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Micheal Savage

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I have an Idea to propose for energy conversion in everyday buildings.

Ok here's my challenge. I would like to see a material designed that is completely transparent, strong, insulating, and can absorb light from the sun and discharge the energy back into the building as electricity.
I think that such a technology would alone be able to keep the lights on in a house.
Maybe instead of taking heat or light for that matter lets try converting ultraviolet radiation into electricity. This would play two roles.
1 absorb the radiation before it enters the house through a window.
2 Creating more power for the building.
Lets take sky scrapers for instance. there are thousands of windows on all sides of a sky scraper. In fact the windows take up roughly 90% of the surface area. This is a lot of potential energy.

Topics: Clean energy Eco-Friendly New and Safe Energy System Radiation alternative energy energy consumption
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    Ricardo Novillo astrada

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    Sep 14 2011: i agree, i think we could insert into the glass thin layers of solar panels, or combine normal windows with solar panels in the case of buildings.

  • Cristi Adam

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    Sep 12 2011: Hi,

    I'm no scientist, but I think what you say it's impossible.
    Fotovoltaic panels work by absorbing the photons from sun light. Those photons are the ones that give light. If you absorb them and use them to create energy, then they can't pass thorough the panels... If you let them pass through, then you can't use them to create energy. (this applies if you want to make them very efficient... not 10% as the transparent ones are right now... my guess is, if you raise the efficiency, you loose the amount of light you let through)
    At least this is what I'm thinking... I may be wrong :)

  • Bob Shingles 10+

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    Sep 12 2011: It is one of those cases of "easier said than done" and then there are the issues with the material being cost effective.
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    Benny boy

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    Sep 12 2011: i like your idea; "Ok here's my challenge. I would like to see a material designed that is completely transparent, strong, insulating, and can absorb light from the sun and discharge the energy back into the building as electricity."

    to me it sounds like a reinvention of the window.
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      Micheal Savage

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      Sep 17 2011: It basically is a reinvention. My objective is absorbing non-visible light waves, mainly UV radiation. I don't know what the cost of such a material would be but it would be a way to increase the energy efficiency of the home and business. Using a limited spectrum would output would limit the effectiveness of the energy absorbed but buildings that have more windows would generate more energy. It would be a function to go along with regular solar panels and wind turbines. Alone it would do very little but combined with the other natural energy sources would increase efficiency even by a little would be worth it. In order to completely remove our dependence on fossil fuels we need to generate energy from every source we can as much as we can. I hope for a world where energy isn't something that costs money.
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