Caltech Makes Flexible, 86% Efficient Solar Arrays

strredwolf writes "Caltech has released a flexible solar array that converts 95% of single-wavelength incandescent light and 86% of all sunlight into electricity. Instead of being flat-panel, they stand thin silicon wires in a plastic substrate that scatters the light onto them. The total composition is 98% plastic, 2% wire — the amount of silicon used is 1/50th that of ordinary panels. So as soon as they can get these to market, solar could be very viable and cheap to produce." Update: 03/01 21:02 GMT by KD : Reader axelrosen points out evidence that the 80%+ efficiency figure is wrong. MIT's Tech Review, in covering the Caltech announcement, says that the new panel's efficiency is in the 15%-20% range — which is competitive with the current state of the art. And the Caltech panel should be far cheaper to manufacture.

Comments

Re:I think its entirely reasonable to say...

[ShakaUVM]

Holy balls. If this article is spot on, they've doubled the efficiency of the current technology (which converts at about 40%) AND done it in such a way that the stuff is cheaper to manufacture AND made it flexible. This is the sort of thing that can have a real (and probably positive) impact on the world we know. Amazing. The only remaining question (I didn't see anything about it in TFA) is how durable this stuff is compared to the current panels.

Currently, without subsidies, Solar PV is roughly 20x-100x more expensive than coal or nuclear power. If it is indeed twice as efficient and costs 10% of the current costs to fabricate, then solar might finally become cost competitive.

If I was Obama, I'd toss a billion or so at this scientist and see if he couldn't get mass production of it up and running.

I mean, as long as we're spending billionS keeping teachers temporarily employed (because their states can't afford them right now), right?

Re:It's plastic !

[HarvardAce]

Harvard students can't grasp simple concepts such as "puck goes in the net, not the opposing team pepband's trombone section".

They were probably tired of scoring so many goals against Cornell, so they wanted to change things up a bit. On a more serious note, where were you sitting that you got struck in the face? If it was at Harvard, the pep band sits off to the side and it would have to be a very random event to have a puck go off into the stands with such force that you couldn't dodge it. Or was this at Cornell or was it before they put nets up behind the goals?