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Clear Solar Cells Could Help Windows Generate Power
ckwu writes "The vast real estate of windows in office buildings and skyscrapers could be a fruitful field for harvesting solar energy—if lightweight solar cells could be made with a high enough conversion efficiency and appealing aesthetics. Now researchers at Oxford University report semitransparent solar cells that might do the trick. The team made solar cells using a perovskite, a class of mineral-like materials that have properties similar to inorganic semiconductors and show sunlight-to-electricity conversion efficiencies of more than 15%. The team deposited a thin film of perovskite onto glass so that the material formed tiny crystalline islands. The islands absorb photons and convert them to electrons, while light striking the empty areas passes through. The result was a semitransparent solar cell with a grayish tint."
The challenges for mass-adoption of solar cells having nothing to do with convenient locations to put them. Nearly all home-owners have a roof that they can access.
The challenges for solar cell adoption are:
Cost-effective manufacturing methods
The market price of silicon
Efficiency of conversion
Storing the energy for when it's required (or moving it to where it is helpful)
and Durability
When those problems are REALLY solved, we won't need to have dark windows to generate our energy needs. And we won't need to burn coal. But we're a long way from solving all of those problems.
We should learn what we need to know about issues, before we decide what we need to feel about them.
Will they be available as a service pack for XP ?
http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.slashdot.org Errors found while checking this document as HTML5!
Seriously, unless you can make these absorb energy only in wavelengths we actually don't want in the house, it seems like all we'd be doing is generating electricity, which we'd then burn trying to substitute the light we filtered out. If these capture either IR, or visible light (and they deffinately capture visible light), then we're just going to end up turning on more light bulbs, and heaters to compensate for them.
Speaking of pesky laws of physics, o hater of all things right and good...
According to Wikipedia, only about 44% of the sun's electromagnetic radiation that reaches the ground is in the visible light range.. Photovoltaics are typically responsive to limited wavelength ranges. It would make perfect sense to tune semi-transparent photovoltaics to absorb radiation that falls outside the visible spectrum, while transmitting most of the visible light.
You get all the benefits of Low-E glass, plus electricity.
From the makers of submarine screen doors
A 15% efficient cell mounted in a vertical position probably produces less per area than a 10% efficient cell mounted in an optimal position. And since 15% seems to be "optimistic", its just hard to see unless the price is way less than anything we've seen to date.
Car tints were exactly what popped in my mind when I saw this article.
We are beginning to design stuff into cars which continuously draws power, much like the numerous things in our homes that never turn completely off.
Solar cells built into car windshields can be used to mitigate the effects of a car not having its engine running. An owner of a solar-cell windshield equipped car will be able to return to his car, parked at an airport after it has sat unused for possibly several weeks, and have the battery fully charged upon his return. I have traveled and it has always been a concern to me whether the car will start after I have ignored it for a week.
Just a few hundred milliamperes going into the battery would have mitigated this concern.
I do agree with the posters who have already pointed out that using this for office building windows is a lot of wasted expensive effort for a negligible ( and likely negative sans tax credits ) return on investment, considering the cost of line power. A car in a parking lot usually has no line power available.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
So that's the sort of person you are - building a drug addicted strawman no less. Why do you get such a bunch of complete arseholes every time some sort of type of progress in an alternative energy is mentioned? I'm in the fossil fuel industry and see no need for such mindless attacks on alternative energies so what's your excuse?
These people are actually freeloaders but of course he can't say what they really are because of political correctness that forces him to use softer words like "freeriders".
I don't want sewage electricity being forced down my throat after it's been on some other guy's filthy roof already! I'm an American; I have a right to choose clean electricity!
IN THE BEGINNING God created heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was floating on the surface of the waters. God said "let there be light" and there was light. God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness with a thin film of perovskite on glass so that the material formed tiny crystalline islands. The islands absorbed photons and converted them unto electrons, whilst light striking the empty areas passed through. And God saw that it was good. Then God said "let the rooftops sprout with panels: panels bearing light from the heavens"; the ceilings brought forth electricity, freeriders yielding current with voltage in it, unto the grid. And God saw that it was good. Then to be fair he charged the freeriders $100 per month, which Arizona reduced to $5, for those who drilled the formless void of the earth for the Spirit of God, and have to distribute the unwanted surplus electricity. And God saw that it was good.
Wrong. The photoelectric effect explains how electrons energized by photons can escape their atomic bonds. It does not involve photons being converted into electrons.
If the material Perovskite is as good as they say it is, why limit the application on only the windows ?
We can apply the same thing to walls, to roof, even to pavements, so long as the sunlight can shine on them they get to generate electricity.
Heck, we can apply it on the car windows and car body surfaces as well, and and store the power inside the battery - or use it to run, aka that solar car in the Logan Run's tv series (it was aired in the 1970's, far too old for the young uns to enjoy)
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !