroppings breaking through prairie grass in Big Cypress National Preserve. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Geology" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love the earthCylindrical rock cores laid out in trays at the USGS Core Research Center, showing bands of different rock layers. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Rocks" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love rocksThree orange lava fountains jet more than 100 feet above the fissure 8 cone during the 2018 Kilauea eruption. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Volcanoes" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love volcanoesA jagged crack running across desert ground with a yellow tape measure stretched over it, marking surface rupture from the 2019 Searles Valley earthquake. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Earthquakes" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love earthquakesHundreds of dinosaur bones still embedded in the tilted rock wall inside the Dinosaur Quarry building at Dinosaur National Monument. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Fossils" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love fossilsThe historic quarry building at Dinosaur National Monument, built over steeply tilted Jurassic rock layers that hold a dinosaur bone bed. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Dinosaurs" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love dinosaursHurricane Juliette photographed from the Terra satellite as a huge white spiral of cloud with a clear eye at its centre. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Weather" page — read by families in Smyth County, VA.Why I love weather

Near Smyth County

Why I love the sun, everywhere in the US · All things to love · STEM jobs you could do · Summer camps in Smyth County