Solar Panels Have Potential to be 10 Times More Efficient

Image of Conventional Solar Panel

This is great news that shows we have only begun to tap the full potential of alternative sources of energy.  Some people have already written-off solar, saying that the energy it takes to create the panels isn’t justified by the energy-creating potential.  That argument could quickly become a thing of the past if advances like this continue:

Solar cells thinner than wavelengths of light hold huge power potential, Stanford researchers say

Ultra-thin solar cells can absorb sunlight more efficiently than the thicker, more expensive-to-make silicon cells used today, because light behaves differently at scales around a nanometer (a billionth of a meter), say Stanford engineers. They calculate that by properly configuring the thicknesses of several thin layers of films, an organic polymer thin film could absorb as much as 10 times more energy from sunlight than was thought possible.

Read the Rest: http://news.stanford.edu/news/2010/september/nanoscale-solar-cells-092710.html