Vastly improved solar cells :)

[nelg]

Professor Peter Peumans of Stanford University, who has reviewed the U of T team's research, also acknowledges the groundbreaking nature of the work. "Our calculations show that, with further improvements in efficiency, combining infrared and visible photovoltaics could allow up to 30 per cent of the sun's radiant energy to be harnessed, compared to six per cent in today's best plastic solar cells."

http://www.physorg.com/news2617.html

 

[silence]

thats nice.....making something work 5 times better. really nice. lets hope they come to market soon.

 

[London Geezer]

I'm waiting for the day we have small black holes to use, so they'll be able to absorb 100% of the light. Just don't feed them too much or they'll absorb the planet.

 

[Wunderchu]

Professor Peter Peumans of Stanford University, who has reviewed the U of T team's research, also acknowledges the groundbreaking nature of the work. "Our calculations show that, with further improvements in efficiency, combining infrared and visible photovoltaics could allow up to 30 per cent of the sun's radiant energy to be harnessed, compared to six per cent in today's best plastic solar cells."

http://www.physorg.com/news2617.html

excellent ..... IMO, solar cells have always had tons of potential, but the main thing holding them back was their horrible efficiency.. so to make up for that awful efficiency, one always had to use huge solar cells that took up a lot of space ............ I am really excited about this news.. thanx for the heads up, nelg

 

[Frank]

Well, solar cells are more than 90% efficient already for the radiation bands that are absorbed. The term "efficiency" as regarded to solar cells is highly misleading. As long as things like neutrinos, long wave radio and X-ray radiation won't be absorbed (and they won't), they aren't going to absorb even half the solar energy that touches the surface.

And solar cells that absorb about 30% of the total energy are nothing new. You just need to add enough layers for each frequency. The're just very expensive, which is why commercial grade cells don't absorb more than about 12% of all the energy. They use less layers to make the cells much cheaper.