Silicon-based solar cells have a theoretical efficiency limit of around 30 per cent, but adding a perovskite layer enables new designs to harvest more energy.
By Alex Wilkins
“Part of what we’re doing is conceptually simple, reflecting sunlight to a solar panel located in the dark,” said Maxar Chief Robotics Architect and lead for Light Bender Sean Dougherty in a Maxar statement. “Where it gets complex is doing that without humans involved. We’re leveraging investments in autonomy to study how NASA can use robots to assemble and deploy a set of reflectors that keep sunlight focused on a solar panel operating in the shadows. It’s never been done before.”
Light Bender works by hoisting two 33-foot (10-meter) reflectors up a 65-foot (20-meter) telescoping mast. One mirror autonomously tracks the sun and reflects that light to the second mirror, which then reflects those rays towards the intended solar panels.
The Light Bender project is a collaboration between Maxar and NASA’s Langley Research Center, and is scheduled for its first terrestrial demonstration in 2025. The company was awarded the contract in May 2023, under NASA’s Announcement of Collaboration Opportunity Program. For their part, NASA’s team is responsible for Light Bender’s structural design, and Maxar is taking the lead on the robotics — an aptitude for which the company has demonstrated in the past.
In energy policy debates, nuclear energy and renewable energy technologies are sometimes viewed as competitors.
In reality, they could be better, together.
At the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Ben Lindley, an assistant professor of engineering physics and an expert on nuclear reactors, and Mike Wagner, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering and a solar energy expert, are studying the feasibility and benefits of such a coupling.
This photographer drove six hours from his home in order to find the perfect position for this event that would take place for less than a minute!
Photovoltaic cells work best when sunlight is incident directly on them. To make the most of sunlight available during the day, scientists have relied on solar tracking to move panels in sync with the Sun as its travels across the sky. However, installing these systems increases the cost of deploying solar panels, which is a significant obstacle to their wide-scale adoption.
As the world gets warmer, the use of power-hungry air conditioning systems is projected to increase significantly, putting a strain on existing power grids and bypassing many locations with little or no reliable electric power. Now, an innovative system developed at MIT offers a way to use passive cooling to preserve food crops and supplement conventional air conditioners in buildings, with no need for power and only a small need for water.
The system, which combines radiative cooling, evaporative cooling, and thermal insulation in a slim package that could resemble existing solar panels, can provide up to about 19 degrees Fahrenheit (9.3 degrees Celsius) of cooling from the ambient temperature, enough to permit safe food storage for about 40 percent longer under very humid conditions. It could triple the safe storage time under dryer conditions.
The findings are reported today in the journal Cell Reports Physical Science, in a paper by MIT postdoc Zhengmao Lu, Arny Leroy PhD ’21, professors Jeffrey Grossman and Evelyn Wang, and two others. While more research is needed in order to bring down the cost of one key component of the system, the researchers say that eventually such a system could play a significant role in meeting the cooling needs of many parts of the world where a lack of electricity or water limits the use of conventional cooling systems.
Perovskite solar cells designed by a team of scientists from the National University of Singapore (NUS) have attained a world record efficiency of 24.35% with an active area of 1 cm2. This achievement paves the way for cheaper, more efficient and durable solar cells.
To facilitate consistent comparisons and benchmarking of different solar cell technologies, the photovoltaic (PV) community uses a standard size of at least 1 cm2 to report the efficiency of one-sun solar cells in the “Solar cell efficiency tables.” Prior to the record-breaking feat by the NUS team, the best 1 cm2 perovskite solar cell recorded a power conversion efficiency of 23.7%. This ground-breaking achievement in maximizing power generation from next-generation renewable energy sources will be crucial to securing the world’s energy future.
Perovskites are a class of materials that exhibit high light absorption efficiency and ease of fabrication, making them promising for solar cell applications. In the past decade, perovskite solar cell technology has achieved several breakthroughs, and the technology continues to evolve.
The idea of solar energy being transmitted from space is not a new one. In 1968, a NASA engineer named Peter Glaser produced the first concept design for a solar-powered satellite. But only now, 55 years later, does it appear scientists have actually carried out a successful experiment. A team of researchers from Caltech announced on Thursday that their space-borne prototype, called the Space Solar Power Demonstrator (SSPD-1), had collected sunlight, converted it into electricity and beamed it to microwave receivers installed on a rooftop on Caltech’s Pasadena campus. The experiment also proves that the setup, which launched on January 3, is capable of surviving the trip to space, along with the harsh environment of space itself.
“To the best of our knowledge, no one has ever demonstrated wireless energy transfer in space even with expensive rigid structures. We are doing it with flexible lightweight structures and with our own integrated circuits. This is a first,” said Ali Hajimiri, professor of electrical engineering and medical engineering and co-director of Caltech’s Space Solar Power Project (SSPP), in a press release published on Thursday.
Continue reading “Scientists claim they’re the first to transmit space-based solar power to Earth” »
Stella Vita is the World’s first ever solar powered campervan capable of a staggering 600 Km on a single charge! Aptly described as a “self-sustaining house on wheels” it comes kitted out with a double bed, sofa, kitchen area, a shower, sink and toilet! This could just be the perfect way to go off-grid…! Robert went to meet the engineers at Eindhoven University of Technology to see it for himself.
0:00 A solar powered campervan?!
1:20 A 3000Km road trip.
3:55 Better than the back of a Tesla.
4:38 Back to Uni.
6:40 600Km of range.
7:12 Everything is lightweight.
8:51 Experimental but comfortable.
9:44 Key design elements.
10:43 Built in this room.
11:35 Robert makes his bid.
12:02 Arriving in Tarifa.
12:50 Can we buy one?
13:30 Bobby’s outro.
Residents feel trapped and choked by dust, while experts warn environmental damage is ‘solving one problem by creating others’.
