'Solar leafs' outshine panels in UK breakthrough - Energy Live News
The new technology eradicates the need for pumps, fans, control units and expensive materials, while also making more clean water and thermal energy
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Experiments reveal PV-leaves generate over 10% extra electricity compared to standard solar panels, which dissipate 70% of solar energy.
So basically you go from using 30% of solar energy to 33%? Sounds nice but would that really do that much?
It's not just a 10% increase in productivity, it produces fresh water as a byproduct:
Furthermore, the photovoltaic leaf is capable of synergistically utilising the recovered heat to co-generate additional thermal energy and freshwater simultaneously within the same component, significantly elevating the overall solar utilisation efficiency from 13.2% to over 74.5%, along with over 1.1 L/h/m2 of clean water.
where does the salt go? wouldn't it build up in the pipes and cause them to get clogged?
Another commenter summarized the nature article linked in comments... Yes, the salt is left in the pipes, so they are flushed out at night to prevent buildup.
Only if the water evaporates within the pipes?
1.1l/h/m2 ? That means 25m2 generate 27.5l/h so 660l a day. That's huge.
You're assuming full production for 24 hours a day, I don't think that's likely. Maybe 8 hours of full production a day under optimal conditions? Still, ~200 liters a day of potable water seems quite big for a 5x5 area of solar panels.
Yeah, my bad. Your estimate seems more likely.
Thats pretty cool, although that is not even mentioned in the article unless Im missing something.
The article is extremely light on detail
That bleeping lobster linked the actual paper
It doesn’t make sense to think of it in terms of how much of the Sun’s energy it uses because solar energy is essentially free and unlimited, it comes from an outside system, we don’t need to mine it or carry it or anything and we can’t ‘waste’ it in the same way we can other fuels. All it tells us is the maximum theoretical limit.
10% more energy from solar means a rooftop array could generate an extra 300-500W which is a genuinely useful amount of energy.
