A few days ago, I was having a conversation with a friend who was a retired IT manager.
He said, "Jason, the problem with solar power is that it is not powerful enough."
I asked, "What do you mean?"
He said that he recently rejected a proposal to install a solar power system for a data center because even if they had filled up the entire roof area of the data center with solar panels, it would only generate enough electricity to meet 1/3 of what the data center needed.
I was reminded that this is quite a common rejection to adopt solar.
People have the expectation their rooftop solar should match 100% their energy consumption.
This, however, varies case-by-case depending on your energy consumption pattern and suitable rooftop area available.
A data center is an extreme case because data centers are designed to run computers 24 hours a day and are one of the largest consumers of electricity in the modern city.
But his question is a valid one and it got me thinking...
What is the most powerful solar panel today?
Conservatively, most solar panels that people buy today only have a solar efficiency of 10%.
Solar efficiency represents a solar cell's ability to convert radiation from the sun into usable electricity.
In July 2017, however, scientists have developed a solar cell that is capable of converting direct sunlight to electricity at 44.5% efficiency. It is an impressive solar cell that stacks multiple layers of gallium antimonide substrate (GaSb) based materials into a single cell and results in capturing more parts of the solar spectrum.
This new solar cell also uses concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) panels, which is very very new tech. These panels are equipped with lenses that concentrate sunlight on cells with a microscale dimension of just less than one-millimeter square. Just imagine this...
But designed at a tiny scale.
What this means for us
It is worth looking forward to GaSb technology.
When it does come into commercial availability:
- You can generate 4X the amount of electricity using the same amount of rooftop space.
- You need 4X less panels to meet your energy consumption needs
- It is possible to generate enough electricity to power that data center example above.
The Challenge Ahead
It's not going to come so soon.
Research into GaSb based solar cells existed since 1989. But the innovation these scientists did, has brought the technology to newer heights.
So why is adoption so slow? I reckon in this case, it's because of the dollars and cents.
The highest solar efficiency money can buy is 35% by Spectrolab; subsidiary of Boeing. This might set you back $100,000 per square meter; and you probably need aerospace or military connections to buy one.
Like any new technology, solar has its adoption lifecycle to take its course. But the adoption rate of solar technology is not the same as say, smartphones; even though both technologies have seen their prices drop consistently with Moores Law. The latest smartphones will always be taken up by the market upon each release because the demand dynamics are different.
People want the latest smartphones. But there is zero demand for the latest solar technology.
Final Thoughts
Technology is not a barrier.
Technology adoption is driven by demand.
And demand begins with us.
I believe that a 100% renewable future is possible in this lifetime if we want it. A future where market forces naturally look forward to the latest developments in solar technology as fervently as they do for the latest cars, smartphones, and computer graphic cards.
All made possible by introducing a new energy economy that you & I are going to create together.
Hi, my name is Jason aka @buzz.lightyear. I envision a future where renewable energy is our main source of electricity in this lifetime; reducing the largest contributor of carbon emissions by 90% and bringing our global temperatures back to its natural balance.
I believe that this is no easy task but it is achievable with your support.
I am developing an open blockchain that incentivises both producers and consumers of renewable energy and am looking to collaborate with brilliant minds who share this vision so that we can create a future where it just makes sense to go 100% renewable, visit your local store, buy some latest tech and generate energy for your own use and for others.
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Meteor Shower: VisualHunt.com
Solar Concentrator: Johan Douma on Visual Hunt / CC BY-NC-SA