Article originally published on www.greenbiz.com in July 8th 2015.
Mirroring the sun
Power pods
Printing panels
When it comes to solar energy, much of the emphasis of
late has been on declining prices. And with good reason; the closer to cost
parity with fossil fuels, the more likely solar adoption is to accelerate.
But in addition to all of the activity around solar
business models and financing mechanisms, underlying solar technologies also
remain a major point of interest. From streamlining manufacturing processes to
decreasing environmental impacts or simply trying to make it easier to generate
power from the sun, a slew of companies are in the business of solar
innovation.
Among the solar technologies on the horizon: Solar
windows; spray-on solar and solar panels that dissolve in water after their
useful life.
The hard part, as is so often the case when it comes
to new technology, is making a solid business case and scaling new solutions.
Here's a glimpse of how three specific solar
technologies aim to deploy renewable energy in inventive formats.
Mirroring the sun
Sweden-based Ripasso Energy already has 3 gigawatts of manufacturing capacity
and is testing its solar concentrating mirrors in South Africa's Kalahari
desert.
The system involves huge, 100-square-meter dishes that
rotate automatically, accurately following the sun. They concentrate the sun
on a small point in the center, which drives a zero-emissions Stirling Engine, reports The Guardian.
The mirrors convert 32 percent of the sun's energy
into electricity — much more than the 21 percent converted by the most
efficient solar panels. Yet the mirrors also take up much less land than other
concentrating solutions and require no water at all.
One mirror generates 80 megawatt hours of electricity
a year, enough to power an average 24 average homes, according to tests by IT
Power.
The challenge, of course, is to get costs down and to
get enough financing, and the mirrors can be used only in areas with strong
sunshine.
Power pods
ECO-GEN claims that its modular solar system brings the
costs way down to generate clean electricity. All you need is four to eight
solar panels and an 8-foot by 6-foot box called the JouleBox Hybrid
Generator.
Each modular pod produces 60 kilowatts
of continuous energy a year, rain or shine, by tethering
the solar panels to an integrated turbine generator backup
system. The boxes can be stacked and expanded to 50
megawatts (MW).
To generate 20 MW takes up less than 55,000
square feet, in contrast to a solar farm which would cover over 600
acres. Although the company eventually plans to make the pods for homeowners,
ECO-GEN is starting with commercial applications.
Printing panels
Organic solar cells have been under development for
years — flexible, cheap, portable and printable solar cells — and the first
generation of the technology is getting close to commercialization.
After printing solar cells, larger cells can be
attached to windows to produce electricity and smaller ones can be
used to charge smartphones and laptop computers, for example.
The technology works by printing a fine layer of solar
semiconductor "ink" onto plastic or steel to capture sunlight. Right
now, the printed cells are only 10 percent as efficient as solar panels
(although they are also much smaller).
Ink and plastic hardly cost anything, and silicon gets
cheaper all the time. With these encouraging economics, the hope is that cheap,
printed solar cells could end up in all sorts of applications — especially as
they work well even when it's cloudy.
Australia's Victorian
Organic Solar Cell Consortium has a goal to develop organic solar PV
cells that can be printed commercially and get 10 percent
efficiency for 10 years — an endeavor it has termed the 10plus10
challenge.
"Eventually we see these being laminated to
windows that line skyscrapers. By printing directly to materials like
steel, we'll also be able to embed cells onto roofing materials," David
Jones, who coordinates the consortium, told Phys.org. They even could be attached to solar panels to
boost their power.
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