As far as the solar part goes most cars have about 12 square feet of surface in the sun when the car is in the sun. 12 square feet can produce 900 watts. In four hours that would be 2700 Watt hours. A gallon of gasoline is about 37,000 Watt hours. What means is is that it is going to take over 100 days to produce the energy of one gallon of gasoline and everything has to be perfect.

Solar panels lose 40% of the energy from the sun as heat loss. If instead you used solar collectors to directly heat the water you use in your home you would save more money and energy. Solar Collector systems are much cheaper. Why convert the suns energy to electricity only to turn around an convert it to heat again to warm your water?

Photoelectric Solar panels are very expensive to produce money-wise, and energy-wise. With current technology the amount of energy that is used to produce a photoelectric panel is MORE than the amount of energy it will ever produce. The quality of Silicon Crystal required does not occur naturally and the process that it takes to produce it is very energy intensive. ( 2100-2300 degree C temps are required ) Photoelectric power has the perception of being "green" but only if you leave the production process out of the equation.

as for the money side, you might be able to come out ahead if you can buy the panels outright and recieve a tax break. Then if you live in a very sunny area, the more direct sunlight you get the more benefit you recieve.

To explain further, I would imagine that solar energy is built up to be one big energy in normal circumstances. (For lack of better way to explain.) However, would it be possible to store a certain amount of solar energy, then take some more energy from the sun and somehow take that energy and use it to increase the energy of the previously stored energy? And on and on until it’s being magnified in large amounts as you collect small amounts of energy and magnify the energy you continue to store? ….

It’s hard to explain! But I’m wondering if anyone knows if this is at all possible?

You can magnify the sunlight on its way to a solar collector or photovoltaic cell. This would let you benefit more from the cost of the device. You can accumulate the heat from a solar collector to keep heating water to higher temperatures (within limits). You can accumulate the electricity from a photovoltaic cell in a battery. Plants accumulate the carbohydrates they produce using photosynthesis.

We don’t have a practical way to store sunlight. Combining energy to produce more energy than you started with violates laws of conservation of energy.

Solar Energy
Light from the sun are discrete packet of energy. When the light shone on the solar panal which is a p-n semiconductor, electrons are excited by the sunlight, producing an electron-hole pair. these electron-holes pair will den act as a charge carrier conducting electricity. When potential difference is applied, the charge carriers will flow in a specific direction generating electricity and hence power.

Hope this helps

solar power: energy from the sun that is converted into thermal or electrical energy

So yes, both solar energy and solar power is the same in definition.

solar power: energy from the sun that is converted into thermal or electrical energy

So yes, both solar energy and solar power is the same in definition.