Originally published on RenewEconomy. By Sophie Vorrath An ARENA-funded solar research team at the University of New South Wales has recorded the highest efficiency for a PV system ever reported, converting over 40 per cent of sunlight into electricity, with an innovative take on Australian-designed solar tower technology. The team … [continued]
By John Perlin, author of Let It Shine: The 6000-Year Story of Solar Energy. Photo’s courtesy of AT&T archive. Sixty years ago on April 25, 1954, Bell Laboratories demonstrated to the world one of the most significant breakthroughs ever recorded in the history of solar energy and of electricity – the first solar … [continued]
The following is an excellent short history of solar panels and solar power from guest contributor Dane Cross. I think you’ll thoroughly enjoy it — I did! What do Archimedes, Einstein and Arnold Schwarzenegger all have in common? Answer: They’ve all contributed to the development of solar power. From the 3rd Century BC when Archimedes … [continued]
“Scientists boosted the significance of tandem polymer solar cells by successfully testing cells with low-bandgap polymers that achieved certified conversion efficiencies of 8.62 ± 0.3% with respect to standard terrestrial reporting conditions,” the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) announced today. “Further, after the researchers incorporated a new infrared-absorbing polymer … [continued]
Sharp, GE, Google, Boeing,… who isn’t in the clean tech game these days? Boeing (yes, the airplane company) has just announced that it “plans to deliver its first commercial scale high-efficiency solar-power cells for Earth-based electricity production in January,” according to Bloomberg News. Boeing’s concentrating photovoltaic cells have an efficiency … [continued]
