Tag Archives: nrel
Spray on Solar 2.0
New Energy Technologies announced last week that it has successfully scaled up its spray-on, see-through solar photovoltaic technology designed for after-market application on windows. The futuristic idea behind the technology is that it could be used to solarize windows in the 85 million commercial buildings and residential homes throughout the country. The Maryland-based company first [...]
Confimed Shrinkage: Solar Venture Capital Funding
The amount of venture capital (VC)—early-stage funding with higher risks, but high potential returns—going to solar companies continues to shrink, according to a new report from Mercom Capital Group. The report found that solar venture capital in the first quarter of 2013 fell to $126 million, almost a third of the $324 million in the [...]
SolarWindow Gets Green Light from NREL
New Energy Technologies and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) are moving with research and development on the company’s transparent SolarWindow photovoltaic technology. New Energy Technology’s SolarWindow technology consists of nano-particle spray, with PV cells that are smaller than a quarter of grain of rice and 1/1,00th the width of a human hair. Under the [...]
NREL: CSP+Thermal Storage Adds Value for Utilities
A concentrating solar power installation with a six-hour storage capacity can add $35.80 per megawatt hour to the capacity and operational value of a utility, finds the United States Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory. “We’ve known for a long time that CSP with storage adds significant value, however, we are now able to [...]
Fastest Supercomputer in the World to Tackle Climate Change
Climate change research is getting a huge boost from one of the world’s fastest supercomputers and a new world-class center dedicated to advancing the state of weather and climate science. US scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) are now using ”Yellowstone” - it can crunch numbers 30 times faster, allowing them to run much more complex experiments and create much [...]
NREL Achieves 18.2% Efficient Nano Solar Cell
Using a chemical nano-porous etching process, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) was able to create an antireflective surface on silicon PV cells without using additional antireflection coating. The method could reduce the cost of adding anti-reflective layers to crystalline silicon-based photovoltaics. Researchers at the laboratory, including Jihun Oh, Hao-Chih Yuan, and Howard Branz developed [...]
NREL’s Plan for Clean Energy Scaling
I’ve begun thinking that one of the defining questions for clean energy is, “What’s the plan?” Not a company plan, but a country plan — one that realistically maps us to an economy that gets the vast majority of its energy from wind, solar, geothermal, and that has us drastically minimizing waste. Amory Lovins has [...]
Natcore: Racking Up NREL Black Silicon Patents
The National Renewable Energy Laboratory has expanded the license it gave New Jersey-based Natcore Technology to develop its black silicon. The term “black silicon” refers to the seeming color of the solar cell. The dark color allows the cells to absorb more sunlight and convert more into electricity, increasing the energy output and effective efficiency [...]
NREL: Solar Has Biggest Potential
A recently released study by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, estimates that the technical potential of photovoltaic cells and concentrated solar power (CSP) in the United States is as much as 200,000 Gigawatts, enough to generate about 400,000 TWh of energy annually. The report dismisses economic and political impacts on the solar industry and focuses [...]
NREL: Cutting Building Energy Use in Half
The blips of a heart monitor, the hum of an MRI, the intense lights of a surgical room: all can bring both comfort and fear — and all require a lot of power. But new hospitals are being filled with natural, calming light and are leveraging energy from the sun and earth to power the [...]
Richard Branson Discusses Clean Energy
The end of subsidies for fossil fuels was one of the big topics at Rio+20. One of the businessman to support initiative was Virgin founder Richard Branson. He said getting ridding of all subsidies of fossil fuels would be one of the most useful outcomes of the Rio+20. “That would be the biggest boost for [...]
Report: 80% of U.S Electricity Can Be Supplied by Renewables by 2050
Renewable energy can supply 80% of US electricity demand by 2050, concludes a report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), the Renewable Electricity Futures Study (RE Futures). The technology needed is available today and is “more than adequate” combined with a more flexible electric system. That increased electric system flexibility, necessary to balance supply [...]