12 Year Old’s Nanotube Solar Cell 500 Times More Efficient
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September 26, 2008Treehugger today has an amazing story about 12 year old William Yuan, an American middle school science student, who has developed a new 3D solar cell which could seriously change the face of solar power.
A 3D Nanotube Solar Cell For Visible And UV Light
“In his project “A Highly-Efficient 3-Dimensional Nanotube Solar Cell for Visible and UV Light,” William invented a novel solar panel that enables light absorption from visible to ultraviolet light. He designed carbon nanotubes to overcome the barriers of electron movement, doubling the light-electricity conversion efficiency. William also developed a model for solar towers and a computer program to simulate and optimize the tower parameters. His optimized design provides 500 times more light absorption than commercially-available solar cells and nine times more than the cutting-edge, three dimensional solar cell.”
William was encouraged in his research by his science teacher and his work has been rewarded with a $25,000 scholarship from the Davidson Institute for his research. He is currently looking for a manufacturer for his new solar cell.
Click here for an American KATU TV news report on William Yuan.
5 Comments
I find in fascinating how much great technology we have … and yet don’t seem to have sufficient political will to use it to save ourselves ..
if they were building the Harbour Bridge today .. a PPP would probably build a two lane structure with a user toll
why do we elect such semi-competent people ?
Wow Kevin, in a few words you’ve captured the sentiments of so many. As someone said “Democracy lurches along!”
What we demand we can have but we don’t seem to have the determination to demand these things. The polititions don’t want us all off grid because they have sold off all the public assets that used to fund their excesses. Now they rely on water charges, rates and power etc. to fund them.
The solar rebate is another thing to stop us going off grid. You can’t get it if you don’t connect to the power roughters. They charge thousands to connect and have cuts almost daily where I’m building. The amount they charge to connect would buy me an excellent solar/wind hybrid power system and cost less than a connected system with the rebate.
The Queensland government is determined to muddy the Mary river when it would make far more sense to put the money into home tanks. Thing is then they wouldn’t be able to count on the water revenue. During the past summers restrictions they were complaining that the water business wasn’t viable at the lowered level of consumption so they chose instead to add sewerage to the water system. Yuk! How many times have scientists told us something is safe, only to discover at a later and more lethal date that it was not. I don’t trust any of them.
Our planet cannot withstand our current economic growth yet all we hear about is how we need more of it!!!
Get serious pollies. Some of us aren’t as stupid as you assume
If you follow the above link to a news video it says he the improvement is ony 10%, not 500 times. 500 times would not be Wikapedia also lists and references the same story, which a couple of green sites have plagiarised. Sounds like a another case of bad jounalism?
Way to go William. Please keep up the good work. Please don’t hope this is a bad case of journalism.