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Researchers from Australia’s Swinburne University of Technology and Suntech Power Holdings have developed the world’s most efficient broadband nanoplasmonic solar cells for use in thin-film technology. Project scientists report improving the efficiency of existing thin-film cells by up to 8.1 percent through incorporating nucleated gold and silver nanoparticles.
Gold & Silver Nanoparticles Improve Efficiency of Thin-Film Solar Cells at Australia's Swinburne University of Technology
Seeded on Mon Feb 20, 2012 1:19 PM EST
Article Source: CleanTechnica - By Glenn Meyers- Enjoy this article? Help vote it up the 'Vine.
- Public Discussion (5)
Suntech plans on mass-producing the improved solar cells, and expects them to be commercially available by 2017.
- 1 vote
#1 - Mon Feb 20, 2012 1:19 PM ESTIs that an improvement of 8.1% in efficiency or to an efficiency of 8.1%? It is confusing when they later state they hope to reach an efficiency of 10%.
Solibro has a thin-film panel in the 16 to 18% efficiency range that is compatible with their mass production technology. It is a CIGS technology which has good application to variable substrates, building material integrated applications and flexible panels.
- 2 votes
#2 - Mon Feb 20, 2012 4:39 PM ESTup to 8.1 percent
An improvement of 8.1 percent... my guess...
- 2 votes
Cleantechnica is pretty good about the qualitative aspects of a story but not so much on the quantitative aspects .
- 2 votes
Par,
An improvement of 8.1 percent... my guess...
That is what I thought at first, then they confused me with the 10% figure.
nSZ,
I agree. Unfortunately, they are not unique in this problem in the media. I find it quite frustrating. So often I find I have to explain news reports on science and medicine to people after they have seen a report because of this. It is often the result of the tighter meaning of a word or phrase in science than in common usage. Or like in this case it should have been worded as "an improvement of 8.1% to 12% efficiency" or whatever the final value is. That would eliminate any confusion. Or in the later statement "They hope to increase this to a 10% improvement in efficiency". Instead they said "they hope to reach and efficiency of 10%". These 2 statements have totally different meanings.
This isn't meant to take away from the value of the increase and report. Just a little griping over a pet peeve of mine.
- 1 vote
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