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Transparent solar panels to replace windows? - Printable Version

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Transparent solar panels to replace windows? - Kyng - 02-03-2019

Alberta https://globalnews.ca/news/4892180/edmonton-tech-firm-to-turn-windows-into-solar-panels-gets-financial-boost-to-go-commercial/ Alberta

A company operating out of the University of Alberta is one step closer to turning windows into transparent solar panels — thanks to a grant of carbon tax revenues.

Applied Quantum Materials (AQM) has a clean energy innovation called luminescent solar concentrators.

CEO David Antoniuk explains what they do: “We can apply a coating to the glass and the glass can absorb energy and it can transform that energy to solar cells which are located on the edges of the window-frame.”

The coating helps collect the UV light hitting the glass, and send it to the edges — where it can be converted into electricity.

“What you have is simply glass that’s coated, it’s transparent and it generates electricity. So for a building, it could be a net zero building,” Antoniuk said.


It's a nice idea, but is it going to work in practice? 
 
  1. How dark are they? Too clear, and they'll let most of the light through instead of absorbing energy from it; too dark, and they won't be any good as windows. 
  2. The position of the sun changes over the course of the day, so many solar panels adjust and/or rotate automatically to face the Sun as directly as possible. This isn't really possible with windows: nobody wants a window that automatically opens and closes according to the sunlight. Will fixed transparent solar panels generate enough electricity?
  3. These solar panels will generate more electricity in summer than in winter. Will this be a problem? (Will the excess during summer be stored somewhere, or will other means of generating electricity be used during winter?)
  4. How much are these transparent solar panels going to cost? Will they generate enough electricity for it to be worth installing them on the average house?

I'm still unsure about this myself - but, good luck to them :) !

RE: Transparent solar panels to replace windows? - Detective Osprey - 02-03-2019

That's a cool idea! I like this.