Printable Solar Cells

nanosolar Printable Solar Cells
This looks pretty cool - solar power you can roll out like roofing material. Could really open up the market for locally generated solar power. From the company's website:
Nanosolar has developed the world's most cost-efficient solar electricity technology and is working to bring it to customers everywhere and capture a significant fraction of the world’s electricity generation.

Improving the cost of solar electricity means optimizing power-conversion performance (W/sqft), product cost ($/sqft), lifetime (years), as well as other system and installation costs ($) – and the optimum of this is generally not the maximum of any individual dimensions. (For instance, the highest efficiency does not necessarily result in the lowest cost.) In addition, addressing the market in volume requires scalable production and technology with robust high yield and low capital expenditures ($/MW).

Conventional solar electricity systems based on crystalline silicon wafers have succeeded in meeting the first several billion dollars of annual market need for solar electricity systems. But the industry is finding it increasingly difficult to further optimize products based on the inherently stiff amounts of material and energy required, as well as production fundamentally limited by processes based on moving batches of fragile wafers and/or glass plates through a factory.

In order to make solar electricity scale beyond the limitations found with crystalline silicon, substantial amounts of R&D have been invested over the past two decades into novel kinds of approaches based on much thinner and more easily processable solar cells. These thin-film cells are based on non-silicon semiconductors (inorganic semiconductors of the IIb/VIa and Ib/IIIa/VIa families as well as solution-coatable organic semiconductors) which can absorb the same amount of sunlight as crystalline silicon but in layers that are at least two orders of magnitude thinner. (ref.)

Designed to be easily installed on large low-slope rooftops or directly integrated with leading commercial roofing membrane products (such as single-ply thermoplastic membranes), customers can save on installation and achieve even lower total system cost.

With multiple SolarPly™ sheets readily interconnected, large areas of sunpower collection and electricity generation can be easily created. Nanosolar has developed reference designs and mounting mechanism for all of the most common types of building structures.(ref.)

The University of Toronto has developed a 'spray on' solar collection material that is capable of capturing energy in the infra red spectrum. “We made particles from semiconductor crystals which were exactly two, three or four nanometres in size. The nanoparticles were so small they remained dispersed in everyday solvents just like the particles in paint,” explains Sargent. Then, they tuned the tiny nanocrystals to catch light at very long wavelengths. The result – a sprayable infrared detector.

Existing technology has given us solution-processible, light-sensitive materials that have made large, low-cost solar cells, displays, and sensors possible, but these materials have so far only worked in the visible light spectrum, says Sargent.
...
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.” (article)

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Smart venetian blinds - 30% efficient solar collection, and it looks great too!

Wind power

Technically, wind is a form of solar power that has already been converted into mechanical power.

From the Sept. 1990 Issue of Scientific American:
About 90% of the wind power potential of the U.S. is in 12 contiguous states, where large scale ranching and grain producction are major industries. Wind power could be a good neighbor to such agricultural activities. Experience shows that the value of ranchland increases rapidly when it is converted to wind farms, while using only around 5% of the grazing area since cattle can continue to graze around the wind turbines".


From Canadian Geographic:
Since 200 bc, when windmills were used to pump water in China and grind grain in Persia, wind has been providing power to the people. Wind is the world's fastest-growing energy source increasing by some 24 percent a year over the past decade. Approximately 20 percent of Denmark's electricity comes from wind, with the goal of reaching 50 percent by 2030. Parts of Germany and Spain are producing 14 and 22 percent, respectively, and India, China and Argentina are making advances. Alberta alone has enough wind potential to power up three million homes.



From Wired Magazine:
(May 22, 2005)
Wind power could generate enough electricity to support the world's energy needs several times over, according to a new map of global wind speeds that scientists say is the first of its kind.

The map, compiled by researchers at Stanford University, shows wind speeds at more than 8,000 sites around the world. The researchers found that at least 13 percent of those sites experience winds fast enough to power a modern wind turbine. If turbines were set up in all these regions, they would generate 72 terawatts of electricity, according to the researchers. That's more than five times the world's energy needs, which was roughly 14 terawatts in 2002, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.


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Global wind map identifies wind power potential
Wind turbines a breeze for migrating birds