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Follow The Money: 30% Efficient Lab Solar?

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Niraj discovered that his
. . . ‘nanobowls’ manipulated light by creating a ‘plasmonic’ resonance, which
. . . quadrupled the laboratory solar cell’s efficiency,
. . . compared to a similarly made flat solar cell.”

“Current standard solar panels lose a large amount of light-energy,
. . . as it hits the surface, making the panels’ generation of electricity inefficient,
But if the cells are singing bowl-shaped,
. . . then the light bounces around inside the cell for longer” ” says Niraj.

“To a silicon solar cell, a rainbow just looks like a big bit of red in the sky,
. . . they don’t ‘see’ the blue, green or UV light,
. . . they convert all light to electricity as if it was red ,
But when we put a 2nd cell on top, which ‘sees’ the blue part of light,
. . . and allows the red to pass through to the ‘red-seeing’ cell below,
. . . we can reach a combined efficiency of more than 30%.”

Every extra % in efficiency saves you thousands of dollars over the panels lifetime.
. . . “Current roof-top solar panels have been steadily increasing in efficiency,
. . . which has been a big driver of the 4fold drop in the price,
. . . for these panels over the last 5 years.”

09-15-2014 Source:  Follow the Money: 30% efficient lab Solar?


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