Nanoantenna Arrays Seen As Possible Solar Cell Replacement
Traditional solar cells only use up to 20% of the visible light they collect, and more efficient solar cells are too expensive for mass production. Now researchers at the US Department of Energy’s Idaho Laboratory have figured out a way to capture solar energy on the cheap: plastic sheets filled with billions of nanoantennas.
The nanoantennas are made up of small gold squares or spirals set in polyethylene. Researchers believe that under the right conditions, the simulated nanoantennas could harvest up to 92% of energy at infrared wavelengths.
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While traditional solar cells only use visible light, the nanoantennas use mid-infrared rays. This means that they can still collect energy after dark.
Eventually, researchers hope that the plastic sheets of nanoantennas will power everything from hybrid cars to iPods.
Of course, there is still plenty of research that needs to be done before nanoantennas can go into production—in fact, scientists still don’t know how to convert energy from the devices into electricity. But the nanoantenna research is an interesting preview to a more affordable solar future. For now, though, we’ll have to make do with traditional devices.
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@Uncle B
Gore had 8 years in the Whitehouse to work his magic, but accomplished nothing other than to pass NAFTA, which substantially sidesteps decades of environmental legislation in the USA by sending the manufacturing to places without such laws. Thanks to NAFTA, Canadian 2-4-D which is cheaper, comes contaminated with 2-4-5-T, making it essentially Agent Orange which is being spread all over America’s lawns. It’s illegal to make brake pads with asbestos in America, but most of our cars have asbestos brakes which are made in Canada, and which we can’t refuse under NAFTA. I won’t even get into the Mexican environmental consequences… Those are too depressing, and well documented anyway.
Mostly useless.
The correct solution is to use the more expensive solar cells and concentrate light onto them. I suggest a parabolic aluminum mirror.
That’ll get you from 20% to 35% and come with a total cost of maybe $50/meter.
Want more efficiency?
Use a prism to split the light into colors and then use weird crap like this and you can probably get 80% efficiency on most of frequencies.
Best,
Dan
@Shawn,
Please do a bit of reading before you editorialize and rant about subjects that you clearly don’t understand. Nitrogen is NOT a Greenhouse gas. CO2 and Methane are two of the biggest offenders in the Greenhouse Gas category.
Methane is roughly 20 times more effective at trapping heat in the atmosphere than CO2 is. To truly make an impact on global warming we really need to look at limiting Methane emissions more than CO2. Landfills, rotting biomass, and cattle do more damage to the atmosphere by releasing Methane than all of the automobiles in the world do by emitting CO2.
How do we limit Methane emissions?… Gasification technologies can be used to convert garbage to fuels that can be used to heat buildings and power vehicles. Biomass can be converted to cellulosic Ethanol for cars. I don’t know how you get the cattle to quit farting though… Anyone got any ideas there? GasX maybe?
Oh, Shawn. You silly, small minded person.
To even suggest that ‘limiting C02′ would ‘hurt’ the economy is totally imaginary. My brother-in-law runs a wind tower manufacturing plant. My 2nd cousin is going to be an engineer, working on wind and solar energy production. My B-I-L is currently ADDING to the economy. My cousin will be doing so after he graduates.
So, to blatantly lie like that instantly makes you part of the problem. And… whether you like it or not, Peak Oil is real. The economy is going to hurt after cheap plentiful oil runs out. Once it does, alternatives will be sought after.
Shawn, who do you think will be making money after Peak Oil? Well, that would be anyone working in the alternative energy industries. You won’t be there. Nope. Not you. You’ll still be presenting your imaginary issues and your imagainary scenarios.
You are quite silly. Quite.
Here in the United States there is possibly the greatest wasted solar energy opportunity in the world
if we installed a solar station in death Valley one-mile by 1 mile square would it not produce enough energy to run the entire United States and never have to burn another coal plant again.
For the life of me I do not know why Bill Gates and some of the other billionaires cannot get together and get this done because land is super cheap in death Valley as well as an abundant amount of silken to make the solar panel with so why aren’t the billion-dollar companies investing in this opportunity.
[...] future energy, potential energy, solar news, solar power, sun solar by asteres According to cleantechnica.com, researchers at the US Department of Energy’s labs in Idaho have developed a technology that [...]
Efficiency isn’t important; cost is. If you have a device that’s only 10% efficient, but costs 1% as much to make per square meter as a 100% efficient device, you’re in business. The point of the nanoantennas is that they’re
a) potentially WAY cheaper than traditional solar cells per unit area, and
b) better for the environment, since they generally don’t require as many harmful chemicals to manufacture as most photovoltaics.
Incidentally, the infrared antennas are only a stepping stone. There’s a lot of work being done on visible optical antennas as well. The efficiency/cost isn’t there yet, but it will be someday soon.
I bet this array could be made even more useful with a black quartz filter. The quartz turns UV and some visible light into IR. If it works, then there would be more IR to absorb. Now they just need to figure out how to utilize it.