GRE写作素材Section Two: Science and Technolo_GRE写作

GRE写作素材Section Two: Science and Technolo

　　Labor Department figures show that productivity in the services sector where electronic equipment should have maximum impact and which employs nearly three quarters of all American workers is scarcely above levels in the mid-1970s, chiefly because of problems understanding and adapting to new technology.

　　3. Solar Energy

　　Solar power was an exotic new technology when John Schaeffer graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1972 and helped start a primitive commune in the woods in northern California. He was a tinkerer, and in his spare time he managed to rig up a solar-powered television set so he wouldn t have to miss his favorite shows. Soon Schaeffer was selling solar panels to his fellow urban refugees. Today Schaeffer s beard has become a white goatee, and his Real Goods Trading Company has blossomed into a catalog operation that is the country s largest retailer of home solar equipment. With a circulation of 400,000, the catalog offers everything for the energy-efficient home. The growth of Real Goods sales have jumped from $29,000 in 1986 to $10 million in 1933 is a small but sharp tremor along the shifting tectonic plates of America s energy landscape.

　　Until now, solar energy has appealed mostly to affluent homeowners and the save-the-environment folks. That s because buying and installing solar equipment can cost $15,000 for an average-size home before any currents starts to flow. What s making solar energy so hot? For one thing, the technology is getting better and cheaper. The price of the photovoltaic cells that convert sunlight to electricity has fallen sharply from $500 a watt in the 1960s to about $4 today.