Nathan Lewis Lecture Reflection

I thought that Nathan Lewis's lecture was very structured and constructed very well. At first I didn't understand why he was talking so much about coal and how it was so abundant and cheap. Then he made it explicitly clear when he got into his counter argument that we cannot depend on this source forever.

From Nathans lecture, he reconfirmed my belief that solar energy/power is the way to go. I only have one question. Why didn't we discover this (solar energy) was the most resourceful and beneficial power source ever? Why didn't we find some way to harness this energy a long time ago? For being such a beneficial source, I would think some one would think to harness this energy.

Seriously solar is the way to go. There is no carbon emissions and we can power all of our utilities forever. I wonder if there is a way we can some how record how the plants convert sunlight into energy and mimic them. If we can do this, we will then be able to create photovoltaic paint for houses which would take a huge chunk out of energy bills.