An industrial carbon dioxide recycling plant is being developed by Canadian scientists that could one day suck CO2 out of the atmosphere and convert it into a zero-carbon e-diesel fuel. Developed by tech start-up Carbon Engineering and partly funded by Bill Gates, the system will essentially do the job of trees, but in places unable to host them, such as icy plains and deserts. (Video)
Solar cell printers.
We’ve come a long way from the solar-powered calculator to waiting to see when innovators are going to give us solar-powered smartphones, where most of our calculators are these days. While the average energy consumer is busy worrying about such everyday concerns, scientists at the Victorian Organic Solar Cell Consortium (VICOSC) are wondering how to power entire buildings, and pretty much the whole planet, as the technology they are creating will be easily transferred inexpensively to developing and third-world areas, thanks to 3D printing and design. (Video)
Continue reading… “The sky’s the limit for 3D printing solar panels”
Flexible solar cells.
The Victorian Organic Solar Cell Consortium (VICOSC), CSIRO, and the University of Melbourne has developed a new printer that has allowed researchers at the university to print solar cells up to the size of an A3 sheet of paper. The solar cell printer makes renewable energy even easier to source.
Continue reading… “Printing Australia’s largest solar cells”
Solar cells thinner than a thread of spider silk.
On Wednesday, researchers from Austria and Japan unveiled solar cells thinner than a thread of spider silk that are flexible enough to be wrapped around a single human hair.
Continue reading… “Scientists develop solar cells thinner than spider silk”
Kyosemi’s Sphelar cells
Solar cell designs need to be aimed directly at the sun to be most efficient. But a company in Japan has come up with a clever new approach using spherical micro cells that can harness the sun’s rays from any direction.
Continue reading… “Spherical solar cells capture sunlight from all directions”
Titanium dioxide nanoparticles coated with cadmium sulfide produced a yellow paste that, when painted onto a transparent conductive material, generates electricity.
The next coat of paint you put on the outside of your home could generate electricity from light — electricity that can be used to power the appliances and equipment on the inside.
Continue reading… “Researchers develop paint-on solar cells”
MIT’s Test Cell
Solar cells are intended to mimic the photosynthesis of plants — converting light into energy in the most efficient manner possible. But what other characteristics of plants could be handy for the renewable energy sector to mimic? How about the self-assembly of chloroplast, the component of plants that do all the vital photosynthesis. Leaves repair themselves after sun damage again and again to keep up their ability to convert light into energy. Now, MIT researchers believe they’ve discovered how to use this self-assembly to restore solar cells damaged by the sun.
The outdoor Cumuli cable-suspended lamp has solar panels above and LEDs below.
OK, I can admit it – I was one of those people that a few years ago ran out and bought those generic-looking solar garden path lamps and strung them all along the walkways up to my front door. Subsequently I was hugely disappointed that the lamps’ weak pale glow wasn’t enough to keep people from tripping over them and falling into the flower beds. Since then, solar LED lighting, especially for commercial applications, has taken huge leaps in beauty and functionality, and newcomer Qnuru’s designs – by sculptor Tom Joyce – reflect the advances.
Solar LEDs growing up
Qnuru (pronounced Kuh-Noo-Roo) is a family of solar LED lights using granite, forged and cast iron, and aluminum in different shapes together with solar cells, LEDs and microprocessor controllers….
Continue reading… “Qnuru’s Solar Landscape Redefines LEDs”
Robert X. Cringely: It isn’t very often I get to apply Moore’s Law to a non-Information Technology business and rarer still that I can then relate the whole thing back to Microsoft, so I’m going for it. Here’s what the solar power industry can teach us about Microsoft.
Continue reading… “Microsoft and the Electric Power Industry Have a Lot in Common”