A solar power milestone was reached last week when First Solar Inc brought its manufacturing costs for cadmium telluride (CdTe) solar panels down to $1 per watt, eclipsing silicon panels, which are still in the $3 range.

The company estimates that it needs to get manufacturing costs down to $0.65 to $0.70 per watt and other installation costs down to $1 a watt to reach grid parity — goals… read more

A new mechanism for focusing light on small areas of photovoltaic material could make solar power in residential and commercial applications cheaper than electricity from the grid in most markets in the next few years.

A new nanoengineered anti-reflective coating developed by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute researchers
boosts the amount of sunlight captured by solar panels (from 67 to 96 percent) and allows them to absorb the entire spectrum of sunlight from any angle, regardless of the sun’s position in the sky.

It could help to overcome two major hurdles blocking the progress and wider use of solar power.

The public is being kept in the dark about the viability of solar photovoltaic energy, according to a study conducted at Queen’s University. The real cost in 2011 is under $1 per watt for solar panels purchased in bulk on the global market, he says.

“Many analysts project a higher cost for solar photovoltaic energy because they don’t consider recent technological advancements and price reductions,”… read more

Speaking on behalf of a panel of experts convened by the National Association of Engineers to address the 14 “grand challenges of the 21st century,” Ray Kurzweil said solar power will scale up to produce all the energy needs of Earth’s people in 20 years.

Members of the panel are “confident that we are not that far away from a tipping point where energy from solar will be [economically]… read more

A dramatic and surprising magnetic effect of light discovered by University of Michigan researchers could lead to solar power without traditional semiconductor-based solar cells.

The researchers found a way to make an “optical battery,” said Stephen Rand, a professor in the departments of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Physics and Applied Physics.

Light has electric and magnetic components. Until now, scientists thought the effects of the… read more

Daniel Nocera, a professor of chemistry at MIT, has made a major advance in chemistry that could lead to a cheap way to store energy from the sun, solving one of the key problems in making solar energy a dominant source of electricity.

He has developed a low-cost catalyst that can generate oxygen and hydrogen from water, and the hydrogen can then be burned or run through a fuel… read more