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Pour-In-Place Solar Cells
ianchaos writes: "According to an article in New Scientist, solar cells that 'self assemble' from a liquid have been developed by scientists at the University of Cambridge. The breakthrough could make it cheap and easy to cover large areas, like roofs, with efficient, ultra-thin solar cell coatings. Now they just need to try coating clothes with the stuff to make the wearables more viable."
so much free power all over and we can't use it because of cost factors
that doesn't really make sense....
eh? 240 watta/sq. meter is a lot. either way, i believe that is on the very high end of possible energy capture, i.e. assuming a very very efficient panel. however, A)240 W/sq m means a small roof could provide 20kW or so, way more then a regular house needs. even assuming a low efficiency, the numbers are still pretty nice.
Yeah. And maybe 20 years or so from now when the technology moves out of the laboratory and into Home Depot, we'll see it powering peltier junction air conditioners.
Also, how do you collect the power from the solar cells? Anything capable of dumping 20kW of power would be ...troubling, since a paint-on coating isn't terrifically easy to which to make a low-resistance high-current connection. Anything less than a perfect connection to the surface would result in voltage drop due to the resistance of the connection. There would be a *lot* of heat.
B) you don't need batteries, just hook the system up to the power grid, and during the time you make more than you use, the power company pays you for the excess.Typically, electrical demand in a city increases as the sun sets. Batteries *would* be required, and current (and horizon) technology isn't especially efficient.
20kW of power, per house, trying to be put back into the grid would mean that all the pole transformers and stuff would have to be retrofitted for it. Much of the grid in my area was installed over 40 years ago, and is unlikely to be changed in the near future - it's built to last.
Finally, household power is 60Hz (in North America) AC. Syncing the inverter to convert the DC from the solar cells into AC with the grid is a non-trivial exercise. If the power from the grid and the power from the inverter are off by even one degree in phase, bizarre problems which would look like a lagging load (power factor) issue will ensue. Very nasty.
I see something like this as, in the future, being a great way to power air conditioners on sunny days (but what about hot and cloudy days) but beyond that, I think it's a neat idea that will remain essentially impractical.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
Oh yah Baby... FP I've been searching for patents that show the comstruction method of cells for a while now to build my own. Maybe we dont need to buil them just pour them. I live in FL and it always erks me to see so much free power all over and we can't use it because of cost factors.
Not exactly... the 34% quoted is the "external quantum efficiency" which I assume refers to the ratio of input photons to output electrons or something similar. On page 1122 of the article it reads, "The power efficiency maximum was 1.95% at 490 nm." This, naturally, doesn't really cut the mustard in comparison with silicon cells. ------------
The article said they found a *peak* efficiency of 34%, so that's a maximum value, not an average value. Some piece of the cell was 34% efficient; they now have to figure out how to make the rest of it approach that level of efficiency (and hopefully, in the spirit of science, why it's that effiecient).
I was essentially trying to make the same point as you. Somebody made a huge leap from this article to "The breakthrough could make it cheap and easy to cover large areas, like roofs, with efficient, ultra-thin solar cell coatings." It doesn't sound like the application method is cheap or easy. Rooftop solar cells are still a long way off.
WebGuyCS
Anyone intersted in going solar should check out this product from Unisolar. It's about the cheapest I've seen yet. If I've done the math right you could roof a decent sized house with these for about $5000.
If solar panels and storage technology continues to become cheeper and more availiable to the masses then (I assume) solar power usage will also become more popular.
If the power companies don't support pumping power back to the grid they risk pushing more people towards independent power storage.
A customer who makes and stores their own power is no longer a customer and this doesn't seem like a sustainable business model.
Power storage technology has always been a bit klunky, expensive and annoying, especially in the large quantities required for residential use.
Solar panel technology on the other hand seems to be getting more efficient, reliable and cheeper at a much faster rate.
If the above trend continues to hold then electricity companies will probably have no choice but to change from simply supplying power to the large scale storage and distribution of power.
Residential property could be largely power independent, supplying the excess to the grid and getting paid to do so. While industries ( eg: the local 'water electrolysis plant' AKA 'hydrogen factory' ) and residents ( eg: old apartments ) unable to use solar power will be dependent on the grid.
The electricity companies primary function could be to maintain massive power storage facilities and distribution systems rather than actually making power.
Suitable surface area will become nice solar investment property.
Will this start a new environmental issue? clearing land for solar power? (how would Greenpeace comment on this?)
The power companies might be able to save substantial amounts of money buying solar power rather than producing power because residents maintain and upgrade their own solar
power systems.
This could have some amazing consequences:
If massive power storage proves to be a bit tricky, electricity companies around the globe could cooperate to exchange power throughout the day/night cycle.
At the moment everyone is laughing at the music industry since the advent of 'file sharing'. Will there be a parallel situation with 'power sharing'?
But this is all based on theory and conjecture with ample influence from my opinions, hopes and biases.
My assumptions are also based on a nice linear technology development curve which is probably inherently flawed.
I don't pretend to know what will be invented next. Maybe in the not-too-distant future we will have bar fridge sized free electricity producing devices based on gravity impulse technology? Maybe we will slowly poison earth with carbondioxide and toxic chemicals. Maybe bacteria will evolve to the point they can use electricity for their cellular metabolism and humankind will be crippled by the 'great plague of the power bugs'.
No one knows, but everyone gets to find out..
sponge
however, A)240 W/sq m means a small roof could provide 20kW or so, way more then a regular house needs. even assuming a low efficiency, the numbers are still pretty nice.
B) you don't need batteries, just hook the system up to the power grid, and during the time you make more than you use, the power company pays you for the excess.
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Is this the MPAA? Is this the RIAA? Is this the DMCA? I thought it was the USA!
rant complete
I'm more impressed by some of the other research being done in this area, such as the German scientists who are developing solar fabric. Maybe solar-powered textiles will finally explain 7of9's shiny wardrobe.
My deviantArt site
With its low efficiency, this type of solar cell will have very few uses. And solar power is nearly useless as a large-scale energy source: even in the sunny southwest desert, the average power one can collect with solar power is no more than 240 watts per square meter. No matter how cheap the solar collectors are, much of the cost of solar power would take the form of batteries used to keep the energy coming while the sun isn't shining.
And Carthage must be destroyed.
I want to see them spin the buildings around to put this coating on them. That would be way cool!
Honestly, is this really practical? I'm not sure this qualifies as a breakthough quite yet. Call me when then create a high effeciency solar cell that can be poured out of a bucket onto the roof on a jobsite.
WebGuyCS
I hope that these cells become viable in the next few years, for as high as Arizona Public Service is with its electric service, I'd be more than happy to install something like this. It would pay for itself so quickly in the summer (when we have rain 5 days out of 90) that my electric bill could drop from $140 to $50 or somesuch.
IBM had PL/1, with syntax worse than JOSS,
And everywhere the language went, it was a total loss...
They should add hot grits. The only problem is finding a way to get enough sunlight into your pants after you pour it.
They said that they needed to work to improve the efficiency to make it viable, and that is simply not something that would be true if it were 34%. There's very little improvement even possible at that level of efficiency.
However, cells that can be poured on and installed locally would be a huge boon if they can make that work.
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation