Big boost for solar cell efficiency

[menotu]

tgdaily - 7 dec 2012

Princeton researchers say they've found a cheap and simple way to nearly triple the efficiency of organic solar cells.

Their nanostructured sandwich of metal and plastic collects and traps light, and can also be used in conventional inorganic solar collectors, such as standard silicon solar panels. And it's ready for commercial use, they say.

Called a subwavelength plasmonic cavity, the sandwich is the foundation for a solar cell that absorbs as much as 96 percent of light, with 52 percent higher efficiency in converting light to electrical energy than a conventional solar cell.

"It is like a black hole for light," says professor Stephen Chou. "It traps it."

http://www.tgdaily.com/sustainability-features/67923-big-boost-for-solar-cell-efficiency

[MaddogF16]

Problem is, in the solar industry right now when a more efficient method is found they tend to price it out of range of decent pay back range. At our corp. we have 2 wind turbines, 3 methane generators, and a waste burner generator, all in an effort to "go green" and solar for electricity is running 4 times longer in the pay-back department so we avoided it. We do use a small bank of solar for hot water regeneration but not electrical.