Soon it will be possible to produce solar cells more cheaply by using nano-particle ink that allows them to be printed like newspapers, or to cover external walls or roofs with them to absorb solar radiation and convert it into electricity
Dr. Moshe Nahamani
Soon it will be possible to produce solar cells more cheaply by using nano-particle ink that allows them to be printed like newspapers, or to cover external walls or roofs with them to absorb solar radiation and convert it into electricity.
Brian Korgel, a chemical engineer at the University of Texas at Austin, predicts that the price of the new cells will be only about a tenth of their current price following the replacement of the usual production process of solar cells - gaseous deposition in an empty cell, which requires high temperatures and is relatively expensive.
"This is what is required to make solar cell and similar photovoltaic cell technologies more common," said the researcher. "The sun is an almost unlimited source of energy, but technologies for utilizing this solar energy are limited and expensive, and therefore not competitive relative to petroleum-derived fuels."
For the past two years, the scientist and his research team have worked together on developing a cheap manufacturing process for these cells based on nanomaterials. The initial findings of this study were published in the scientific journal Journal of the American Chemical Society.
The ink could be printed using printing rolls on a plastic substrate or on stainless steel. And the ability to paint the walls of buildings and roofs with this ink is extremely practical. "You will have to paint one layer of the sun-absorbing material and several other layers in addition," explains the researcher. "This is one step in the direction of dyed solar cells."
The researchers use solar-absorbing nanomaterials whose thickness is ten thousand times smaller than the thickness of a single human hair, and this microscopic size allows obtaining physical properties that help increase the efficiency of devices of this type.
In 2002, the researcher founded a company in California called Innovalight that produces types of ink in which Zoran is used as a base. Now, the researchers are using a copper-indium-gallium-selenide (CIGS) material, which is both cheaper and more environmentally friendly. "This material has several possible advantages relative to the mold," the researcher points out. "This is a semiconductor with a direct band gap, which means that less material is needed to create the solar cell - a very significant economic advantage." The research team developed a prototype of this type of solar cell whose efficiency is XNUMX percent; However, they are required to have an efficiency of ten percent to be competitive alternatives to the methods that exist today. If this goal is realized, it will be possible to see the finished product on the market within five years." The researchers add that the ink, which is semi-transparent, could also be used in dual-purpose windows that would provide properties of solar cells.
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They say that a leader is the one who sees where the herd is going and shouts (prematurely) after me. Ray Kurzweil is such a….
Solar energy will not replace fossil energy so quickly, not in the next 20 years, and not 100%.
Cleantech energy technologies are still in their infancy, and have a low efficiency relative to fossil energy (mainly solar energy) - 1% efficiency, and that's not to mention that the British Society for Science is talking about raising dust into the atmosphere through spontaneous volcanic eruptions to block a significant portion of the sun's rays (for the purposes of cooling the earth) which will further reduce the usefulness of the cells if this happens...
Thank you Ami and Eyal
One of Ray Kurzweil's main arguments (in his book, in his lectures) is that within the next 20 years solar energy will provide 100% (and much more) of humanity's energy needs, thanks to the use of methods based on nanotechnology, and it will also be much more affordable in terms of cost/ Benefit over the use of oil or natural gas -
http://www.tapuz.co.il/blog/ViewEntry.asp?EntryId=1065939
A question about the printed collectors,
How can they be connected to the power grid? I guess not via cables, but still, what's the way?
Chen T,
on the contrary. These surfaces absorb the sun's energy by converting it into electrical energy. The roof of your house, if it is not covered with such collectors, then it simply does not convert the sun's energy into electrical energy, but returns part of it to the atmosphere, which in turn, through the greenhouse effect, returns it back to the ground (again partially), and the roof converts the rest into heat energy..
The farmer will be able to cover his area with a surface that absorbs sunlight from certain light waves and allows other waves to pass (filters, in standard Hebrew) and under the collectors he will be able to grow his plants.
Regarding the warming: today the situation is that all the sun that reaches the earth and is not returned to space (albedo) turns here either into heat immediately or into consumer products that will eventually turn into heat. It seems to me that there is no fear of warming. If anything, then the opposite, because the growth rate of greenhouse gases from fossil sources will decrease
Imagine that every house in the country is painted this color and it is said that 10 percent of the electricity it receives from the sun drives the elevator, the air conditioner in the reception room, and finances the maintenance company by selling it to an electricity company.
Think of a situation in which a farmer who was not successful in his crops, will cover his area with such energy collectors and make a living selling electricity to an electricity company, 9 months a year. Of course, he can also cover the entire upper part of the greenhouse with the same collectors.
Another step on the way to printed clothes that will absorb energy and charge a computer on a garment and a cell phone. But, if such products become as common as jeans, for example, and absorb increasing percentages of the sun's energy, won't this increase the warming of the atmosphere in greater proportion to the gases produced when we use stupid electricity (based on coal, gas)?