The Power Crisis Mythology, the 40% Efficient Solar Cell and the Cost of the War in Iraq
June 5th, 2007Spectrolab, Inc., a subsidiary of Boeing, has developed a solar cell technology that has a conversion efficiency of 40.7%. They accomplished this with a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
The annual budget of the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory: $210 million
The cost of America’s war in Iraq per day: $300 million
The U.S. spends more on the war in Iraq in one day (about $300 million) than it does on the ANNUAL BUDGET for the primary government laboratory that is tasked with renewable energy and energy efficiency research and development. As absurd as that is, a recipient of a grant from this lab has developed a 40% efficient solar cell.
What if that lab had the funding equivalent of what the U.S. is spending on the war over a period of two or three days?
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The energy scarcity argument, on its own, is like the American dream: you’d have to be asleep to believe it.
Top soil depletion: Yes.
Water scarcity: Yes.
Energy scarcity: Yes, by design.
My guess is that the clean energy technology will become ubiquitous after the kill off phase has thinned out the herd by a few billion people. In the meantime, keep thinking that there are no solutions to the global power crisis… Even if the purpose of that idiotic meme is to help make kill off look more like die off.
Via: Physorg:
Scientists from Spectrolab, Inc., a subsidiary of Boeing, have recently published their research on the fabrication of solar cells that surpass the 40% efficiency milestone—the highest efficiency achieved for any photovoltaic device. Their results appear in a recent edition of Applied Physics Letters.
Most conventional solar cells used in today’s applications, such as for supplemental power for homes and buildings, are one-sun, single-junction silicon cells that use only the light intensity that the sun produces naturally, and have optimal efficiency for a relatively narrow range of photon energies.
The Spectrolab group experimented with concentrator multijunction solar cells that use high intensities of sunlight, the equivalent of 100s of suns, concentrated by lenses or mirrors. Significantly, the multijunction cells can also use the broad range of wavelengths in sunlight much more efficiently than single-junction cells.
“These results are particularly encouraging since they were achieved using a new class of metamorphic semiconductor materials, allowing much greater freedom in multijunction cell design for optimal conversion of the solar spectrum,” Dr. Richard R. King, principal investigator of the high efficiency solar cell research and development effort, told PhysOrg.com. “The excellent performance of these materials hints at still higher efficiency in future solar cells.”
In the design, multijunction cells divide the broad solar spectrum into three smaller sections by using three subcell band gaps. Each of the subcells can capture a different wavelength range of light, enabling each subcell to efficiently convert that light into electricity. With their conversion efficiency measured at 40.7%, the metamorphic multijunction concentrator cells surpass the theoretical limit of 37% of single-junction cells at 1000 suns, due to their multijunction structure.
While Spectrolab’s primary business is supplying PV cells and panels to the aerospace industry (many of their solar cells are used on satellites currently in orbit), the company envisions that this breakthrough will also have applications in commercial terrestrial solar electricity generation.
The research that led to the discovery of the high efficiency concentrator solar cell was funded partly by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and will play a significant role in the government’s Solar America Initiative, which aims to make solar energy cost-competitive with conventional electricity generation by 2015. The company has said that these solar cells could help concentrator system manufacturers produce electricity at a cost that is competitive with electricity generated by conventional methods today.
Oh, and another thing, I’ve cynically blogged elsewhere pointing out the quite “obvious” evil machinations of pissing billions away on bombs and bullets. Had they been used to build oil refineries, and you could build a whole hell of a lot of them, would have resulted in an easing of the fuel crunch. Thats not to say we shouldn’t get off of the black stuff for so many things… it just doesn’t happen overnight, but to say that this “crisis” is all coincidence just stretches the imagination. Above all there is the obscenity of having war over oil while infinitely free energy is all around for the taking.
Let the oil run out, fight a few oil wars, make few trillion, kill off a few billion.
Replace with biofuel, fight a few farmland wars, make a few more trillion, kill off the remaining few billion.
http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/06/05/1678/
“Armed groups in Colombia are driving peasants off their land to make way for plantations of palm oil, a biofuel that is being promoted as an environmentally friendly source of energy.”
Then break out the remaining hidden oil for the private jets, solar panels for the estates, and go enjoy the peasant-free world in lovely luxury.
It always blows my mind to see that a technology albeit partially funded by the U.S. DOE, sees the light of day. Let alone gets media attention. That Spectrolab is a subsidiary of Boeing says it all. Otherwise, the results of this research would join the rest of the EXTENSIVE XFiles of successful technologies gathering dust in NREL’s archives. You know, all those successful energy efficient technologies paid for with taxpayer dollars, that we the peoples have no right to know about. FOIA you!
Of all the multiple missions of the U.S. DOE, NREL is my favorite. But NREL’s budget has been a cachepot of directed Congressional funding (earmarks), and largely depends on the favors of the party in power. Republican, funding goes down; Democrat funding up.
Kevin, I think it would be really swell to spend the money going to Iraq at NREL. Unfortunately, NREL takes dictation re their mission from the White House and does NOT formulate energy policy.
Like other DOE labs, NREL is run by a contractor. That contractor then spends DOE money funding subcontractors. Can you imagine? NREL can’t even spend the money they do get for their budget. They are trying, but NREL has had a problem with finding “takers” of fed money for technology development. So, the bulk of the money goes to the big boys in federal contracting who know how to milk the taxpayer for the greatest amount for the smallest return. Bechtel comes to mind here.
NREL will probably continue to fund a gazillion small entrepreneurs who have applied to and received funding from the U.S. government for many worthy projects. Wind and geothermal energy are two that I think FINALLY took off with DOE funding. But sheesh, how long did that take? 30 years? I think the small developer wants nothing to do with NREL.
Through no fault of their own, I don’t think NREL has a fricking clue as to what to do with the myriad of technology contracts they have funded. But its not NREL’s job to formulate policy, just fund the living shit out of anyone who wants money to develop new technologies. And then, rather than promote the technology – whether successful or not- it goes into the XFiles. Hey, we, the DOE gave you money to develop the technology, but DOE never said we were going to do ANYTHING with it.
Like the rest of us, NREL waits for the sometime, somewhere, whenever U.S. administration, whether or Pub or Dem that is going to be interested in formulating a national energy policy using technologies that are based on anything other than oil.
P.S. Oops, I forgot to say, Energy Scarcity by Design – you’d better believe it. Energy Scarcity designed for the Great Kill Off? Ditto.
How many people do you know that aren’t relying on Oil as their energy resource? How many people do you know that are looking for ways to conserve, retrofit, get the hell off of whatever grid we pay through the nose to for access? How nany ( including me) are ready to shortly and anon get off of their large derriere’s and start chopping wood and baling hay. Those who can’t get with the program are well, just another bunch of TV American Idol worshippers.
I have a naive question I would like answered. If there is a better, cheaper, more efficient alternative to oil which can be distributed on a wide scale, why hasn’t another country adopted and implemented it? Along these lines, why is China forging parterships with Iran, and various African Dictatorships including the Sudanese? Why are the Japanese forging multi-billion long term trade agreements with the likes of Iran? Then there are the Isreali’s. Should the Middle East be deprived of their Oil Sales, there power would amplify dramatically.
@Mike
I’ve thought a lot about this, and I think it has to do with these states grasping to maintain order. An energy scarcity paradigm is like an invisible cop who keeps people stuck in the same fascist, go nowhere sub routines. Scarcity issues are good for the elite in terms of their power. It’s not simply an American thing.
Is the Steorn thing from Ireland real? If that thing is real, the Them might decide to wipe us out sooner rather than later. (Pandemic?)
We’re not even allowed to have wave buoys, there is no way we would be allowed to have something like that Steorn thing, if it was real.
If Steorn is real, and their technology is actually released, the rest of the surface of the planet will be turned into garbage, and the other scarcity issues will become even more serious.
I was visiting with a friend this weekend, who is an engineer, and we discussed for hours matters related to energy production. He is currently working during his free time on an energy system and I encouraged him very much to dilligently pursue it.
We were discussing free energy and both agreed that it didn’t matter if a system came out that was less than perfect just so long as it was better than what we have now. The steps needed towards energy, and by extension our own liberty, starts with these advances.
“If Steorn is real, and their technology is actually released, the rest of the surface of the planet will be turned into garbage, and the other scarcity issues will become even more serious.”
EXACTLY!!!
– Mike Lorenz
Kill Off vs. Die Off – either way the outcome is the same. Ultimately, we humans must reach a sustainable carrying level on Earth. It seems 500,000,000 humans on the planet worked well in the past. An incredible 90% reduction from today. Regardless of the limiting factor, (energy, food, water, etc) and like it or not, a correction from our current unsustainable population will occur. Far better to plan and manage the change over time with compassion instead of letting nature or some other nefarious group foist their plan on the world in what will likely be very unpleasant.
Given that the worldwide average lifespan of a human is just under 70 years (average varys greatly based on location), the goal of 500,000,000 could be acheived gradually over approximately 50 years with little pain or suffering if population control became the number one goal of the United Nations and every country set targets for population over time much like a Kyoto protocol.
All the discussion about one limiting factor or another misses the only point that matters, we have too many people on the planet and the spaceship can’t continue supporting all of us.
Humane long term planning regarding population control will reduce suffering on everything and everybody while creating a sustainable world over 50 years (if we have that much time – which I doubt). Advancing this discussion is the best possible course of action for all caring people.
I’m against all new energy advances (solar or otherwise) as they merely push us against another limiting factor and distract us from the real issue of a currently unstainable (and growing) human population on the planet.
If you want to see ‘scarcity’ agenda laid out, here it is from our ‘friend’ the CFR.
http://www.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/EnergyTFR.pdf
Let me paraphrase: “We have moved all our money from the US to China, so let’s tax the US peasants more, give the money to our corporate friends to do long-term R+D that may be useful to us in the future.
Then once we are done, we can let the USD freefall, and energy will be unaffordable for US masses, so we can allocate their oil to our investments in China.
Then we can rebuild Canada, US and Mexico into a NAU trading block and then watch Asia, EU and NAU battle it out to keep our investments growing.
Of course we will need frequent wars to keep defense contracting investments booming, continually thin the herd and keep everyone scared so we can continue making them slave away for us.
http://www.energyandcapital.com/articles/energy-policy-renewable/330
Make methanol and dimethyl ether from coal and sequester the factory’s carbon dioxide. These co-soluble fuels make a dandy replacement for current petroleum based liquids. They are cheap and there is a lot of coal avsilable. Methanol has a natural octane of 114 and has been the fuel of preference for the Indy 500 for years.
It’s not the full answer but then there is no silver bullet that will solve all the problems unless you use it to pass on to another world or oblivion.
The American Dream or “the American hologramâ€
Kevin, you link to the George Carlin video on the American Dream is priceless. Everyone should watch it!
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article14837.htm
I am really looking forward to Joe Bageant’s book coming out June 19th.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/030733936X/ref=nosim/cryptogoncom-20
Deer Hunting with Jesus is a potent antidote to what Bageant dubs “the American hologramâ€â€”the televised, corporatized virtual reality that distracts us from the insidious realities of American life.
Kevin,
u pose an excellent question whether energy scarcity is real or make believe. I guess it amounts to whose interest is it to change the current paradigm. Not Russia, OPEC, or the US, for obvious economic reasons. I imagine that Isreal has the technological capacity and will to implement such a program but stops short due to the US’s influence. Probably the US, or maybe Russia, has threatened to bomb a country into the stone age if they break rank. Maybe? More uncertainty in an unstable world.