new solar invention "artificial leaf"

[ophiuchus]

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) professor Daniel Nocera and his colleagues announced the development of an effective, relatively inexpensive "artificial leaf"—a solar cell that can turn sunlight directly into chemical fuel. The playing card-sized device is made up of cheap materials—silicon, cobalt and nickel mostly—and when placed in a container of water and exposed to sunlight, it generates bubbles of oxygen and hydrogen.

full story, more links and specifics:
http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/0 ... lar-power/

 

[IJesusChrist]

hopeful stuff...

I always thought leaves were more efficient than what this article claims (<2.5%)..

Huh.

well I think it is too complicated to be the best solution, panels are still in my favor :)

 

[sidefx]

its about bloody time.

i think were pretty pathetic as a race to still, "in this day and AGE", be destroying our beautiful Gem of a planet.

Greedy Greed Want want me ME

What will be Left...?

 

[EewDefining]

Thats pretty cool. Hydrogen and Oxygen are great fuels. They use oxygen and liquid hydrogen (aka really cold hydrogen) to fuel the space shuttle main engines. These are the ones on the plane not the boosters on the side.


They use turbines that create hundreds of thousands of horsepower.

Edit: my dad worked for nasa

 

[IamYou]

its about bloody time.

i think were pretty pathetic as a race to still, "in this day and AGE", be destroying our beautiful Gem of a planet.

Greedy Greed Want want me ME

What will be Left...?

Amen to that! This is a cool article :)

 

[ophiuchus]

thank you!

well I think it is too complicated to be the best solution

it's actually extraordinarily basic. it's essentially a piece of metal connected to + and - , then dipped in water...