Posts Tagged solar panel

Nanowire Solar Panel More Efficient at No Additional Cost

Posted by Benji Jerew in Solar Power on April 9, 2013

Solar installation prices continue to fall as solar panel manufacturers add to the glut of solar panels on the market already. The standard silicon-based solar panel is no more efficient than before, and there are just too many on the market to make a profit. Other technologies could make solar panels more efficient, but not [...]

BioSolar’s Solar Panel Backsheet Made With Bio-Oil, Not Petroleum

Posted by Benji Jerew in Solar Power on March 14, 2013

Typically, manufacturers apply a protective backsheet made of plastic, but BioSolar’s solar panel bio-oil backsheet has no petroleum component. The semiconductor photovoltaic solar panel needs some measure of protection as well as electrical insulation. For this reason, petroleum-based plastic works well as a backsheet for pretty much all solar panels that are manufactured today. Up [...]

Holographic Solar Panels – Cheaper and More Efficient

Posted by Leigh Kim in Solar Power on February 1, 2013

Apollo Shipping GmbH & Co. KG, from Dresden, and Solar Bankers LLC, which is based in Arizona, have banded together to develop a silicon-based solar panel with a holographic foil that is twice as efficient as typical models. Apollo and Solar Bankers said that instead of the typical 17% efficiency of other panels, their solar [...]

Solar Frontier Establishes New Record in Thin Film Efficiency: 19.7%

Posted by Benji Jerew in Solar Power on January 13, 2013

We’ve been covering a lot of advancements in the area of photovoltaic [PV] solar power, from how long solar panels last, decades that is, to breaking the efficiency barrier, which has stood at 18.6% for the last ten years. Some prototype panels have boasted higher efficiency values, up to 44% in the case of a [...]

Learning From Deep-Sea Bacteria to Increase Solar Panel Efficiency

Posted by Benji Jerew in Solar Power on January 7, 2013

Photovoltaic [PV] solar panels are a really green way to generate electricity. They are simple, have zero emissions, and last for decades. They also take up space, and the more electricity required, the more space they use, and not everyone has a whole lot of space they’d like to give up for solar panel installations. [...]

Solar Panel Exceeds Original Specifications After 30 Years of Service

Posted by Benji Jerew in Solar Power on October 30, 2012

There aren’t too many things that we bought in 1980 that are still functioning just as they were when new, much less in existence. This might be a good time to check your warranty, if you still have something like a solar installation on your roof or land. Any good company will have a decent [...]

How to Build a Cheap DIY Solar Panel System for Under $1,000

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in How to..., Solar Power on June 13, 2012

Let’s face it: we’re still living the post-traumatic stress of what’s happened in 2008, and we’re still living uncertain times when every cent we take from the bank is thoroughly analyzed before we actually sign a contract. The lack of financial stability has caused astute savings among those who learned how to save what they [...]

Imported Chinese Solar Panels Causing Instability in U.S. Industry

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Green Policy on November 9, 2011

An economic “war” is about to unleash between China’s solar panel industry and the U.S.’s, as the latter applied more than $1 billion in duties to the imports from China. Also, Solyndra LLC blamed the Chinese low-priced solar cells for their September bankruptcy. The two Chinese companies that have been accused of unfair policies are [...]

An Interesting Report on Solar Panel Efficiency in Near Space Conditions

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Experiments, Solar Power on December 21, 2010

You don’t really have to be an accredited scientist to prove the world that you actually can do scientific experiments. All you need is passion, knowledge and a little financial effort. That’s how a team of San Diego engineering students succeeded doing an experiment that involved sending a balloon, solar panels, cockroaches and anti-freeze Cucujus beetles into near-space.

Israeli Company Builds Floating Concentrated Solar Panels To Help Clearing Lands

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Solar Power on November 19, 2010

Keeping the land clear for useful projects is vital to some countries that have limited space and that have to manage it as tightly as possible.
If those countries will want to rely on solar power in the future, they’ll have to find solutions for managing their solar fields and the land is just not proper for that in some cases. But water bodies are.

Suntech's New Power Optimizers Could Solve Solar Panel Efficiency Issues Related To Shades

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Solar Power on October 15, 2010

Solar panels are usually mounted in series, to sum up their voltages, and the resulting power is sent to a large inverter, which transforms the DC voltage into AC. One big issue with this scheme is that if shade falls on one panel, or it gets dirty, the inverter lowers the current of all the other panels, and causing power losses through inefficiency.

Dutch Researchers Designing 65% Efficient Nanowire Solar Cells

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Solar Power on June 18, 2010

High efficiency solar cells are for the moment only available to space applications, because of their prohibitive costs. The Eindhoven University of Technology from The Netherlands, with a EUR 1.2 million help from the Dutch government wants to develop ultra-efficient solar cells that are also cheap. They envision their cells having a 65% efficiency, something even the satellites would envy.

Canadian Company Installs 1 MWh of Solar Power in Italy

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Solar Power on June 14, 2010

The Italian town of Narni has been in the attention of the press these days as Canadian Solar, an important solar power company announced the opening and commissioning of a 1 MW solar farm, called SOLARTA.

Shimizu's Master Plan For a 11,000 Km Long, 400 Km-Wide Lunar Solar Belt

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Solar Power on June 2, 2010

A Japanese company, Shimizu, dreams of turning the Moon’s ecuator into an 11,000 kilometers long solar collector, and bring that energy “down” to Earth via a 20-km wide dishes, through microwaves and lasers. The belt would have widths ranging from a few to 400 km. Now, how brilliant is that?

Solar Powered Windows From Pythagoras Solar Both Transparent and Productive

Posted by Ovidiu Sandru in Solar Power on May 19, 2010

Some solar energy adopters wish to use their solar panels in the classic manner – installed on a roof or in their backyard. Still, there are situations where installing a flat solar panel is near to impossible, due to space limitations in places like corporate buildings or where aesthetics matters.