Working On Solar Cells That Will Print Like Newspaper

Investing in solar power still has a long enough economic break-even period to discourage more widespread investment. Creating less expensive and more efficient soalr panels is a key aspectof making solar power more universal.

Alternative Energy News reports:

"It is believed that solar cells could soon be produced more cheaply using nanoparticle “inks”. These nanoparticles can help in printing solar cells like newspaper or painted onto the sides of buildings or rooftops to absorb electricity-producing sunlight. Brian Korgel along with his team is working on this low-cost, nanomaterial solution that can replace the current photovoltaics. Brian Korgel is a chemical engineer at University of Texas at Austin. He is quite hopeful that his new technique coupled with different manufacturing processes will lower the price of solar cells to one tenth

Korgel is utilizing the light-absorbing nanomaterials. Their specialty is that they are 10,000 times thinner than a strand of hair. Their microscopic size makes it possible to attain higher-efficiency devices. The inks could be printed on a roll-to-roll printing process. They can use a plastic substrate or stainless steel for printing. It seems that this type of ink could be used to paint a rooftop or building and it doesn’t look like a tall claim." See full article.

Roofs That Generate Electricity

Roof tops are a huge potential source of power and using solar roof "shingles" show great promise. Photo by Pam Owen RLEP.org

The Energy Harvesting Journal Reports:

"A transparent thin film barrier used to protect flat panel TVs from moisture could become the basis for flexible solar panels that would be installed on roofs like shingles. The flexible rooftop solar panels - called building-integrated photovoltaics, or BIPVs - could replace today's boxy solar panels that are made with rigid glass or silicon and mounted on thick metal frames. The flexible solar shingles would be less expensive to install than current panels and made to last 25 years.

'There's a lot of wasted space on rooftops that could actually be used to generate power,' said Mark Gross, a senior scientist at the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. 'Flexible solar panels could easily become integrated into the architecture of commercial buildings and homes. Solar panels have had limited success because they've been difficult and expensive to install."' See full article.

Solar Sahara: Massive Solar Proposal Could Power Europe.

There is a serious proposal to build a massive-scale solar power farm in the Sahara. How big? Imagine a plant that covers an area the size of Massachusetts. (Phot0: Eco13.net)

Examiner.com reports:

"The project being proposed by Desertec would not all be situated in one location, but scattered throughout politically stable countries. Promoters of the project claim that it could satisfy as much as 15 percent of the European Union’s power needs. This project is the brain child of multinational partnership organizations in the likes of TREC-( Trans-Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation), Eumena(European Union),The Club of Rome, and The Mediterranean and North Africa ." See full article

A $5 Box to Save the World?

Sometimes the most important inventions are the simplest. An inexpensive and amazingly simple box could improve the lives on hundreds of millions and reduce wood burning and habitat loss.

Myra Per-Lee at InventorsSpot.com reports:

"The device, which cost Bøhner $5 to make, would decrease pollution, deforestation, energy costs, and about 1.3 million deaths a year in Africa alone caused by wood-burning related respiratory illnesses. The life-saving estimate does not even include the number of deaths resulting from contaminated water.

The Kyoto Box is targeted to the three billion people who use firewood to cook. Estimates are that each family that uses wood-burning methods of cooking releases almost 2 tons of carbon dioxide per year into the atmosphere. The Kyoto Box consists of two cardboard boxes, one inside the other, insulated with straw or newspaper between them. The inside of the box is painted in black and the flaps of the boxes are covered in aluminum foil. A transparent layer of acrylic then covers the box. The stove can boil water and bake, but not fry, according to Bøhmer, as the temperature required to fry would burn the box." See full article.

Colorful Glass Will Improve Solar Efficiency

Technical teams at MIT are working on ways to improve solar panel efficiency by as much as 1,000%. Colored glass may hold part of the answer.

Alternative Energy News.Info reports:

"Scholars at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have found a way to trap maximum sunlight into solar panels and improve its much needed efficiency and take care of the esthetically inclined consumers who don’t want to see the same glass panel lining every rooftop in the area. This can be achieved by colored dyes mixed glass which can direct sunlight to the edge of the glass in a cost effective and practical way. The MIT researchers are using “solar concentrators” — an improved version over the 70s era. These solar concentrators can grab the solar light and keep it too. The concentrator can send the light at a much longer distance than past models have achieved, shooting the energy straight into solar cells along the glass’s edge. The solar concentrator can produce 10 times more energy than what current systems can provide — and, it can achieve it at a fraction of the price. The MIT team is optimistic that the products could become commercially available within the next three years." See full article.

New Module Concentrates Solar Power to "10 Suns"

A team has developed a module for homes and buildings that intensifies the power of the sun as a source of power.

Science Daily reports:

"This system has been developed by Daniel Chemisana, member of the research group in Agrometeorology and Energy for Environment, leaded by UdL lecturers Manel Ibáñez and Joan Ignasi Rosell.

This thermal-photovoltaic modular system has a solar concentration of 10 suns, that is, it only needs a tenth part of a standard system’s active surface to produce the same energy, be it electricity, heat, or both simultaneously. Besides the reduction in the surface of used solar cells and the cost reduction this implies, this new technology can generate cold by connecting a heat pump to the system." See full article.

Solar Light For World's Rural Poor

The 2 billion people in the world who lack electricity often burn kerosene for light and that puts 400 billion pounds of CO2 into the atmosphere. A new solar light can help.

Miller-McCune.com reports:

"But in a massive new study carried out in Gujarat, one of Western India's poorest states, hit hard by drought in recent years, researchers have proposed that solar photovoltaic lanterns could represent a solution for rural communities with insufficient lighting...... generating a solar energy equivalent greater than the country's total energy consumption. With India's large and growing population, solar lanterns, using the country's abundant sunlight, could be the cleanest and most practical energy alternative available." See full article.

New Solar Device Could Transform Impoverished Regions

A new solar device has the potential to improve the lives of people living in impoverished areas, -- cut out wood burning, disinfect water, provide light to see and heat to cook.

Worldchanging.com reports:

"The satellite dish-shaped SolSource, developed by U.S.-based nonprofit One Earth Designs, is elegant in its simplicity. Reflective nomadic tent material, stretched across a bamboo frame, concentrates sunlight from a large area inward toward a focal point where the user can place a pot stand for cooking, a thermoelectric device for generating electricity (at a lower cost than a photovoltaic panel), a heat module for heating the home, a solar water disinfector for treating drinking water, or a thermal battery for cooking after dark. These interchangeable parts are each about the size of a laptop computer, and the main platform is easily folded and disassembled for portability." See full article.

Inexpensive Magnifying Glasses for Solar Panels

There are many ways that have been developed for concentrating and intensifying light on solar panels. A new inexpensive technology could significantly ramp up the efficiency of traditional solar panels.

PopSci.com repports:

"The next frontier in traditional solar panels is concentrators - devices, usually lenses, that concentrate solar power onto the most expensive part of a solar panel - the silicon. Skyline Solar's "solar trough" design concentrates sunlight without using expensive lenses or complicated robotic armatures for tracking the sun as it crosses the sky. The entire system is built from commodity parts in an effort to make it cheap and scalable – the ultimate goal being 'grid parity,' or a system that is competitive with fossil fuels as a means of generating electricity." See full article.

New Florida City to Run on Solar

Florida has a rapidly growing population and a need to keep a serious eye on see level rise. A new city being developed there wouldbe fueled by sun power.

Physorg.com reports

"The new city is being developed by Kitson & Partners on 17,000 acres northeast of Fort Myers. The city will include the world's largest photovoltaic power plant, which will be operated by Florida Power & Light.

The concept behind this 75-megawatt solar generator is that it will produce more power for the state's electric grid while the sun shines than the city will use in 24 hours. For the evening and night time hours, Babcock Ranch will have to rely on conventional power sources but its net effect will be a solar power city. FPL estimates the Babcock Ranch solar facility will cost about $300 million and sit on 350 acres within the development." See full article.

See-through Solar Cells for Windows

Remember those large solar panels on people's roofs? New technology is evolving that will make the roofs themselves and the windows of the home into no-carbon energy generators.

CNet News reports that:

"Solar company Konarka has developed a transparent solar cell that it hopes will be built onto electricity-generating windows. Under its Arch Active Solar Glass development, the company has built prototypes of windows with the solar cells between two panes of glass. The photovoltaic cells can be tinted different colors.

"It is energy-efficient and transparent with superior vertical performance and a subtle red, blue or green aesthetic. With these features, BIPV (building-integrated photovoltaics) will no longer need to be confined to spandrel or overhead applications," says CEO Leon Silverstein" See full article.

Solar Panels In Space

Here is some interesting techno-thinking:

The fact that greenhouse gases capture the sun's refected heat as it drifts back to space and warms Planet Earth has gotten people thinking about ways to intercept the sun as it enters the atmosphere. Sometimes this is to block its rays and sometimes its to beam the captured energy down in a more concetrated form.

Discovery Magazine reports:

"By 2016, the energy powering some California homes may come from solar panels orbiting the planet. California’s largest electric utility has announced plans to purchase energy from Solaren Corp., a startup company that hopes to launch the first commercial test of space solar power. Solaren would generate the power using solar panels in Earth orbit and convert it to radio-frequency transmissions that would be beamed down to a receiving station in Fresno…."" See Full Article