
Breakthrough in solar efficiency by UNSW team - mtgx
http://www.smh.com.au/technology/sci-tech/breakthrough-in-solar-efficiency-by-unsw-team-ahead-of-its-time-20130505-2j117.html
======
bdcs
This article makes the prototypical solar energy mistake: thinking efficiency
matters. It doesn't (unless you're working on satellites). There is no
shortage of rooftop space. There is a shortage of dollars. The only thing that
matters with solar is cost (in dollars) per installed watt (in watts).
Efficiency plays a part in that; a more efficient cell for the same price is
much better! But, a slightly more efficient cell for something much more
expensive is not an advance at all.

This finding is technically neat, but I don't see how it is a breakthrough by
any means. Admittedly, I only read TFA.

~~~
dredmorbius
Agreed. Tom Murphy makes that point in his blog: "Don't be a PV Efficiency
Snob": [http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/09/dont-be-a-pv-
eff...](http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/09/dont-be-a-pv-efficiency-
snob/)

There's plenty of solar capacity on the planet to meet not only present
electric generation demand, but the growth require for substituting much
present fossil-fuel usage with electricity. Probably even bringing up per-
capita energy allotments to a reasonable fraction of Western levels (1.5 - 2.5
kWh/day would make a huge difference for most people's lives).

The real challenges are cost -- building out solar capacity would require 8-9
doublings of existing capacity, at least. Financing this (or ramming through
the construction regardless) is going to be the biggest challenge.

Storage though is the other bogeyman. There's very little pumped storage
available. Grid batteries, likely emphasizing cost over size, weight, or
efficiency, as there simply isn't enough of many common battery materials to
meet requirements, thermal storage. Maybe hydrogen production, maybe
electrically-powered synfuel production, flywheels.

There are a few reactor options, mostly still not commercially proven, which
may help bridge the gap: TerraPower, LFTR, and other breeder designs. Relying
strictly on conventional uranium fission reactors would burn through known
reserves in a few decades -- 30-80 years.

~~~
Tuna-Fish
> Relying strictly on conventional uranium fission reactors would burn through
> known reserves in a few decades -- 30-80 years.

While strictly speaking true, this is completely irrelevant. "Known reserves"
refers to the surveyed amount that is technically and economically feasible to
extract at present market prices. The cost of uranium ore is a vanishingly
small part of running a nuclear plant -- fuel costs are less than 10%, and the
vast majority of that is enrichment and processing. Uranium market prices
could go up by two orders of magnitude without endangering the industry, and
at that point, we have milennia of known reserves (mostly in seawater).

~~~
dredmorbius
No, it's not irrelevant. If you're going to claim that, at least have the
intellectual honesty to point to models of probable reserves or advanced
recovery methods.

I haven't looked extensively at the fission fuel issue, but that estimate is
one that's fairly widely disseminated, including by the nuclear power
industry. I see values from 5.4 - 6.3 megatons of uranium.

The problems are that:

1\. Existing scale of fission energy generation is a small fraction of a
"total replacement" estimate.

2\. Even if there are extensive amounts of uranium, recoverability and net
EROEI matter. Unless the extraction process is tremendously complex, nuclear
chemistry _should_ tend to make this favorable, though it may still be
expensive in terms of time, plant, technology, and/or other limiting inputs.

3\. This calls for betting the farm on unproven technolgies or reserves. We
_do_ know that solar is sufficient for at least the next century or so. During
which hopefully humanity can get its population back under control and to
sustainable levels.

I'm aware of the concept of proven reserves. I'm also familiar with models of
resource extraction and exhaustion such as Hubbert's work in oil, though not
of the specifics as applicable to uranium. The IAEA's got some light reading
on the topic: [http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/iaeabooks/1357/Methods-for-
the...](http://www-pub.iaea.org/books/iaeabooks/1357/Methods-for-the-
Estimation-of-Uranium-Ore-Reserves-An-Instruction-Manual)

And as mention, breeder designs change the maths a bit.

Sources / math:

<http://www.sjc.ox.ac.uk/3675/Energy%20Challenge.pdf.download>

[http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/2010/prn201009....](http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/pressreleases/2010/prn201009.html)

(And the math done here showing we'd exhaust those reserves building the first
5,000 of the 17,000 1GW plants required to meet present demand at a cost of
$52 trillion: [http://terrydyke.com/2011/06/even-if-nuclear-power-were-
safe...](http://terrydyke.com/2011/06/even-if-nuclear-power-were-safe-enough-
peak-uranium/))

[http://terrydyke.com/2011/06/even-if-nuclear-power-were-
safe...](http://terrydyke.com/2011/06/even-if-nuclear-power-were-safe-enough-
peak-uranium/)

~~~
Tuna-Fish
1) True. Which is why we should be building more...

2) EROEI is fantastically, ridiculously good for everything nuclear-related.
Even the worst uranium mining schemes beat everything else by a million times.
And the costs are still minimal even with the more exotic extraction schemes.
There have been trials of them, they have been successful.

3) Solar is incapable of being used as baseline generation. All intermittent
capacity needs to be backed by something else. Right now, that's gas turbines.
Fracking will make this feasible for ~30 years, beyond that we need something
else.

The Hubbert's work in oil is not really applicable to Uranium, simply because
there are effectively unlimited reserves of it at an economically acceptable
price points and fantastic EROEI levels.

------
xutopia
Are we really falling for this again? How many times do we have to go through
this.

Ignore all articles regarding solar breakthroughs unless:

1) they have a sticker price on their web site, for sale immediately 2) they
don't need investments to get a business off the ground 3) they have links to
all research and patents that capture what the breakthrough is all about.

~~~
SeanDav
I came here to post pretty much the same thing.

If you believed the commercial success of all the solar panel breakthroughs we
have been hearing about, then by now every solar panel would be the size of a
postage stamp, be generating 12 KW of power by moonlight and they would have
been giving away a free solar panel with every six-pack of beer...

------
jacquesm
In the end the only important figure in solar energy is Watt-hours generated /
$invested over the lifetime of the panel.

The most efficient commercial solar cells available today are (as far as I
know) the Maxeon line and their rated efficiency is 24%, so even that claim
holds no water.

What I find a bit annoying is that any news item that contains the words
'breakthrough, solar, efficiency' will automatically get wide distribution.

You can probably find one such announcement per month and it usually amounts
to nothing once the dust has settled.

~~~
pinko
> In the end the only important figure in solar energy is Watt-hours generated
> / $invested over the lifetime of the panel.

Are there any meaningful differences in the toxic byproducts of manufacturing,
transport, and/or disposal of the panels?

I might care about that, too, but I've heard very little about it.

~~~
jacquesm
All things being equal (same location of production and same environmental
laws in effect) that should be factored into the price. If you compare say
Chinese made panels with US made panels there will be a difference due to
environmental issues being ignored but this will to some extent be off-set by
import duties.

------
short_circut
It would be nice if they gave some sort of citation or linked to some sort of
scientific paper.

------
vajrabum
Even for a press release the TFA has woefully little real information. After
digging around I did find this one article which has a little bit more on how
this is supposed to work. [http://newsroom.unsw.edu.au/news/technology/solar-
discovery-...](http://newsroom.unsw.edu.au/news/technology/solar-discovery-
sets-new-record-low-grade-silicon)

------
sbierwagen

      At present, the best commercial solar cells convert between 
      17 per cent and 19 per cent of the sun's energy into 
      electricity. UNSW's technique, patented this year, should 
      produce efficiencies of between 21 per cent and 23 per cent.

~~~
capisce
While being able to use significantly cheaper silicon of poorer quality, was
the breakthrough as far as I gathered.

~~~
just2n
A quick TLDR from the article:

    
    
        The breakthrough involves using hydrogen atoms to counter defects in 
        silicon cells ... [so that] poor quality 
        silicon can be made to perform like high quality wafers.
    

A 25% improvement to efficiency is a big deal. Getting that improvement with
cheap silicon makes this a huge win.

But there's no reference to patents or to research demonstrating these claims,
so I don't know what to think.

~~~
zimbatm
What's the cost of adding these hydrogen atoms though. Too bad they're not
talking about that in the article.

------
ck2
Actually, this time they seem to want to crank it out in three years:

 _Funding to help commercialise the technology will total about $15 million
over three years, with the UNSW seeking support from the federal government’s
Australian Renewable Energy Agency for part of that sum._

Most of the time these articles are very vague about any real application.

