Teenager invents £23 solar panel that could be solution to developing world's energy

_if_ that works... and is really managing 18W - hes hardly making good use of the space - you could easily push that up by 1000x or more in the same area... which seems a lot.
 
So with all these "green" and mazing energy sources, when oil finally runs out (as people have been saying it will every year for the last 50 or so)the old oil companies will become bastions of good wholesome renewable energy as they rake in thier new profits?
 
Superb invention. Unfortunately unless you can use wind, cold and rain to power it then the idea may be pooched for the UK :D
 
Rroff said:
_if_ that works... and is really managing 18W - hes hardly making good use of the space - you could easily push that up by 1000x or more in the same area... which seems a lot.
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I was thinking the same, I think its because hes using what looks like drawing pins as terminals, but if this was mass produced with tiny terminals you could fine a hell of a lot of hair on a small space, even multi layered.
 
Raist said:
That's funny to me. :p
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That was one of the things that struck me too, do they not employ a proofreader at all?

Mik3 said:
I was thinking the same, I think its because hes using what looks like drawing pins as terminals, but if this was mass produced with tiny terminals you could fine a hell of a lot of hair on a small space, even multi layered.
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It's a proof of concept rather than something that is intended to be brought to market in its current form though isn't it? In which case it doesn't seem worth judging it too harshly, it's quite a novel idea with a certain amount of potential.
 
yes, other than the fact theres very little proof it works, except what seems like clearly a much higher wattage bulb than the claimed 18w, being lit by it.

Either way, current solar panel's aren't terrible, its simply a manufacturing issue and efficiency, solar panels require space to operate and factilities to be manufactured in.

Considering currently the USA alone would need the whole of Arizona covered to power the whole country, and it would take some 30-40years and hundreds of billions of dollars to actually make those panels, its not a very good option, thats ignoring the fact you can't actually cover the whole of Arizona.

Realistically, solar power isn't the answer, nor are massive and multiple wind turbines covering the globe. hydropower is one of the best options, largely because we have a lot of water surface area on the planet and we don't spend that much time in/on it. The River Severn should be converted into a massive hydroelectricity generator as its one of the most powerful tide driven rivers in the world.

But even that won't be easy/enough, we're really looking at needing to find an alternative to oil, something with a very high energy output for its mass. Cold fusion, a possibility, yes, gonna happen in our lifetime, really don't know. Geothermal power to be more widely generated, not sure, probably not.
 
NickK said:
Superb invention. Unfortunately unless you can use wind, cold and rain to power it then the idea may be pooched for the UK :D
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Even on a very overcast day the sun can still provide us with far more energy than say... powering the solar panel using lights. I do like wind power though, and i think that people who are opposed to it are, to put it bluntly, idiots.
 
Superewza said:
Even on a very overcast day the sun can still provide us with far more energy than say... powering the solar panel using lights. I do like wind power though, and i think that people who are opposed to it are, to put it bluntly, idiots.
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The problem with wind power is cost, the best place to have a wind farm is off coast, i.e where there is wind nearly all the time, unfortunatly this is very expensive, so they build them in land, the problem with this is lack of wind or lack of powerful wind a lot of the time.

Also the parts are expensive, as in maintanence.

But if the gov would spend the cash to build them off shore, they would get the money back pretty quickly, unfortunatly most governments aren't willing to take the risk.

p.s My mother works for a company that builds them, I'm not just pulling this out of my rear end.
 
But in land they build them on hills. I was in Scotland a few weeks ago, you saw a wind farm every ten minutes. But the forgotten hero seems to have been the vertical axis windmill, something for us townies to use instead of solar power for lower powered things.
 
i've just had a shower and thought about it more and i'm pretty sure this is a hoax.

i know for a fact that hair is a very poor conductor and i seriously doubt that melanin is capable of the required photophysical processes involved.
 
daz said:
I think his point is that neither 9V or 18W is a measure of energy :o
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Sure it is. The definition of electromotive force (voltage) is the work or energy which causes the flow of an electric current.

I think his point was that in the article they make it sound as though 9V = 18W, like it is a direct conversion such as pounds to kilograms.
 
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