Solar // Current TV

Orchid Greenhouse

This is only site where you can get overall information regarding orchid greenhouse.... more

orchid4green
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Online USA News: NASA Lunar Eclipse 2010, Solar Moon Eclipse Today

A lunar eclipse is visible from North America early Tuesday morning. Melissa Bell set... more

newsfuse
added this
1 year ago
|
1 comment

California Says Yes To Molten Solar

The California Energy Commission has approved a permit for SolarReserve to build a 150-megawatt solar plant that uses molten salt to store energy, the company announced Wednesday.
---The Santa Monica, Calif.-based start-up says its Rice Solar Energy Project will be located 30 miles from Blythe, Calif., and when running at full capacity will supply enough energy to power the equivalent of 68,000 homes annually. The project also has a 25-year power purchase agreement with Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E).

====================
California Says Yes To Molten Solar
December 16, 2010 9:44 AM PST
by Candace Lombardi
http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-20025870-54.html?part=rss&tag=feed&subj=GreenTech

---continued----
The molten salt system will enable the solar farm to store and release solar energy so that it can continue to generate electricity for up to eight hours after sunset, according to SolarReserve.

Molten salt solar plants, which have been built in Spain by SolarReserve with additional molten solar projects underway in Nevada and Sicily, work by using molten salt to retain and release heat energy.

In the case of a molten salt solar plant, heliostats--giant rotating mirrors controlled by computers to best track and reflect sun onto a specific point--reflect sun rays onto a central tower, or a series of pipes, containing a molten salt mixture. The molten salt generally consists of sodium nitrates and potassium. The solar rays heat the liquefied salt to a temperature of up to 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit. The steam from the molten salt is then harnessed to power a generator that makes electricity. Afterward, the cooled molten salt is then piped back to the tower to be heated once again.

In the case of the proposed Rice Solar Energy Project, the heliostats will be directed to a large central tower using a molten salt system developed by Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne. The company received more than $10 million to develop more efficient molten-salt systems, as part of a Department of Energy (DOE) project sponsoring 13 companies with funds.

However, this latest California board approval does not mean this project is full steam ahead. The Rice Solar Energy Project still needs to receive approvals from both the Bureau of Land Management and the Western Area Power Administration, according to SolarReserve.The California Energy Commission has approved a permit for SolarReserve to build a... more

twohawks
added this
1 year ago
|
4 comments

See The Largest Sea Vessel | ForUsToBe

It looks like it came from some SF movie. The Turanor is a giant catamaran that runs... more

project_green
added this
1 year ago
|
1 comment

Expedition 25 NASA astronaut Wheelock tweeted pics from International Space Station + Interview

On September 22, 2010, with the departure of the Expedition 23 crew, Colonel Douglas... more

worrg
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

What may be the solution to the Worlds Energy Crisis is called The Sahara Solar Breeder.

Sand as the solution to the world's energy woes? Or, more precisely, silica? The... more

Tweeter_Topics
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Lease the Power of the Sun

Last month we test drove Nissan’s Leaf…this month, we show you one way... more

Planet_Forward
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Liquid Battery Could Harness and Store Solar Energy

If solar power had a sound bite, a tagline, a motto, it would be "use it or lose... more

Kristena
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

South Central Cartel's Newest Single is Solar-Powered and Super Hot

While one might not immediately associate “going green,” with being... more

April_Hendrix
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Samsung's Top Secret Energy Deal

Samsung making clandestine energy deals with governments.

Alex_Knegt
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Navajos Hope to Shift From Coal to Wind and Sun

For decades, coal has been an economic lifeline for the Navajos, even as mining and... more

JanforGore
added this
1 year ago
|
20 comments

Debunk This - Intelligent Life Is On Planet Mars? (VIDEO) - The Daily Blender

All discoveries and findings by Phillip Roberts - If you don't believe there is... more

dryeraser
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Arizona may get sky-high solar towers

It's happening people, well let's hope so, as this will be the biggest... more

oly90808
added this
1 year ago
|
22 comments

'Renewable Girls' Calendar Strives To Make Solar Power Sexy

'Renewable Girls' is a new 2011 calendar that strives to make solar power... more

sinlung
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Sandia Aces Solar Golf Carts (Webisode 215)

Planet Forward hosted a LIVE event during the White House's GreenGov Symposium, a... more

Planet_Forward
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

U.S. solar industry projected to double capacity this year

The U.S. solar industry grew significantly in the first half of 2010 and is on track... more

JanforGore
added this
1 year ago
|
15 comments

White House Going Solar -- Again - NYTimes.com

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/blogs_v3/green/green_politics.gif The White... more

toyotabedzrock
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

http://www.arch1design.com/Solar_Cooking_Design.html

Inventor turns cardboard boxes into eco-friendly ovens...Read full article at... more

heroinandcornflakes
added this
1 year ago
|
0 comments

Researchers at MIT develop a way to funnel solar energy

Using carbon nanotubes (hollow tubes of carbon atoms), MIT chemical engineers have found a way to concentrate solar energy 100 times more than a regular photovoltaic cell. Such nanotubes could form antennas that capture and focus light energy, potentially allowing much smaller and more powerful solar arrays.

"Instead of having your whole roof be a photovoltaic cell, you could have little spots that were tiny photovoltaic cells, with antennas that would drive photons into them," says Michael Strano, the Charles and Hilda Roddey Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering and leader of the research team.

Strano and his students describe their new carbon nanotube antenna, or "solar funnel," in the Sept. 12 online edition of the journal Nature Materials. Lead authors of the paper are postdoctoral associate Jae-Hee Han and graduate student Geraldine Paulus.

Their new antennas might also be useful for any other application that requires light to be concentrated, such as night-vision goggles or telescopes.

Solar panels generate electricity by converting photons (packets of light energy) into an electric current. Strano's nanotube antenna boosts the number of photons that can be captured and transforms the light into energy that can be funneled into a solar cell.

The antenna consists of a fibrous rope about 10 micrometers (millionths of a meter) long and four micrometers thick, containing about 30 million carbon nanotubes. Strano's team built, for the first time, a fiber made of two layers of nanotubes with different electrical properties — specifically, different bandgaps.

In any material, electrons can exist at different energy levels. When a photon strikes the surface, it excites an electron to a higher energy level, which is specific to the material. The interaction between the energized electron and the hole it leaves behind is called an exciton, and the difference in energy levels between the hole and the electron is known as the bandgap.

The inner layer of the antenna contains nanotubes with a small bandgap, and nanotubes in the outer layer have a higher bandgap. That's important because excitons like to flow from high to low energy. In this case, that means the excitons in the outer layer flow to the inner layer, where they can exist in a lower (but still excited) energy state.

Therefore, when light energy strikes the material, all of the excitons flow to the center of the fiber, where they are concentrated. Strano and his team have not yet built a photovoltaic device using the antenna, but they plan to. In such a device, the antenna would concentrate photons before the photovoltaic cell converts them to an electrical current. This could be done by constructing the antenna around a core of semiconducting material.
....

While the cost of carbon nanotubes was once prohibitive, it has been coming down in recent years as chemical companies build up their manufacturing capacity. "At some point in the near future, carbon nanotubes will likely be sold for pennies per pound, as polymers are sold," says Strano. "With this cost, the addition to a solar cell might be negligible compared to the fabrication and raw material cost of the cell itself, just as coatings and polymer components are small parts of the cost of a photovoltaic cell."

Strano's team is now working on ways to minimize the energy lost as excitons flow through the fiber, and on ways to generate more than one exciton per photon. The nanotube bundles described in the Nature Materials paper lose about 13 percent of the energy they absorb, but the team is working on new antennas that would lose only 1 percent.Using carbon nanotubes (hollow tubes of carbon atoms), MIT chemical engineers have... more

JanforGore
added this
1 year ago
|
38 comments

Green revolution comes to urban areas

Kendrick Harris, a high school dropout who has been homeless and jobless, has had more... more

JanforGore
added this
1 year ago
|
4 comments

select your country

Community Spotlight

TAGS

tagged w/ Solar

top videos

find current on tv

find current online

recent comments

© 2012 Current TV, LLC All Rights Reserved

the basics

follow us online

tools

stay in touch

© 2012 Current TV, LLC
All Rights Reserved