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Added on the 23/11/2015 13:13:40 - Copyright : Wochit
As climate change drives drought, and the rising global population drives food demand, the world's food security is ever more precarious. But struggling farmers may find relief from the soaring temperatures from the sun itself--and the technology that harnesses its power. HuffPost reports students at the University of Arizona noticed that vegetables grown under the cover of solar panels flourished during the hottest summer on record. The observation provided food for thought for Prof. Greg Barron-Gafford’s research in 'agrivoltaics': growing food and generating solar energy on the same land. The concept could fulfill the need for land on which to build new solar installations while also helping farmers stay afloat. It’s a case where one plus one could equal more than two. Greg Barron-Gafford Associate Professor, University of Arizona’s School of Geography, Development and Environment
Building solar farms in the desert may have become a common practice, but one new solar plant unveiled on Monday in northern Jordan is anything but ordinary. This 12.9 megawatt plant made up of 40,000 solar panels will provide power to people living in the Zaatari refugee camp, victims of war whose lives were turned upside when the violence reached their doorstep. The solar power plant became the largest ever located inside a refugee camp
Chinese solar power company Panda Green Energy recently opened the most adorable green energy solar power plant in the shape of China's national animal, the beloved panda bear. The unique shape of the huge solar farm can only be seen from the air, as shown in drone footage from Datong filmed on Tuesday. Panda Green Energy used a combination of darker monocrystalline silicon and white thin film solar cells to create the unique shape, in what is a world's first for solar farms.
Scientists at Moscow's Skoltech may have found a way to dramatically reduce solar energy costs by making solar panels with a new inorganic super-efficient material called Perovskite. Perovskite is the name given to Calcium Titanate, a rare mineral found in the Earth's mantle and named after Russian mineralogist Lev Perovski. In 2009, researchers discovered that Perovskite can efficiently convert the energy of visible light into electricity, and experiments on using the material in solar panels began. Now, a new and improved Perovskite solar panel is just about ready to hit markets.
This array of 149 Xenon short-arc lamps is called Synlight, and it's designed to be an artificial sun. Invented by the German Aerospace Centre, or DLR, Synlight can produce up to 10,000 times the intensity of natural sunlight experienced on Earth. Researchers and scientists turned on their machine for Ruptly in Juelich on Monday. The Synlight array measures 45 by 52 feet but all the powerful bulbs are designed to concentrate their light radiation on a small space which measures just 8 inches by 8 inches. Its inventors claim that the synthetic sun can generated temperatures up to 3000 degrees Celsius and beyond. Synlight was created with a specific purpose in mind. Hydrogen fuel, considered by many to be the fuel of the future because it emits no carbon when burned, is derived by breaking water down into its base atoms. However, this process requires a huge amount of heat energy. Synlight is meant to power the reaction to obtain hyrdogen fuel in a way that uses as little fossil fuels as possible. The high power array also has potential uses in other fields as well, including scientific research and commercial applications which require an intense source of heat. The project cost about 3.5 million euro to buid, funding which was provided by the German government and automaker BMW.
It was only a matter of time before someone invented a cap with a solar panel. This is the SolSol Hat, the world's first solar cap which allows wearers to sustainably charge gadgets on the go. It was showcased at the 2017 SXSW festival in Austin, Texas on Monday. It can charge many different gadgets, including mobile phones and music players, and takes around 5 hours to fully charge an iPhone. The cap is available for $56.
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