All About Solar | Green Energy News

May 28, 2006 – Vol.11 No.10

ALL ABOUT SOLAR.

This week’s news...

For photovoltaic solar cells to become more efficient, and thus become a common, affordable alternative to power from the grid, they need to be able to convert a large portion of the full spectrum of light into electricity. Multi-junction cells help grab larger portion of the light spectrum, but at a high cost. Technologies like holographic concentrators show promise, but are yet to be offered in the marketplace.

Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National (Berkeley Lab) Materials Sciences Division (MSD), working with colleagues at Cornell University, have found a way to use indium nitride as positive conductor in solar cells. With this development solar cells could be made with alloys of indium nitride, grabbing energy from the infrared end of the light spectrum and alloys of gallium nitride responding to the ultraviolet end. The two working together in layers would make a full-spectrum solar photovoltaic cell.

Though work needs to be done to perfect the technology, researchers at Berkeley Lab say they’re not alone. Like-minded scientists in Japan, France, Korea, and Santa Barbara, California are also working similar research. Visit Berkeley Lab’s Science “@” Berkeley Lab magazine at http://enews.lbl.gov/

Solar energy can bring electric power to areas of the world where there there is no grid and it’s too expensive to build one.

The Alliance for Mindanao Off-Grid Renewable Energy (AMORE) has reported that as of the end of March 2006 6,850 households, 143 community centers and 319 streets in 227 barangays (small villages) in the Philippines were electrified with renewable energy systems: 224 barangays had photovoltaic systems and three had microhydro power systems.

The program, supported by the US Agency for International Development, the US Department of Energy, the Mirant Philippines Foundation, the Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao and Winrock International has been building since 2002 mostly stand-alone solar systems with lead-acid battery energy storage systems . AMORE say another 6000 solar and micro-hydro systems should be in place by 2009. Visit AMORE at http://www.amore.org.ph/