- Reaction score
- 1,675
Solar panels are fantastic pieces of technology, but we need to work out how to make them even more efficient – and scientists just solved a 40-year-old mystery around one of the key obstacles to increased efficiency.
A new study outlines a material defect in silicon used to produce solar cells that has previously gone undetected. It could be responsible for the 2 percent efficiency drop that solar cells can see in the first hours of use: Light Induced Degradation (LID).
Multiplied by the increasing number of panels installed at solar farms around the world, that drop equals a significant cost in gigawatts that non-renewable energy sources have to make up for.
In fact, the estimated loss in efficiency worldwide from LID is estimated to equate to more energy than can be generated by the UK's 15 nuclear power plants. The new discovery could help scientists make up some of that shortfall.
"Because of the environmental and financial impact solar panel 'efficiency degradation' has been the topic of much scientific and engineering interest in the last four decades," says one of the researchers, Tony Peaker from the University of Manchester in the UK.
Read more here. (Science Alert)
A new study outlines a material defect in silicon used to produce solar cells that has previously gone undetected. It could be responsible for the 2 percent efficiency drop that solar cells can see in the first hours of use: Light Induced Degradation (LID).
Multiplied by the increasing number of panels installed at solar farms around the world, that drop equals a significant cost in gigawatts that non-renewable energy sources have to make up for.
In fact, the estimated loss in efficiency worldwide from LID is estimated to equate to more energy than can be generated by the UK's 15 nuclear power plants. The new discovery could help scientists make up some of that shortfall.
"Because of the environmental and financial impact solar panel 'efficiency degradation' has been the topic of much scientific and engineering interest in the last four decades," says one of the researchers, Tony Peaker from the University of Manchester in the UK.
Read more here. (Science Alert)
