The City University of New York (CUNY) released a solar map of New York City last week, allowing building owners in the city to determine the amount of solar power their roof could host. The cumulative impact is enormous, with city rooftops capable of providing half the city’s peak power, and 14% of its annual electricity consumption.
When we think of all the solar innovations, they seem relatively new, but some are older than many imagine. The solar cooker is one of these. In ancient times, the Romans used mirrors and glass that didn’t just give light to their homes and bathhouses, but also enabled them to create an oven. The major cities of Rome were often crowded and wood for fires was sometimes far away. The citizens still needed heat to make food, so they took a Greek idea of using glass to magnify heat and applied it to use as an oven. Our technology has progressed quite a bit since then, but the principle remains the same to use the energy of the sun.
An NYU student from Brooklyn decided he wanted to create a swimsuit that would cool his beer. The result: using flexible solar photovoltaics surrounded by plastics, he created a bikini that can power your iPhone, iPod or similar devices. Apparently, he’s getting to work creating a male version as well, the iDrink. This one, having more surface area, will be able to power a 1.5 amp peltier junction that can cool a beer in a custom coozy.
These look pretty cool. And apparently they are getting popular in San Diego. They are small wind turbines combined with solar panels from DyoCore. The name of this product is SolAir.
Pictures and video of the ‘Sun Cutter’ and some suncut sunglasses before a little text on it and its creator. Then, info, pictures, and video of a 3D solar-powered printer that melts sand to create glass objects.
Suntech Power developed a cheaper high efficiency solar cell design which is part monocrystalline and part multicrystalline silicon.
The U.S. agricultural sector is beginning to take on a leadership role in the transition to renewable energy, and the latest example is the California rice industry’s adoption of solar power. In a first of its kind partnership, several California rice companies po0led their stock to put together an entire shipment of rice that was not only grown with solar energy (the sun, right?), but also dried, stored, milled and packaged at solar powered facilities.
I wrote recently on the costs of wind power and how they compare to the costs of traditional forms of power like coal and nuclear when you take externalities and other subsidies into account. I was going to wait until I wrapped up our “comprehensive wind power page” to write on this topic for solar power, but a new report out from the Institute for Local Self Reliance pushed me into the topic a little early.
Samsung has developed a new computer that is solar-powered! It is the Samsung NC215S netbook and it will be the first computer of its kind. The power will come from a solar panel embedded in the lid (see image above and click to make larger).
The “New York City Solar Map” was launched last week. The map shows both existing solar PV & solar thermal installations in the Big Apple as well as solar PV rooftop potential across the city. As you can imagine, the potential is HUGE.
