Scientists Develop Affordable Solar Panels That Work In The Dark

[DREDIOCK]

The patent rights will most likely be bought out by a large corp. and we won't see it for another 20 years.

I was watching a show the other day that had that asian physicist you often see on the discovery type channels.
He was saying that between the advances being made in the technology and the costs coming down. It should be a viable alternative energy source within the next 15 years.

Currently the single largest inhibitor of solar is its cost.

course accelerating oil prices may make this come to pass sooner

[grizz441]

Currently the single largest inhibitor of solar is its cost.

Similarly, the single largest inhibitor preventing us from visiting other solar systems is not being able to travel the speed of light.

[tf15pin]

That is some impressive materials work. I think the challenge will be to tune the intermediate band to an energy that will satisfy the continuity requirements and not act as a giant recombination center for the electrons you have already managed to promote to the conduction band in the two step process. I would be interested to see a calculation of the density of states available in the intermediate band.

[Seraphim]

http://newscenter.lbl.gov/feature-stories/2011/01/24/practical-full-spectrum/

This article is essentially what we've been doing for the past ten years, however the materials may be slightly different. They are just calling them 'multiband' instead of what we call 'multijunction'.
They also talk about vapor deposition, which is cheaper, but an older technology. We use Vapor Prime Epitaxy, which is much more expensive, but makes them much more robust.

Again, ours are used for space primarily, this upcoming stuff primarily for terrestrial, which does not the have the extremities of space.

I would still like to see some of their numbers on efficiency.

[Carrel]

I was watching a show the other day that had that asian physicist you often see on the discovery type channels.
He was saying that between the advances being made in the technology and the costs coming down. It should be a viable alternative energy source within the next 15 years.

Currently the single largest inhibitor of solar is its cost.

course accelerating oil prices may make this come to pass sooner

QFT.

[moot]

Similarly, the single largest inhibitor preventing us from visiting other solar systems is not being able to travel the speed of light.

http://www.sens.org/sens-research

[DREDIOCK]

Similarly, the single largest inhibitor preventing us from visiting other solar systems is not being able to travel the speed of light.

Yes but somehow I think we're alot closer to using solar as a primary source of energy then we are at traveling at light speed
Although

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/3303699/We-have-broken-speed-of-light.html 

[tf15pin]

This article is essentially what we've been doing for the past ten years, however the materials may be slightly different. They are just calling them 'multiband' instead of what we call 'multijunction'.
They also talk about vapor deposition, which is cheaper, but an older technology. We use Vapor Prime Epitaxy, which is much more expensive, but makes them much more robust.

Again, ours are used for space primarily, this upcoming stuff primarily for terrestrial, which does not the have the extremities of space.

I would still like to see some of their numbers on efficiency.

It is quite a bit different; they are using a single material with an intermediate band that acts as a step ladder for low energy photons (charge separation is only happening at highest energy level). Your tandem (and higher order) cells are basically separate cells stacked in series to pull out a certain band width in each cell (charge separation is happening in each cell). Tandem cells will be a lot easier to optimize because you can adjust the thickness of each layer to satisfy continuity requirements, where in theirs they have to find a way to move that intermediate band. This will affect the short circuit current and fill factor of the cell meaning low power output if it isn't done well.

The extremities of space are radiation, vacuum, and temperature, but the extremities of terrestrial environments are dust, debris, and weather. So the semiconductor materials might not have to be as robust, but the packaging will have to be more so.

I read the primary source and the external quantum efficiency of their test cell was less than 1%. But again it was a proof of concept so getting it to work at all was the goal of the work.

[Seraphim]

P.S.

Actually, our cells must withstand all of what space & terrestrial have to offer.

I had the privilege of testing the Mars rover solar panels, which had to survive launch, deployment, landing, and the martian dust storms, their mission was designed to last about 90 days.

Spirit lasted 6 years.

Opportunity, still rollin'

And just in case anyone was interested, a link to my company's site.

And, thanks tf15pin, for that clarification.

[CptTrips]

Solar panels can be a good investment and positive return if the governement pays for the panels with money it doesn't have to eat the loss. 

Its a good idea for the goverment to subsidize and promote local energy production as much as possible.  Energy = economy = our way of life.  When the energy we need is held in the hands of cultures that want to see us destroyed, our civilization lives with a knife held to its throat.

Its all about perspective.  I couldn't find the figure for solar panel subsidies but I think its a couple of hunderd million a year.  We give the oil companies about 4$ billion a year in subsidies.  We've spent around 1$ Trillion on Iraq and Afganistan since 2001.   

We "subsidized" space travel in the early 60's, but reaped huge benefits in accelerating technologies such computers and material science.  Think of the huge costs of sending all those veterns to college on the GI Bill after WWII.  Wasteful spending?  I don't think so.  I bet the Government made that back 2 fold in increased tax revenues over their lifespan.  Goverments subsides are not always a bad investment when chosen carefully, IMHO.

Regards,
Wab


 

[bozon]

We "subsidized" space travel in the early 60's, but reaped huge benefits in accelerating technologies such computers and material science.  Think of the huge costs of sending all those veterns to college on the GI Bill after WWII.  Wasteful spending?  I don't think so.  I bet the Government made that back 2 fold in increased tax revenues over their lifespan.  Goverments subsides are not always a bad investment when chosen carefully, IMHO.

The problem is that treasury people find it hard to factor general science and technological research into their bogus economy formulas. Therefore they are reluctant to subsidize anything that does not have an immediate and clear application. This promotes capitalization on current knowledge, but very little advancement and breakthroughs which tend to come in unexpected ways.

Look at the US space program now: Man on Mars? no. Man on the moon? no. OK, how about just sending man in orbit? no. I guess the US goverment requires another Sputnik wakeup call because now, only the Russian and Chinese are capable of sending men into space - ironically American astronauts will now fly to the ISS on Russian rockets...

[moot]

Not if e.g. SpaceX can help it.  And ULA if they wake up to SpaceX's challenge.