MIT researchers boost the power of solar energy

Using computer modeling, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are working to boost the output and efficiency of solar cells, while lowering the cost of solar power.

A team of MIT physicists and engineers say they've been able to boost the output of solar cells by as much as 50 percent by adding a combination of anti-reflection coatings and multi-layered reflective coatings to silicon films on the cells. The research team said that the advancement could dramatically shave the cost of using solar power because the amount of high-quality and highly pricey silicon traditionally used is slashed down to 1 percent of the normal amount.

MIT announced in a report late last week that the multi-layered reflective coatings, along with a tightly spaced array of lines called diffraction gratings, are added to the back of ultrathin silicon films on the solar cells. Peter Bermel, a postdoctoral researcher in MIT's Research Laboratory of Electronics who has been working on the project, noted in a statement that the added layers force light to bounce around longer inside the silicon, which gives the light time to deposit energy and produce an electrical current. Otherwise, the light is quickly reflected back out of the silicon and is lost in the air.

Sunlight has the greatest potential of any power source to solve the world's energy problems, Daniel Nocera, the Henry Dreyfus Professor of Energy at MIT said in an earlier interview. In one hour, enough sunlight strikes the Earth to provide the entire planet's energy needs for one year, he added.

The problem, however, is how best to harness that energy.

Just four months ago, MIT reported that a team of researchers there made an energy storage breakthrough that could transform solar power from an alternative energy source to a mainstream source.

The problem with using solar power has long been figuring out an inexpensive way to store the sun's energy for those times when the sun isn't shining, said Nocera. Although it could be done, the cost is prohibitive with current technologies.

Taking a page from photosynthesis in plant life, Nocera and Matthew Kanan, a postdoctoral fellow in Nocera's lab, came up with a process (see video) to use the energy from the sun to split water into hydrogen and oxygen gases, according to MIT. Later, when they are needed, the gases can be combined inside a fuel cell. That reconnection creates carbon-free electricity that can be used to power an office building, a home or even an electric car -- whether the sun is shining or not.

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