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New Record For Solar Cell Power Efficiency
mdsolar writes "Renewable Energy Access is reporting that a consortium led by researchers at the University of Delaware has achieved 42.8% efficiency with a silicon solar cell. The method uses lower concentration (factor of 20 magnification) than the previous record holder (40.7% efficiency) so that it may have a broader range of applications, since tolerances for pointing the device will be larger. They are now partnering with DuPont to build engineering and manufacturing prototypes. They expect to be in production in 2010. On a roof, such cells would require less than half the surface area to produce the same amount of power as today's standard solar panels, which have an efficiency of about 17%."
Solar power, cheap, efficient, durable, pick two.
Records being broken for efficiency gains etc. are fine. But why are no new hone systems available today getting more efficient and better priced? It's always "tomorrow is the promised land". Enough already.
The article isn't extremely clear, but these aren't made of just silicon. If that were the case, this would be much more awesome (and is why I was initially extremely excited). They split the light into high, medium, and low energy so that the most appropriate semiconductor can be used to absorb it. Silicon might be used for the medium or low energy light, because it has a band gap of 1.3eV. Something else would have to be used for the other two, running into the problem of gallium being unfortunately rare for widespread use.