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Solar Cells Made From a Spreadable Nanoparticle Paste
An anonymous reader writes "Researchers at Notre Dame have created a nanoparticle paste, which acts as the main ingredient in solar cells that are very easy to construct. In a short video clip, they can be seen assembling a functional solar cell with little more than a heat gun, tape, and some binder clips. The paste is made from a mix of t-butanol, water, and a mix of cadmium selenide with cadmium sulfide nanoparticles. So far, the experimental devices are not nearly as efficient as standard solar cells, but they were just developed. If the materials were slightly less toxic, it might even be a project that kids could do at home."
I build this kit as a solar cell demo for my school a few weeks ago. The article has a very different chemistry, but the assembly is almost identical.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17SsOKEN5dE
Solar paint is fine, but there's a whole lot of energy that could be gathered with solar pavement. Just think of all those blacktop parking lots, if those had a 1% solar energy conversion you could probably make mini-malls power grid neutral.
"If the materials were slightly less toxic, it might even be a project that kids could do at home."
It's easy to make cad sulfide/copper sulfide solar cells at home-- it takes little more work than dipping a penny in a cad sulfide plating solution. Making not-very-efficient solar cells at home is really nothing new. As long as you don't drink the plating solution, it's not terribly dangerous.
(main reason cadmium sulfide/copper sulfide solar cells never really caught on is lifetime-- they degrade quickly if there's any humidity at all. I don't think I've heard of anybody making them since about 1980.)
http://www.geoffreylandis.com
Can this material keep from leeching out into the environment? How about a fire? Would we have cadmium spreading all over the place? I guess if one gets enough cadmium solar cells are no longer of much use at all.