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Originally Posted by Innoc
Are any of those above 28% trickling into the consumer/business markets? I'm guessing most of those are proof of concept devices or too cost prohibitive to justify commercial availability....or those that have never passed standardization tests.
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I think at this point we have to clarify efficiency. To my knowledge most packaging/governments/caparisons of real world solar panels use a number to represent an output (wattage) per square foot at a specific temperature (STC number). In the USA there is a test lab that rates panels in real world conditions (PTC number). These number are no where near 30. But they don't represent the ability of a cell to convert photons to electrons, they represent a percentage of generating capability with a standard luminance. You can buy cells over 28 percent, but you will pay out the @zz. The highest I have ever seen in a panel is 22 percent. Manufacturers of consumer products for us normal people concentrate on cost vs efficiency and we get 3 dollar landscape lights that are tiny and last the whole night.
But the cells on those lights and the ones on your house are different. Those flexible thin cells on a calculator might eek out 6 percent and the ones on your house are in the teens as far as efficiency. Some I looked at for a project (fountain pump) generated 1 watt per square foot. That's 10 percent efficiency based on the STC formula. But efficiency only means you need more space, or more panels. If you need 2 watts of power you need 2 panels at 10 percent or 1 higher efficient panel. The sun is free. Look a cool chart ....
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...v100414%29.png
But yeah, solar isn't going to do much outside running some lights or a small electric device. Looking at commercial power generation will tell you solar is fairly worthless at that level. *and pretty much a waste of tax money Look a cool site...
http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/electri...ble1_20_a.html
but then again, based on solar sales we should be generating a couple billion megawatts a year outside of commercial production. If that thinking is correct, that is fairly significant. Solar is magic fair dust at the moment, Greens, libs, whatever have to accept that Nuclear is the only option outside of fossil fuels. They won't so keep on chuggin the black gold. Canada thanks you, the oil consumer
