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New Solar Cells 20 Times Cheaper
handy_vandal writes "STMicroelectronics has announced a new generation of photocells made from organic plastics. Over a typical 20-year life span of a solar cell, a single produced watt should cost as little as $0.20, compared with the current $4. See also article @ cnn.com. On a related note, this article @ IEEE discusses new improved LED technology by the same team."
Eetimes.com.
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
That might shift the balance of power to sun-soaked states, right? At least if you couple it with fuel cells.
It's just a BloJJ
The mythical solar-powered flashlight becomes achievable!
Daniel
Carpe Diem
Consequently, although the "fuel" for a solar-powered generator is free sunlight, the overall cost of solar-generated electricity (amortized over the lifetime of the solar cell, typically 20 years) is around ten times higher than the cost of electricity generated by burning fossil fuels.
No wonder we still don't have widespread solar use. I had no idea it was this much more expensive to "buy" initially.
3 laptops and the other essentials (TV, etc) run me a quick $100/month bill in electricity. Must... get... solar..
--------
Free your mind.
Um, no. Dumbass.
FP!
yes!!!
time for that exoskelton, now i wont have to do any work at all! cheap solar power will allow my mind and my atrophied muscles to move!
We're like rats, in some experiment! -- George Costanza
Every year, it was going to put the power companies out of business. The last time I priced it in 1999, it was still too expensive. I hate to sound conspiritorial, but it sounds to me like someone is jiggling the switch. It is 2003. Why don't we have affordable solar power for home use?
If you aren't part of the solution, there is good money to be made prolonging the problem
Does the phrase "Organic Plastics" strike anyone else as exceedingly stupid?
"Get this! It's plastic... made from LONG CARBON CHAINS! BRILLIANT! Why did we never think of this before!?!"
Someone want to explain that to me? Aren't all plastics "organic"?
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
Wake me up when they start shipping a product.
I really shouldn't have used someone else's email address for this account.
This should make space probes, satellites, etc that use solar energy much cheaper.
Dr. Michael Gratzel (credited with pioneering the technology in the article) has a startup in Lowell, MA that has been working towards commercializing polymer based photovoltaics since 2001 called Konarka Technologies, and from what I understand from talking to them, they're almost done. I wonder if this involves some technology license, or if STMicro is going to beat Dr. Gratzel out the door with his own technology.
Excited.
Reading the article leaves you with a lot of "will, should, could" and no prototype.
And the $0.20 is a target to be reached, not an acheived goal.
What's Slashdot becoming, a free way to secure prior art against when companies actually has a patentable working model?
Grell
...when it gets down to fundamentals, do what you have to do and shed no tears. Dr. Matson in Tunnel in the Sky
to successfully set up and harness the power of the sun using solar cells would mean venturing out into the sun. what's a geek to do?
It's like a forcing yourself to drink some nasty cough syrup to make a cold go away.
See this company: http://www.spheralsolar.com/ their technology makes very cheap, very efficient, very flexible solar-cells... they are building a massive manufacturing facitliy as-we-type, they do small(er) runs currently in their original test/research facility.
this is one to watch.
This is not an announcement of any new solar cells. It's a press release detailing an advanced research program that STMicroelectronics hopes will eventually lead to cheap solar cells. RTFA whover posted this.
They mention that they're 10% effecient, as opposed to more expensive setups that are 15%-20%--I wonder if it means a much larger surface area will be needed in order to get much benefit out of it? Any solarheads (or whatever the group name is) have any thoughts on that?
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
The bad news: this is a link to goatse.
The good news: this idiot of a troll was so inept that he couldn't even make the link work right. You'll go to a 403 error on Yahoo's page rather than The Dreaded Site.
Consider yourself warned!
Power companies provide at about 15c per kilowatt-HOUR. What does 20c per watt mean ? Meaning running continuously 12 hrs a day for 20 years ? Watt is a power unit. Watt-hours is energy.
Salvo Coffa, who heads the free sunlight, the Graetzel of Technology, uses a given input of generating electricity (amortized over the field) needed to be of the Graetzel cell, a mixture of new solar cells have lower efficiencies (e.g. 10% instead of electricity generation methods such as the electrons), and conducting the environment, we have lower efficiencies (e.g. 10% instead of solar cell), a full organic materials have to be in nanotechnology to photosynthesis. In a mixture of the principle to produce solar cell, a liquid electrolytes that are too expensive to separate electrons (and electron-donor and holes), withstanding the mechanism that are exploring is developing low cost, high efficiency, the new solar cell technologies are much cheaper to compete more effectively with fossil fuels or reduce the electric power.
In a CO2-neutral company by conductive polymers. This could lead to the most important renewable energy sources. However, existing solar cells would dramatically change the lifetime of new technologies are potentially one of producing electric power.
The DSSC cell technologies are too expensive to further reductions in Catania and are mainly based in which is crucial for the ST plans to manufacture. "Although there is also developing low cost, high purity, which exploit the lifetime of semiconductor materials is around the world's leading manufacturers of the world for a nanoporous (high surface area) metal oxide layer to the world for a CO2-neutral company by 2010," says Dr. Salvo Coffa, who heads the essential functions, which the electrons, and Naples, Italy, is following two approaches.
One of the cell technology. The ability to compete more effectively with high material* costs.
Consequently, although the collecting contacts of the lifetime of this blend is much support around ten times higher than the cost of generating electricity generation methods such as silicon performs all three tasks simultaneously with fossil fuel sources," says Coffa.
"In addition to absorb the overall cost of the hole-transport function is free sunlight, the principle to compete with high efficiency, the highest efficiency solar cell performance because the mechanism that will eventually be in Catania and create electron-hole pairs, a single material must be in cost of the environment, we are developing low cost of generating electricity generation methods such as burning fossil fuels or reduce the cost per Watt, which is developing many new solar cells are absorbing sunlight into energy, where each function is around ten times higher than the solar cells would dramatically change the Swiss Federal Institute of very high efficiency (defined as silicon performs all three tasks simultaneously with high efficiency), the world's leading manufacturers of the semiconductor material such as burning fossil fuel sources," says Coffa. "In addition to produce solar cells have the cost of producing electric power."
In contrast, the electron-donor (and holes) to be a conventional means of an organic approach, in an advanced research team, based in an organic approach, in an intimate contact at distances below 10 nm. ST is much cheaper to compete commercially with fossil fuels.
Semiconductor-based solar energy produced for a solar-powered generator is therefore pursuing alternative approaches in cost per Watt, (which the cost of 15-20%) but there is sandwiched between two approaches. One of these, invented in nanotechnology to transport the lifetime of solar cell technology. The ST has made to the electric field needed to further reductions in cost per Watt, which is focusing on the development of generating electricity generated by Professor Michael Graetzel of this blend is the liquid electrolyte. "One of solar cell technology."
The research group that it to compete with conventional solar cells that is free carriers (electrons and electron-donor organic materials such as silicon and revolutionize the electron-acceptor and are developing many new solar power, existing
If you really want an ecologicly friendly source of power look into electric eels. Sure they're a bit slimey and would get you weird looks from airport customs, but for anyone looking for a macho ego boost, "Is that an eel in your pocket or are you just happy too see me?"
That's funny, it doesn't look like he has slanted eyes!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
I've lived off the grid for over 6 years now.
Even with existing prices, it is about as cheap to buy cheaper land in outlying areas and generate your own power as it is to pay a power company _and_ pay higher prices for land. The main problem is you have to have a fair degree of mechanical aptitude to keep one of these systems running reliably.
Cheap solar cells would open up quite a bit of land for human use that is accessible by road but has no power access. When you combine that with WiFi/sattellite access the infrastructure advantages of cities become far less pronounced.
"The new solar cells would even be able to compete with electricity generated by burning fossil fuels such as oil and gas, which costs about $0.40 per watt"
This is certainly excellent news. With oil reserves slowly running down and with countries that require 'liberation' slowly dwindling, we certainly need new cheap energy sources. It's great to see a product has been created that harnesses solar energy to the point that it could one day replace all need for fossil fuels. This is also have many positive ramifacations on the environment, making a lot of people happy.
Another large source of energy that has been largely untapped is geothermal energy, which is obtained through convering heat from the Earth into usable energy.
It really demonstrates the effect that these large oil corporations have on our world, when there are much better cleaner alternatives to fossil fuels, yet these are being ignored for the sake of the oil companies.
Doesn't $0.20/Watt seem expensive to anyone else? For one, I thought electricity was measured in Kilowatt-hours or watt-hours, and right now I'm paying probably $0.06 or so per Kilowatt-hour. Can anyone explain this to me?
Its currently vaporware of course. (And see my comment about cnn's story using 20c / watt which means nothing to me) But if it really becomes 1/2 cost of oil, sell your energy stocks and watch for middle east termoil.
Get a smaller car, you insensitive clod!
www.wavefront-av.com
Now I can wear a flashy solar cell scarf to power my MIThril jacket.
The Free Light by Avexa-Swisslight.
t s% 20main/free-light.htm
http://www.tadgear.com/x-treme%20gear/flashligh
Uses a rechargeable coin cell. 8 hours of sunlight = 2 hours of LED light.
Just imagine had we known about this before 9/18?
Solar cells generate power.
Power companies sell energy.
20 cents per Watt means that will buy you enough solar cell to generate one watt.
If you run it for 1 hour, you get 1 watt-hour.
Energy = Power x Time = Force x Displacement
Don't they teach physics anymore?
This technology has been progressing for several years, and was bound to happen eventually, but with the patent system the oil companies can and will but it out and lock it up for the next 20 years, in addition to new innovations that this technology might spawn.
Are they talking about the cost to make a cell with a constant output of 1 Watt, or do they really mean "kilowatt hour"? A Watt is a rate of consumption, not a quantity of energy.
Cool, right around the corner from work. It's nice to hear about startups in the area
wanted: one clever sig,apply within
Darn... I just bought a solar powered watch (Citizen Eco-drive) - which requires a few hours of office level light, several minutes under a bright lamp, or just a few minutes of direct sunlight, to recharge each day.
:-)
This article makes me wonder if a substantial amount of the price was because of the power cells (no silver or gold). I'm sure a watch doesn't need the best efficiency (15-20%) of the current pricy solar cells - 10% efficiency would mean my new watch needs about 30 minutes under a lamp rather than 15-20. Big deal. Of if I'm lazy, I'll stand in the sun for 5 minutes instead of 3.
Making solar power affordable, attractive and practical is the first step in converting to environmentally friendly sources of power. Cost effectiveness is a primary obstacle for new technologies, especially for the environmentally friendly. I guess the other would be defeating the entrenched monopolies that currently rely on oil and other natural resources.
Here's to a cleaner planet!
Cheers,
RC
RC
The price of existing commercial solar panels generally is compared in terms of dollars per maximum watt output. A 120W maximum output panel costs about $474 or $3.95/watt. That's the measure they're using in the article when they talk about $0.20/watt.
I heard of them when pieces of the ceiling started to fall on me when they started construction upstairs. :)
I don't work in that building anymore though.
They're talking about the end cost of a unit to the consumer. Current solar panels average $4 per ... ie. a 100 watt panel costs about $400 for me to buy.
wat to purchase
-Brad in sunny Tucson
At least one of the research approaches that was described was for making solar cells that were less efficient but much cheaper. For spacecraft, that can be a bad tradeoff, because you really care a lot about size and weight. Less efficient means that you need more surface area, so you need bigger panels, and the extra cost of launching bigger panels could quite easily outweigh the savings in the hardware cost of the solar cells.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Bush commented "We didn't just have a war for oil to have folks stop using it. Switching to Solar means the terrorists have won."
Body and subject
I, for one, welcome our new solar-powered overlords.
Welcome to our Sherwin-Williams Solar Panel Paint overlords.
Welcome to the avegarge bozo with a solar panel spray can overlord.
Welcome to...
Oh fuck it.
according to the article, they are achieving the gains, not by more efficient conversion of solar power into electricity, but by making the cells more inexpensive. they are about 1/2 as efficient as silicon-based solar cells. so if my math is correct, you would need twice as much surface area to generate the same power as a silicon cell - which may be fine for a rooftop, but i doubt this is acceptible for a space craft that is launched by a rocket - to keep the weight and size down, they use the most efficient cells possible.
I don't believe this story for a second. Not a bit.
For decades I have been folowing solar cell technology, absolutely salivating at the promises that efficiency rating would soon rise above 15%, or that costs would no longer be prohibitively expensive or damaging to the environment (moreso than more conventional, polluting alternatives).
Well, I've given up. I've read shitty pie-in-the-sky stories like this almost every year for the last 25-years.
Now, if someone on Slashdot tells me that they bought these +50% efficient solar cells in Home Depot, that's when I'll get excited. Like I'll get excited when Chevrolet markets a flying car or my city puts a nuclear fusion power plant into service.
It looks like not all power companies are the same.
I used to get my power at about $.10 a kilowatt-HOUR, plus all the regulatory add ons.
I recently switched to a time of use plant that, during the summer, charges $.08 off peak and $.31 on peak.
$.20 a kWH is double what I pay now, in California. Other states have much cheaper power.
And with my power company, I don't have to shell out $10k-$25k in up front costs.
This technology makes sense for people who are in remote areas, but not most people.
In order for it to become attractive, the price will have to get much closer to $.10 actual costs.
For about $30k, IIRC, you could get yourself a small gas turbine enging, http://www.capstoneturbine.com/ which runs on natural gas or a number of other fuels with fuel costs in the $.05 range or less.
Production costs for nuclear are in the sub $.03 per kWHrange, and most of the costs in that are fuel and labor.
This makes it look like they are announcing a new product or something. Actually, they are announcing an R&D program which they HOPE will reduce the cost of solar cells. Hardly headline news.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
The only way this makes sense is if you say equivalent solar panel will cost 40c per watt (and all the solar efficiency / 20 year amortization is hidden). But it is unclear that is what they mean or if they screwed up.
Deploy the solar cells and hook them up to racks of fuel cells. I remember from an article in the Financial Times back in 2000 of a British start-up that had the very idea... I believe on a large scale, this would make solar just as ideal as fossil fuels for electricity production, give or take some government interference (err, "incentives")...
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
The reason there isn't affordable solar power for home use is that there are no government subsidies for solar power at the level of subsidies for oil.
At $.20/watt, you have $200/kw. So if you want to break even, you have to run long enough to average $.15/hour, or 1333 1/3 hours. That's less than a year to break even.
At $4/watt, you need 20 times as long to break even, and you'll be lucky to have the system last that long.
hey jackass, not all games cost $49. in fact, the games that nintendo was bundling the gamecube with can all be had for less than that. so now you pay $99 and then spend between $20 and $49 on a game you actually want. but you are fucking stupid so you do not get it. it's okay, be a nintendo hater - it is fine. talk about someone who is dumb - you do not even know that the price of games vary.
But how are us vampires suppposed to get around if cars will only run in the daytime?
Jason
The main point of the approach by this company is not worrying about efficiency, but more about cost. 20% efficiency with silicon is expensive, but they're only shooting for 10-15% with this much cheaper approach.
So we're maybe getting cheaper cells... but we're getting less efficient ones. This really is going to take a long time before we can power our houses on the cheap.
J
I'm wondering about the same thing. My guess is that it costs 20 cents/watt in capital outlay. The article states that it costs 40 cents per watt for traditional plants. So I would guess that a 250 kW facility could be built for one hundred thousand dollars. This doesn't seem out of line, considering that they do this type of plant with a gas turbine on the back of a flatbed truck.
A typical home needs, IIRC, about 5kWh per day. Let's assume that, between rainy days and imperfectly aimed cells, we get the equiv. of 5 hours of full sun a day on these units. Lets also assume a peak load - Summertime afternoon with airconditioning on - of 1.5 kW. That requires about a $300. Figure another $2,000 for inverters, and some extra for miscellaneous. For about $3,000 you could have a zero electric bill in a "net" metering area.
Over a typical 20-year life span of a solar cell, a single produced watt should cost as little as $0.20, compared with the current $4.
A Watt is a unit of power (energy per unit time e.g 1 Watt = 1 Joule per second). So if the above statement is correct then it means that a solar panel that produces 1 kilowatt of power (i.e. 1 kilojoule per second) would cost $200. The "typical 20-year life span" stuff is a bit of a red herring. it just means you will need to fork out another $200 after about 20 years when the panel breaks. Of course you do need to know the typical lifespan to work out the cost per unit energy (usually quoted per kilowatt/hour for electricity). For the quoted numbers this comes out at about $0.003 per kilowatt/hour depending on how many daylight hours you can operate it for. Since average retail electricity prices in the US are on the order of $0.08 per kilowatt/hour this seems rather too good, so perhaps the above statement is incorrect, not just confusing?
So then what do they mean by:
"The new solar cells would even be able to compete with electricity generated by burning fossil fuels such as oil and gas, which costs about $0.40 per watt"
How many watts you get out $0.40 of gas depends on how fast you burn it. The person who wrote the article clearly couldn't handle the difference between power and energy (hence the "over the cells 20 year lifetime" explanation before the power price ratio of the new technology.)
Go back to the right fucking article, fucker. The poster was talking about a fucking brand new game. A specific game. I.E. Only available at one price. And the post was a pro-Nintendo post you fucking braindead fan boy. Eat a cock.
Well, they've not actually developed these cells yet, but here's why the need exists:
:) We'll call that the average because it won't usually put out 1W and yet it'll always produce at least some power. Therefore, said solar cell produces 8 Watt-hour's of energy each day.
Lets do the math.. We have $4 / watt for current generation solar cells which last 20 years..
Suppose that a "1 watt" solar cell can produce that 1 watt from 10am to 6pm each day (8 hours) in the average installation (unless you live in Pittsburgh or Seattle!
8Wh x 365 days x 20 years / (1000W / 1kW) = 58.4 kilowatt-hours during the lifespan of the cell.
$4 / 58.4 = $0.0685 / kWh
My local electric utility costs about $0.10 / kWh, making solar sound cheaper. However, the cost of the individual cells is only half the cost of a solar installation. Once you add in the cost of storage batteries, a charge controller, a high-efficiency DC->AC inverter, etc. now your solar installation is typically MORE expensive than the utility! And it's worse for the environment too with the silicon production chemicals, lead-acid batteries, etc. Yuck!
In contrast, if ST can even reach half their goal and produce $0.40 / watt cells, now we're looking at $0.00685 / kWh for the cells themselves. Even if battery storage technology is not improved by then, at least you can supplement your utility needs during the day at very minimal cost!
$0.20 is a bad target as todays $0.2 will only be worth $0.15 next year, with US economy doing not so good. It will be easier for them to achive a target of 0.2 Euros!
New year Resolution: Don't change sig this year
Amorphous silicon-on-glass cells also have lower production costs and lower efficiency than crystalline cells. They also have considerably shorter service life. I would expect that any polymeric material will also be degraded by UV exposure. I like the idea, but I can't be enthusiastic until they put real parts on the market, close to their price bogey, and show real-world reliability.
Actually, you pay a great deal more than that. You taxes are higher due to the government more or less subsidizing the production. Militaries cost money. Likewise, Energy companies get a number of breaks. For example, Owens && W. are making it dirt cheap to go after energy on Colorado land. Pretty soon, the same will be true of Alaska. Finally, we will need to redo the electriciy grid as any real maintenence has been held off every since deregulation took place.
. . .and I'm still not convinced it is - I think I speak for just about every person on the planet; FUCK OPEC, Fuck the oil companies, and FUCK the execs they placed in public office, and FUCK the SUV-driving rednecks who feel it's their patriotic duty to consume as much of a limited nonrenewable resource in THIS generation as humanly possible, if for no other reason than to prevent others from having it.
Of course, if it's not true, then I continue to stick my tongue up the above people's asses, like everybody else.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
The price comes from the Gee-Whiz Factor (TM).
Slashdotter are stupid and biased.
You pay for power over time, hence the Kilowatt-hour. 1000 watts for 1 hour = 1 watt for 1000 hours; it's the same thing.
Your $0.06 is probably more like $0.10+ after BS fees and other nonsense. More like $0.12 to $0.15 where I live. Let's assume $0.10. If you had a $0.20, 1 watt solar cell, and it gave you its full power for 12hrs/day, it would take 83 days for the full 1 kwh. After 166 days, you have 2 kwh for the same $0.20 it costs to buy from the power company. Every kwh after that is a bonus.
Well, with that said, how long you used the cell shouldn't effect the cost/watt it is the cost/watt-time that is going to change. If it lasts one second, you paid 20c for a watt. If it lasts 20 years you paid 20c for a watt. The original poster is correct, you need to know what the cost of the energy will be, I believe that was his point. If i have to buy a 20c, 1 watt cell, every 10 seconds, that is going to get prohibitively expensive.
Over a typical 20-year life span of a solar cell, a single produced watt should cost as little as $0.20, compared with the current $4.
Ok. I guess I'm stupid. My power bill says I get charged like $.10 per kilowatt hour (kwh.) This says a target of $.20 per produced watt. Someone want to score some karma and explain why this, if it happens, will be cheaper?
Some people have a way with words, and some people, um, thingy.
Well, finally some good news. If it will soon be possible to produce cheap solar cells this could mean a more distributed power base. If houses and businesses can generate most of the their electricity from solar cells on the roof the average consumer would no longer be dependent on the local power company. It remains to be seen if the current administration with its ties to the oil corporations would let this happen.
The CNN article does seem to confuse Watts and Watt-hours. CNN.com's science writers have always had a weak understanding of scientific concepts. In an article about the close approach of Mars they said "About every 26 months, the two planets pass relatively close to one another, during periods now known as opposition." What was it known as before??
The math says a $10,000 investment will repay in 3 years based on the 3% interest rate otherwise.
Now, its an act of God.
Bio-desiel burns in desiel engines with no modifications and achieves the same per litre efficiency. Hemp grows as a weed on six continents and is cheaper to make into diesel fuel than any crude oil deposits.
So if it costs $0.20 per watt over 20 years, then we're talking $0.20 for every 20 Watt-Years, which would be one cent per Watt-Year.
If there are approximately 8760 hours in a year, then we're talking $0.00000114 per Watt-Hour, or $0.00114 per KWh. That's preeetty cheap! Or is my math wrong?
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
"STMicroelectronics, one of the world's leading manufacturers of semiconductor devices, today released details of an advanced research program that it hopes will substantially reduce the cost of generating electricity from solar power."
They are announcing a research PROGRAM, not a new technology.
Sheesh...
-- This sig is only a test. If this were a real sig it would say something witty. --
It seems like solar power efficiency has been at about 10-20% for about forever now, and I thought I read somewhere that where purifiying the semiconductors will get you more efficient at a higher price, there was still a maximum amount you could get out of current designs or theories.
Is there some sort of theoretical limit we're hitting with current technologies, or are there different technologies that may have some promise? This article doesn't address efficiency, it just says they can make them cheaper than anybody else.
Any links or references would be appriciated.
If these are 10% efficient vs. 20% for silicon, doesn't that mean it requires double the area for the same number of watts produced? That's got to have a negative impact on some applications...
To quote the CNN Article:
So, the question is, did Reuters screw up, or is there an announcement that didn't make it to the STMicroelectronics page that was linked to in the body?
so perhaps the above statement is incorrect, not just confusing?
I, too, had a big problem with that statement when I first read it. After rereading it, I think the implication is that these cells degrade over time. Organic based products like OLED also have this problem so that MAY be what they are talking about here.
If the cells start out at 20% efficent and degrade to 0% efficent over 20 years that would make this statement correct. Either way, it is still confusing to the reader.
Prior art? Hell, I've got a science fiction short story (that has since ballooned into a full-length screenplay) that I began writing in 1995 that mentions solar panels installed along the freeway medians that use chlorophyll and copper as the photovoltaic.
Of course I came up with that because it sounded plausible (not that I really know any thing about the subject), and that both copper and chlorophyll reflect green (i.e. the solar panels look cool). Also the story was never published, although I did copyright the script when I submitted it to Project Greenlight.
Actually, I'm just tickled that something that I basically pulled out of my ass, turns out to have some basis in fact.
Besides, you can't copyright ideas. Thank God!
Moekandu
Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself; but talent instantly recognizes genius. -- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
they are using less efficent technologies to make the cells super cheap
they will turn 10% of the solor energy to electricity....so you will still need 2 times the number to get the same power as one high tech cell....
of course, it is still cheaper, but you end up with greater bulk.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
The real cost in solar power are the batteries to store the power in, a good AGM (advanced glass mat) battery that is rated at 220 Ahr is around $650 (CDN)
I want my Mr. Fusion!
This is not the sig line you are looking for... -- Old Jedi Sig Line Trick
How is this insightful? He didn't even RTFA. The article states that the solar cells are targeted to have a 10% efficiency.
"Here's the same artical @"
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
How is this insightful? He didn't even RTFA. The article states that the solar cells are targeted to have a 10% efficiency.
Sorry. I was so enraged by the story's claims that I may have lost my objectivism. Please consider it to be hyperbole.
Why do people insist on using this weird construction? In simple English "twenty times cheaper" means "95 percent cheaper." You use "times" when the cost of item A is more expensive than item B and a fraction (95%, 2/3 etc.) when it's cheaper.
Where did this thing come from? I suspect marketdroids are the culprits.
Insert witty sig here.
Just maybe they are measuring this in Watt/lifetime, meaning that it's 20 cents per watt no matter how long the lifetime is. That would be nice, and would make a 75 Watt solar pannel a more reasonable $15. But then the Over a typical 20-year life statement makes no sense at all.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
... and here we have the wonders of AC posting! Let's all join in shall we?
Repeat after me:
"Eat a cock, braindead fan boy" "Faggot" "fag" WHEEEEEEE!
Fine. And if the pannel lasts 20 years that is:
US$0.20/watt * 1000W/kW * 1/20yr * 1yr/365.25days * 1day/24 hours = US$0.0011/kW*hour.
Sure you have to factor in that it is not always noon, you might get clouds, the pannels might not last the full 20 years, etc. Let's say it really costs 10 times this much. That is still only 1.1 cents (US) per kilowatt hour! This doesn't seem realistic.
The red flag for me was that the cited price for fossil fuel was also stated in watts (US$ 0.40 / watt I think) but I can buy a solar pannel which, while it is operating, puts out 1 watt. Fossil fuels are consumable. All I can imagine is that they asked: how much oil would it take to generate one watt for 20 years? And they came up with US$ 0.40? That just can't be right. The price is far higher than that. That would mean a continuous feed of 10 kilowatts over 20 years would only cost $4000, or $17/month? At the cannonical figure of $0.10/kW*hr, it costs: $175000 or $730/month. Are they not accounting for costs of transportation or refining the crude oil? The number are off by a factor of 43 or so.
In summary, I am not really sure what the CNN article is trying to claim, and I have no idea what their numbers mean.
I have looked into solar and it can be cost effective but there is a large initial investment which you will earn back over a realatively long time (say 15 years). If they can decrease the costs of the pannels by 10x at the cost of 1/3 efficiency loss, that is a net gain of about a factor of 7.5 thus you are looking at making your money back in 2.5 years instead of 15 and loads of people will do it.
a war on terrorism? How can we end a war on a method?
Are these new solar cells less toxic? Existing top-o-the-line (before this, at least) solar cells only achieve around 30% efficiency and create a *lot* of nasty waste products in their prduction. The less efficient ones (10-15%) produce a lot less of these toxic wastes, but meh, 10% light conversion is piddly.
Sometimes, it seems hard to justify solar's use when the panels are just so damned toxic. I really hope that these are a lot better in that regard.
As a side note, my birthday is tommorow. M girlfriend, who always gives her presents to me a couple days early, has given me a badass solar charger for my Zaurus C760. Hell. yeah. Only way if it could be better is if I had one made out of these new fangled solar panels...
Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
It's GIR, a bastardization on "SIR" which was I *believe* "Storage and Information Retreival" unit. They made Gir outta garbage in the first episode and it was a joke... get it? Gir? "GARBAGE Information Retreival.."? :-) I just love Zim....don't take it as a personal flame man
Perhaps the United States govt. could spend just a tiny fraction of the hundreds of billions of dollars it is throwing at the oil companies, on some serious R&D into clean energy...Meh.
The Welkin: Online Music Reviews
I'm glad I live in a state where the infrastructure (distribution system) is still regulated, even though the production side is quasi-deregulated.
California really screwed up in implementing deregulation. Yet I constantly hear media blaming Enron for the troubles during the "energy crisis". The real problem was that the legislature wanted so badly to spur on a deregulated market that they forbid utilities from entering into long term contracts, thus requiring 100% of net power required to be purchased on the spot market. They also required utilities to sell 50% of their production to deregulated companies. And the system the legislature set up for the spot market was designed where all bidders get paid the highest accepted bid for power. In other words, if 95% of power bids are under $.10 kWH, and the last bid accepted (lask kWH needed to fill demand) is at $.35kWH, all get paid $.35kWH.
The other part, which is why I am so critical of our governor (about to be recalled) is during this fiasco, he showed no leadership. He played the blame game while the ship was going down. Rather than resolve to fix the situation, tell people to conserve, and demand the legislature fix the broken market, he kept quiet, except for negative press crafted to shift the focus to those not in power to change anything.
Enron was only a tiny part of market trading, and can you really blame them for taking advantage of a market crafted to benefit power producers and traders? Many many power companies and traders used the rules set up by the legislature. Yet is it so much easier to buy into Enron. We might as well blame Worldcom for the 9/11 disaster and Arthur Anderson for global warming. They are not clean, but they are also not to blame for those events either.
Even if every house has its roof covered with solar cells and all electrical power needs are met that way, the power companies will still have a worthwhile job to do -- running the grid. We'll still need that for when ours has a problem, or we use more than we produce.
:)
Plus, until Mexico and Canada get to the same point, we'll be able to export power to them.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
There are several definitions for the word plastic. A broad definition in this context includes all materials that deform permanently when stressed, as opposed to those that deform temporarily (elastic) or those that rupture.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
Last time I priced solar power it was about $25,000 for my residence before rebates. Knock $6000 off for rebates, and it's still almost $19,000 out of pocket. It would take an estimated 27 1/2 years to pay for itself (assuming no maintenence since I don't know what that would cost). By all means, keep up the research on this, but to expect joe sixpack to adopt solar power right now for a household is just not realistic.
It's not that I'm opposed to solar power, but until something can be done to bring the price out of the stratoshere, it's simply not economicaly plausable right now. I generaly try to be environmentaly sensitive, but I shouldn't have to be a millionaire to make a significant contribution. All of which disregards the energy spent making the things and the fact that used solar panels are bad for the environment! I think I'll stick with nuclear energy for now.
Objectivism?
Please consider it to be hyperbole.
Hey, no problem, Dude. I had written it off as physically impossible bullshit, but whatever you say.
I drool at the idea of filling my roof with solar panels for a fraction of the current cost.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
dunno if this has anything to do with anything, but some bacteria have been designed to grow plastic pellets. Really. It's kind of cool.
Official company press release.
$#!^ happens, but why does it always have to happen to me???
Just stretching out the "back yard" to the moon is all.
Wind power runs into this all the time, too.
Consumer: "Yes, let's build more wind/solar power plants."
Power company: "OK. The best location for that is site A."
Consumer: "What? That will ruin the view!"
Power company: [sigh]
------ "Darn floor. Big bite." (Koko the gorilla's best attempt at explaining the experience of an earthquake.)
You run that solar panel 24 hours/day?
$4/watt, or $0.67/watt is not a useful unit, considering that 1 watt=1 joule/s, $4/watt, also means $4/second per joule. $4/second = $126M/yr...no wonder solar hasn't caught on.
You have to click on News and then 2003, or just change it in the URL. The last one was like 2 weeks ago.
It's so nice to see you fags kiss and make up.
If you've got $5 million for an acre of land in an area of the world which gets sunlight you might get the same amount of power as 1 square foot of expensive solar panel. The real story was on 9/30 in EE Times.
>they hope to use nanotechnology to produce cells
>with lower efficiencies -- about 10 percent rather
>15 to 20 percent -- while reducing manufacturing
>costs
Nanotechnology of course means organic chemistry in a time when nanotechnology sounds better. It would probably be cheaper just to make solar panels using Chinese laborers instead of fullerene and copper.
I've owned my Citizen Eco for about 1.5 years now, and am very happy with it. I wear mostly short-sleave shirts, but don't go out of my way to make sure it gets enough light, and it works great. I don't think it was exceptionally expensive, considering that it has pretty sophisticated electronics, and it is exceptionally well made (mine has a titanium shell, and a very durable crystal face). It was about 30% more expensive than a similar quality watch without the solar/liIon battery, and I doubt I'll ever recuperate that (watch batteries last 2-3 years, and are inexpensive to replace), but the watch is very nice, and it's always cool to watch the hands 'catch up' after the watch has been in the dark for a bit (the hands stop to conserve energy). Personally, I doubt this technology would have any impact on the price of the watch, as it really doesn't take much energy to keep it going, and i don't think a 3/4in^2 solar cell is a significant portion of the construction cost (assuming they want o keep similar profit margins)
As I understand it, photovoltaic cells only convert energy at certain wave lengths. I've often wondered whether it would be possible to set up a system of prisms or mirrors such that only light of the desired wavelength is falling on the photovoltaic cell, thus increasing the current from the cell.
In a a previous /. article regarding solar power, someone did a little calculation and concluded that you'd need a big house to hold enough solar cells for 2kW annual power consumption. This company believes their reasearch will yield solar cells that will be cheaper to produce, and less efficient in use than today's solar cells.
So... your 3.3kW/year estimate is over 50% larger and your solar cells are about 50% less efficient than the assumptions used in the previous calculation. I believe you'll nead a really big house to hold all of those solar cells.
so what does a watt of electricy cost delivered these days, like from the power company?
According to some folks at Alliant Energy (one of their reps recently gave a lecture at my engineering college), it costs about $1.00/watt to build a coal power plant. In other words, building a 500 MW coal plant would cost $500 million. Also keep in mind about 50% of that power is lost as heat during transmission - so the cost to the end user is really about twice that.
Interestingly, in our area large wind turbines cost about the same (a buck a watt) - and the power companies are becoming more interested. Despite what you might think, they actually hate to build new large power plants. It's a huge chuck of cash for them to lay out, especially when the full capacity of a large plant may not be needed for another 10-20 years.
Anyway, $0.20/watt would be cheap!
I want to know how to determine the wavelength of light that an LED will emit. Is it the simple function of the junction potential that I think it is?
wavelength = ( speed of light ) * ( Planck's constant ) / ( ( charge of an electron ) * ( junction potential ) )
The units work out correctly, but I have not been able to google what the real equation is.
The cost of the energy depends on how long you use the solar cell, and the quality of the light.
A car engine can generate 100kW, mechanical power, but the energy depends on how long you run it, at what level, and how much gas you put in.
Same with the solar cell.
The CEO of STMicroelectronics was found crushed to death by a stray oil barrel.....
I made the same mistake at first,
but if you read the article carefully,
you'll see they aren't amortizing the price.
If STMicroelectronics can reach their target,
that 75 watt panel would cost fifteen bucks.
(But probably $115 with the mounting hardware.)
When you amortize the cost,
they're hoping to produce electricy for 1/4 cent per kilowatt hour.
Even at five times the price it's cost competitive with fossile fuel generation (unlike current solar panels.)
-- this is not a
I've worked in the Conductive Polymers area for about a year and I can tell you that this article seems more of wishful thinking than any. Conductive polymers are exceedingly difficult to work with, have a very narrow range of pH under which they work, their properties have not been sufficiently characterized and so on. The replacement of liquid electrolytes sounds exceedingly difficult if not impossible to me, atleast from my experience.
the overall cost of solar-generated electricity (amortized over the lifetime of the solar cell, typically 20 years) is around ten times higher than the cost of electricity generated by burning fossil fuels.
The author forgot to factor in the environmental costs of buring fossil fuels for 20 years.
TallGreen CMS hosting
Where'd you get the 5kW figure?
On seeing stuff on the moon...
And In summary....
Anyway, this has been a long thread, so I'm now going to let it go...
"There are a dozen opinions on a matter until you know the truth. Then there is only one." - CS Lewis (paraprhase)
Not only that, but they use "nanotechnology" in the buzzword-sense:
-- MarkusQ
..ST has made [the commitment] to be a CO2-neutral company by 2010..
Nice. Why can't more companies make commitments like that?
TallGreen CMS hosting
According to the DOE Energy Information Administration, the average household energy use per day is 20 kWh/day. An a small generic split level house has about a 2000 sqft footprint (with garage). This is equal to 185 sq meters on a flat. The roof slope will at about 20% to this giving you 222 sq meters of roof space on the average small house. At 15% efficiency for 6 hours per day of peak sun (the US average) the gives you 200 kWh per day OR 10 TIMES the homes required load. PV doesn't need to be more efficient, it is not the same as the efficiency of a feul consuming device. What is the efficiency of a free resource? Extra efficiency is only important if it lowers the cost of the system. But a really cheap 10% efficient PV system would beat an expensive 30% efficient - BECAUSE SPACE IS REALLY NOT THE ISSUE (as seen above)
Who controls the British crown?
Who keeps the metric system down?
We do! We do!
Who keeps Atlantis off the maps?
Who keeps the Martians under wraps?
We do! We do!
Who holds back the electric car?
Who makes Steve Guttenberg a star?
We do! We do!
Who robs the cave fish of their site?
Who rigs every Oscar night?
We do! We do!
Ummm... One thing that has seems to have been overlooked is the fact that solar energy isn't always 12on/12off in a day. The closer you live to the Artic Circle (or Antartic, for our southern hemisphere friends), you get a disproportionate lack of sunlight in the winters. Not very feasable in these locations.
On the other hand, if someone could make a darkness panel that makes energy out of a lack of light... ;)
All that aside, $.20 per peak watt is freaking incredible. At that price you can probably make electric awnings out of the stuff. Let's just hope that this doesn't turn out to be vaporware like so many other stunning "advances" in energy have turned out to be (coughcold fusioncough)
Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
It's easier to get forgiveness than permission; go guerrilla.
Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
Over a typical 20-year life span of a solar cell, a single produced watt should cost as little as $0.20
Isn't that still like really high?
Must-not-watch TV!
The Big deal about renewable energy and the solar cells is that you get HUGE tax write-offs for using these technologies.
In fact I know of a hotel that has a "mini power plant" on the site. the only reason why it is their is for the added tax break they receive for it (It initially would costs more money to use the plant than to get energy off the grid [read with higher energy prices this equation changed])
The reason the plant was created was for the ADDED tax benefit.
3333 W * $0.20/watt = $666. That's way UNDER $2000. Total system cost might multiply that, but the cells won't.
If these things work, daytime electricity will be something close to free. That is going to amount to a sea change in energy economics, and it can't come too soon.
Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
I thought plastics broke down under UV light? Would kind of put a crimp in the design of a plastic solar
cell, considering the point of solar panels is to be exposed to light.
is that the author of the press release is scientifically illiterate.
Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
This is not a sure thing. They just have a "break-through" that they don't even have a good prototype developed for, and they're just guestimating the 20-cents per watt, targeting it. Call me back when they have an ACTUAL PRODUCT ON THE MARKET that will give me 20-cents per watt.
*yawn*
-------- the energy cost of the materials exceeds the expected lifetime output of the solar cells. -------- I hate this quote. I hear it all of time. Unfortunatly, its WRONG. Sure it was true in 1972! But technology does have a way of marching on! Today the energy pay-back period for solar cells is less than 6-24 months (depending of the technology). And then it keeps working for 20-30-40-50 years (20-30 guaranteed by warranty).
Or, as all you geeks will probably call it, Peer to Peer Power Sharing. I wonder if the utilities will sue for infringing on their turf if it gets big enough? :D
Maybe towns and cities could just invest in their own battery banks? Even if this kind of power generation really takes off... and I hope it does.. there has to be storage somewhere. Not every town could build a double resevoir to pump water uphill during the day and run hydroelectric at night...
How would the issue of storage be solved for a fully decentralized, 100% solar grid? I bet someone has ideas on that...
Theory can predict all kinds of cool stuff, it's actually making the damn thing that is difficult.
I hate to say RTFA, but RTFA. They are planning 10% efficiency (as the other guy said), just making them REALLY GODDAMN CHEAP compared to current ones.
Uh, I did a week ago.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
From reading this press release, they have struck a deal with EDF (Huge french based utility provider), and my conspiracy theories might make me think that EDF's goals are not all that glamorous, when you know that they have a very big parc of nuclear power stations and promotes them heavily.
Murphy(c)
if you want "No More Hiroshimas" then I say "You First. No More Pearl Harbors."
Having an electric eel in your pocket isn't likely to lead to macho anything, especially not happiness!
Why do I have this? I don't smoke.
Those who have it can cheat with it.... Cheat with what?!?! Theres no multiplayer yet. Who cares.
So these guys are almost a factor of 10 up. The story's a bit short on details - I'm guessing that they are using some form of inorganic nanocrystals (CdSe or CdTe seem popular) embedded in the plastics. The plastics give cheapness of manufacturing (spin coating etc.), the inorganics do the real charge separation work. There was a paper a while back that reported 50% EQE (external quantum efficiency) with such devices, but this is not the same as power conversion, and that was at the system's maximum absorption wavelength; real solar cells have to take what they're given from the sun - they can't rely on a laser at the right wavelength!
It's also almost word-for-word what he/she/someone posted on a previous story /. story about solar power.
if someone on Slashdot tells me that they bought these +50% efficient solar cells
I know you're exaggerating, but...never going to happen. The theoretical maximum efficiency on solar cells is 50%, which doesn't count losses from things like resistance in the transmission media and so forth.
Even NASA's newest, sexiest solar cell design is only about 22% efficient.
-Carolyn
Like Daddy always said: if you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit.
That is only because things like long term environmental damage and the inability to sustain our mining of resources like oil in the future are not factored into the price you pay for company generated electricity.
In fact, damage done to the environment usually hits us multiple times (and very little of it is factored in)... just to make the fuel you have the mining, the shipping, the refining - all of which cause air pollution and water pollution that isn't factored into the cost you pay for company generated electricity. Then, if we're talking about fuels that are burned, that also generates air pollution that may only be marginally factored into the overall cost (by filter technology mandates etc. - but then there are always grandfather clauses)
Basing judgements of actual value - actual cost - purely on prices, is really quite naive.
"On optimal system would include traditional power generation for base power and dispersed solar systems for peak demand."
Shouldn't it be the other way around? The distributed solar system runs during daylight hours, it isn't something you can turn on during peak hours. Peak hours are when people get ready for work, and when they get home from work. In winter, it will be dark during peak hours.
So solar or wind provide you with a daily baseline, and you have to fill in where it leaves off with other traditional systems that you can turn on and ramp up. A large distrubuted solar system could provide for all of the daytime electricity needs.
Don't moderate flamebait as Troll. Know the difference or you will be Meta-moderated.
So we can cover a desert in Australia with these and dump all our nukes? Im gonna find a tree to hug now.. :-)
"You lied to me! There is a Swansea!"
Homes in snow areas accumulate snow on the roof. This actually helps insulate them in winter. And, even if it didn't, this means those expensive roofing panels are useless in winter until someone climbs on the roof to sweep away the snow.
You cannot "aim" shingles. If your house is "conventional" (as the building codes require in many areas) you are going to have a pitched roof with a peak. At any given time, half the area of the roof is going to be utterly wasted. And even with the sun directly overhead, one is not likely to experience "peak" generation.
That 10% efficiency is peak not average. So you might be able to get a third that - or ~3.5% efficiency - for a roof. A roof that costs ten times as much to install and five times as much to maintain when you get the semi-annual hail or wind damage.
I do think solar energy is where it's at, but I'm dismayed that solar cells seem to be the only solution the mainstream is willing to consider. The sun provides lots of energy and you DON'T have to convert it to electricity to make use of it. The earth itself also can provide huge sums of heating and cooling energy and yet, even in homes with basements, this utility source is rarely exploited in an efficient manner. Design a house properly and you need hardly pay for heating, hot water, or even for cooling in the summer. Much of this is possible without making use of a single solar cell, and without substantially adding to the maintenance costs of the building.
This seem high on fluff and low on science. First, from what I know about the state of organic electronics, up to 13% efficient solar cells have been achieved in lab (I think that number sounds right). An organic solar cell would certainly be cheap and therefore would not have to be as good as Si solar cells. So in that way the article checks out.
However, and this is a big however, the production of organic solar cells has been greatly hampered by the instability of organic devices. Anything with dangling bonds will pretty much attack organics (read: oxygen in from water vapor in air). So, it is feasible that they've got 10% efficient solar cells, but it's the packaging that matters.
Being one to work with Solar panels for years, this discovery (even at only 10% efficency) is fantastic.
Panels that are 600W are $2400.00US. Now we're looking at the possibility of 600W for $120.00US.
Solar panels will truly (and finally) catch on as a reliable alternative to "the grid."
Also, lets not forget all the states that give a nice tax break to those people purchasing panels of any kind.
---
IMHO, of course.
May the SOURCE be with you.
The only problem is that political power and energy are tightly interwoven. The interested parties would not like a major upheaval of the whole power generation and distribution system. People get murdered, I mean, commit suicide, in traffic over this.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
Perhaps because the original article was in ?
Launch galeon, click edit, preferences, appearance, and change the value of "Minimum font size."
Really, this is a pretty crass assessment considering all the progress solar has made. It is a very real solution.
Sure, omnidirectional cells are not above 15% efficiency. They may never be. But they are dramatically denser, and getting more dense every year...and with dense enough cells, even 15% efficiency is plenty. Also, thanks to LEDs and micronization, overall power usage is actually decreasing.
The cost is not that much any more...I could do up my house for $9000 to cover all my electric costs including heat, and actually make a little money selling back to the grid during the summer to offset my neighbour's power usage. The only reason I haven't done it is that I don't intend to keep the house long enough to recoup that.
After all, as of right now solar power is a break even proposition. It's no longer prohibitively costly like it was in the 1980s, but it's not going to save your wallet, either. Add in the cost of batteries and maintenance, and it still only makes sense for people who are really concerned about the environment or whose power needs are otherwise not being met.
Is it cheap, readily available and ubiquitous? No. But that's because the social, environment and economic drivers to solar are SLOW. People are doing it, but they aren't getting the tools from the Home Despot because there's a big difference between installing shingles and installing a solar system. You want to have experts on your side. So the industry has grown up around these experts. These experts cost more, so contracting costs more. You deal with the same thing when you do any specialty work on your house, be it having a custom shaped pool dug or installing copper gutters.
But this is not the same realm of fantasy as flying cars or fusion. Real people are doing it, not just libertarian nutjobs. If you're waiting for some evolutionary advancement, you might as well wait for the rapture. I heard on the radio it's due any day.
Hey freaks: now you're ju
1. Increase collection by tracking dependent
upon f(lat,long,day_of_year)
2. Thin film photovoltaics w/ up to 15%
efficiency NREL (less expensive)
3. Multi junction (multiple bandgaps) up to
36% (more efficient, more expensive)
Australia University (USNW ???)
4. Batteries are the most expensive part of
a solar system. If on grid, install
5. Modify AC appliance power supplies to work
directly off of DC. (No rectification, one
less Voltage/current transformation)
6. **Unplug devices that gobble power when not
being used ( or add switch adapter to outlet
or power strip)
7. Read homepower magazines solar home design
guidlines. Better Window placement
8. Kyocera photovoltaics have a textured
surface with a geometry that has better
asorbtion
Strangley, about six months ago I sat next to a guy on the tube train in London and couldn't help but notice that he was writing a document on Organic Solar Cells. I hadn't heard about them before so I asked him what they were. He was really friendly and proceded to tell me all about his project and how they are basically the same tech as the OLED displays that kodak were begining to use ontheir cameras but in reverse. They were not very efficent but so much cheaper they will be the "next big thing"
Photovoltaic cells are priced in cost per watt. For example, I just bought fourteen 80 watt panels for something like $3.53/watt (Just under $4K). Assuming I get the full rated power from the panels for 8 hours, I've just paid $2,240 per kilowatt hour. Fortunately I'll be running these panels for at least the length of the warranty (20 years). At that time, given the above assumptions I will have paid just over $0.30 per KWH. Unfortunately, the weather here isn't always perfect, and the load/batteries don't always use the full capacity of the panels.
--
http://jsl.com/solar
Sorry this has to be AC, don't have my password handy. The solar cells we're using on our satellite are about 30% efficient. They're also nasty expensive and hard to get. But the newest, sexiest solar cell design is much better than 22%.
What they announced was a new research project into the possibility of these devices. There is no device yet.
They don't even have a timeline for having something useful. Only a plan to tackle at least two possible approaches.
And no-one read the article before they posted a response?
Later . . . . . . WebBug
This will make solar panels even more attractive.
Why did GEAR crush RDP?
While solar cells may be less efficient to produce for the power they give, they do have benefits such as not letting Cheney and his buddies rape and pilage the world... Actually, the economies of scale haven't yet been tapped with solar panel production. Couple an inexpensive solar panel with a fuel cell storage system and you are no longer hostage to power outages and corporate greed. M
Really? Excellent! Are you industry or government? It's been almost 8 months since I came by the ~22% figure, and it might reflect NASA's innate conservatism--that is, they're only willing to deploy technologies with a certain degree of history for things like planetary missions in order to minimize risk.
-Carolyn
Like Daddy always said: if you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit.
Actually, distance from equator has a lot less to do with how well photovoltaic solar energy works at a given location than was indicated above.
9 37 948047/qid=1065134484/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/103-468497 9-8794204?v=glance&s=books
The federal government (I forget which dept.) publishes seasonal tables every year which indicate, among other things, the SOLAR INSOLATION for many cities and areas in North America. Solar insolation is measured in equivalent hours per day of "full intensity" sun - and latitude is only one factor which affects it.
It turns out that the sun, at peak intensity, radiates energy with an magnitude of about 1KW/M^2 at the surface of the earth.
The tables indicate, for example, that Pittsburgh's solar insolation is something like this:
Summer months: ~4 hours / day
Winter months: ~1.5 hours / day
Annual average: ~3 hours / day
So, on an average summer day, a square meter of Pittsburgh earth receives about 400W of solar radiation. At the same time, southern S. Dakota (at the same latitude) is getting over 600W!
Seasonal weather conditions (cloud cover) have at least as much affect as latitude. There are a number of cities north of Pittsburgh which have much greater solar insolation than Pittsburgh.
See Joel Davidson's "The New Solar Electric Home" for more info:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0
Gee, I could provide for my total power needs in the summer (about 1200 KWH/month) with only 10 square meters of PV panels, right??
Unfortunately, NO. With PV efficiencies in the 12-13% range, plus I^2R losses, battery efficiency, etc. I would need more like 100 square meters with present-day technology.
Sigh.
Can't be any worse than the idiots who try to sell "organic" meat and produce.
No shit it's organic, sherlock.
I hate when people try to make buzzwords out of touchy-feely.
They've just invented incredibly cheap solar cells, AND they've just invented incredibly efficient fuel cells? Yeah, right. I've heard that one before.
According to the company's press release, this is all vapor ware. I'll believe the $0.20/watt claim when the cells go on sale at a nearby Home Depot.
Currently hooked on AMP
>Thats absorbed glass mat. ...
>An apostrophe is not a warning...
Indeed. An apostrophe indicates that one or more characters have been omitted, for example the 'i' in 'That is'.
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
In anyone is really looking for a flashlight that dosen't need batteries, look no further. The future is here: http://www.thinkgeek.com/gadgets/lights/5a9f/ This is only one among many models out there. They don't last several hours like the solar powered ones, of course, but they can be charged in the dark. and they are decently bright to boot!! In my opinion, they represent a realistic solution to the problem of the batteries always being dead on your flashlight.
Hahaha!
pwned.
"Verbing weirds language." -- Calvin
I'd rather run my house, car, and power plant on hydrogen, and have to change nothing more than the burners in my furnace, water heater, and stove top this way.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
They announced they are going to WORK on one.
They don't have one yet!
grrr...
Appliances built for cars are ideal for solar.
Suppose that a "1 watt" solar cell can produce that 1 watt from 10am to 6pm each day (8 hours) in the average installation (unless you live in Pittsburgh or Seattle! :)
That's unreasonably high for anywhere. Average of 5 solar hours/day or greater only occurs in deserts int the continental US.
Here is a nice set of insolation maps (part of a fine FAQ on practical issues with alternative energy).
Also when calculating:
- Find P - the average power generation required (kwhr/day).
- Find C - the cost of the total system to produce power P.
- Find T - the lifetime of the total system.
- Find M - the monthly payment for a T year mortgage for C dollars.
Your cost per kwhr is (12/365.25)*M/P. When this is significantly less than power off the grid, solar has arrived.
If you're out in the boonies, one-time hookup costs for the grid will be large. Subtracting them from C before doing the M calculation ammortizes their costs over your the lifetime of your solar system - which is close to the result of ammortizing them over the life of the house.
If you're using battery storage don't forget to split the system into panels and batteries and do a separate mortgage calculation for the batteries (which have a much shorter life than the panels).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Slashdot needs a Real Soon Now and/or Vaporware icon/category. Come on, guys, fire up your favorite graphics program and make a nice whisp of steam or something.
To balance that out, we also need an "on sale now" category for cool technology that was not only promised but also delivered. Perhaps a cash register with smoke coming out of it to let us know that what was once vapor is not only available but "red hot".
Oh, BTW, I've got a car that gets 200 mpg. OK, OK, It's just something I'd like to do so I've established a club which consists of me and 6 other guys who drink beer, play poker, and talk about cars. However, since Slashdot doesn't seem to know the difference between that and an actual product you can buy, we were wondering if you'd give us a $100,000. You know. For beer and car parts and stuff. The 200 mpg care is beer-powered. That's the best part. Honestly.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
i never knew that the 2Kw little fan heater i have would cost so much if those numbers were used. Had my fan heater been powered by solar energy it would've cost what...? $4 per watt? what about 2Kw? gee even $0.20 sounds like much
is the 2Kw on the fan heater per hour or per minute or second or what?
Hi,
I read about solar panels and often they are given a lifespan of twenty years. What's up with that? There aren't any moving parts. Does the efficiency of the solar panel decrease over time? Why? I figure the only maintenance would be hosing/shovelling them off. I have a solar calculator that is more than a decade old, it works fine under a 20 watt fluorescent lamp. Why isn't solar power touted as a "permanent" "renewable" power source?
Thanks,
A.C.
Now I can use this to power my Beowulf Cluster....
dear fuckwad,
3 hours with no batteries
9 hours COMBINED with two batteries
9-3=6 hours with two batteries
6/2=3 hours per battery
so the original post is CORRECT, you fuckwad, in that the solar charge is no better than a single battery
fuckwad
The darling measure of PV has been efficiency. The big bucks have gone into pushing efficiency. The solar races across Australia provide the big showcase for PV and these favour efficient cells.
The quest for efficiency has been at the expense of the more important quest of reducing $/W. $/W is about the only measure of any meaning when it comes to using PV in any volume.
There is always the bullshit theory that the quest for high efficiency will have the spin off of producing reduced $/W cells. I don't believe this any more than if NASA said their $16000 toilet seats would bring plumbing to the masses.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Today's solar cells cost roughly $4/watt (larger modules - 75 watt output or higher, smaller modules can be $10+/watt) and the rest of the system's components including the inverter, disconnects, wire, over-current protection, mounting equipment, monitoring electronics, (and batteries for autonomous systems) can run another $1.50-2.00/watt and installation can cost $1 or so per watt. This brings the total to about $7/watt for a typical grid-tied photovoltaic system. In California, buy-down programs sponsored by the local utility as well as state incentives can chop that price in half bringing the cost to only $3.50/watt after it's all said and done. I've seen numbers where that kind of system can pay itself off in only 5 years especially if the utility has some sort of TOU (time of use) metering program.
Already we are looking at a 20% ROI for a solar system installed today, at least in Cali. So what if solar cell prices drop to 20 cents/watt? Well, that would bring the cost down for the entire nation to that of Cali prices and allow anyone to take advantage of a pretty much guaranteed 20% ROI investment or better. But that won't be the end result - it will be much better than 20%. If solar cells dropped to anywhere near even $1/watt or $2/watt, inverter manufacturers such as SMA, Xantrex, and Sharp will sharply drop their prices on inverters down to 40 cents/watt or less (current wholesale cost is approx 65 cents/watt) because of the huge increase in demand. Installers will not be as "specialized" anymore because of the ubiquity of solar systems and in due time all electricians will be competent in photovoltaic installations. This will subsequently bring the installation rate down as well to maybe 50 cents/watt (from current $1 or so per watt) Once it's all said and done we'll be looking at installed cost at probably less that $2/watt for the entire system BEFORE incentives (keep in mind that 20% ROI is at approx $3.50/watt). And that isn't competitive with regular electricity states in most states - IT DARN WELL BEATS THEM. So if you could install a pv system that saves the world, saves you money, and is pretty damn cool, wouldn't you do it? Of course you have to consider that electricity rates vary by state and places like CA, NY, and HI would be the big winners but if prices become as low as noted above, I'd say at least 15-20 other states would be in a pretty sweet zone to go solar.
Now what will this do to the utilities? Well, they would be losing TONS of business. All that money they put into infrastructure improvements won't get paid off because too many people are utilizing free solar energy to power their homes. So utilities will eventually go out of business and the world will be a happier place. NO. That's why solar will never be 20 cents/watt or even $1/watt. Because the powerful evil empire won't let it happen and they'll do whatever it takes to make sure of that.
Talk about a rant..
Maybe $0.08 for you, but under PG&E in rural California (El Dorado County), it's about $0.12 to $0.15, I think. Some friend's of my wife's down the road are putting in the panels (civil engineers, not computer geeks). Apparently, they did the math and decided not to give so much of their money to PG&E any more. Even with the existing glassy blue silicon panels, it is still working out.
OTOH, municipally owned utilities like SMUD, MID or TID (various Central Valley cities/towns) charge quite a bit less than their "free enterprise" counterpart.
Yow! I'm supposed to have a plan?
I wish I could mod it up, but I commented, and think I lost my points anyway...
Yow! I'm supposed to have a plan?
Reference: price. The raw panels are only about us$270 for 80Watt panels (new Mexico Photowatt). The regulator and wire can be used with several panels (US$500 should get you a nice 50amp regulaor, remote panel, fuses, wire, etc.).
My point: To pay CN$1000 for a single panel is pretty much a waste. You get 75/watts for US$700. For US$1000 you could have had 150 watts! One single panel has so much price overhead (the regulaor, wire, fuse, etc) that it only starts to make sense with 2 or 4 panels.
If you don't have space on top of your RV, OK - one panel - but your price is pretty much a worst case install.
There have been a lot of back-of-the-napkin type of calculations flying around in this discussion relating to system costs and pollution associated with solar cells.
If anyone is serious about evaluating an alternative energy installation, you should download RETScreen, free software developed by the government of Canada. The software is all excel spreadsheets with extensive macros, so it should work with OpenOffice, too.
RETScreen lets you estimate the total system capacity that you will need to meet your electrical needs. There is no need to guess how much energy from the sun you will receive, Retscreen has charts that indicate this based on latitude and local weather patterns. It contains databases from ground station data and NASA satellite derived surface meteorology and solar energy data, including temperature data across the globe.
It has cost estimates for the panels, electrical equipment, batteries for use with off-grid systems, and installation and maintenance cost estimates.
It also lets you calculate the estimated Greenhouse Gas emissions that will be avoided for the proposed project.
Photovoltaics are not the be-all and end-all in solar power. In northern climes, you can save a huge amount on your heating energy bills with an inexpensive passive solar heating setup. RETScreen has worksheets for this as well as wind energy, biomass, and other renewable energy sources.
The wind-power analysis is also very interesting, as it is a much more economical electrical energy source for those of us a bit further north who don't get as much sun. RETScreen contains databases on annual average wind speed data across the globe for calculating the energy production of a wind-power system.
That was my point. My point was they have to give a cost/energy not a cost/power. Cost/power is a useless number.
This Article indicates that an average resolution is either 4 arc-minutes or 6 arc-seconds. The 6 arc-seconds makes more sense than 4 arc-minutes (4 arc-minutes is a whopping 1.2 mm at a distance of 1 m (I don't know about you but I can see better than that!), where 6 arc-seconds is 0.03 mm (about .001") at one meter. I don't know about you but I can see a 1-mil thick object at a distance of 1 meter (think piece of paper or something seen edge-on - if lighting is correct). According to this, the moon is 3476 km diameter and averages 384,467 km from the earth. That means the moon covers 31 arc-minutes. 6 arc-seconds at the distance of the moon is 11.18 km. So, your 617-square-mile city will be more than visible, since it's surely larger than 11.18 km in one direction. (sqrt(617 sq.mi) = 24mi on a side = 40 km, so you've got a fudge-factor of 4 on my calculation to be visible. Even your smaller cities of 400 sq.mi. are 20 mi/side = 32 km, or a fudge-factor of 3). (This should also prove that we can see better than 4 arc-minutes, since if the moon only covers 31 (This confirms an average of 31 arc-minutes), we sure can see features more fine than 1/8th the diameter of a full moon - even without magnification!)
"Using math since 1986 to sound like I know what I'm saying"
"There are a dozen opinions on a matter until you know the truth. Then there is only one." - CS Lewis (paraprhase)
If they are this cheap all roofs (is that the plural?) should be covered in them. Especially here in oz.
-- Karma Karma Karma Karma, Karma Chameleon - Boy George
Power matters too.
My stove uses 700kWh per year
This works out to less than 100Wh
If I only had 100 Watts of power it wouldn't cook.
I need 2kW of available power to get stuff done, the energy isn't the limiting factor, it is the power availability.
> 0.666
I always knew the enviromentalists were in league with Luicfer.
between the greater and lesser infinities sleep the dreams undreamt
Engery? Engery?
The president of the United States is posting on /.!
COOL!
My other car is a 1984 Nark Avenger.
Grid-interactive inverters shut down automatically if the grid goes away (it's part of the "anti-islanding" requirement). Besides, your 1 KW (peak) of PV isn't going to be able to keep your block powered. The inverter would shut down from undervoltage/overload even if the loss of frequency reference didn't get it.
Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
How much is $19k spread over 30 years at 5% interest, or whatever it's at now?
You can also think of it as insurance against a fraudulent "energy crisis" that increases your bill 1000%.
Before I got layed off I was considering this even though I live in Oregon where we don't see the sun half the year.
This signature used to contain a cute kitty virus with ansii art. Please set the slashdot editors on fire. Thank you