Solar Power

As reported by Tokyo-based newspaper Nikkei Asian Review, plans are afoot to transform Fukushima into a renewable energy hub, with 21 wind and solar plants to be built and the power to be fed into the national grid for use in the country’s capital.

The University of the Sunshine Coast in Queensland, Australia, is on a mission to become completely carbon neutral by 2025, and a huge early addition to its energy systems is boding well for these lofty ambitions.

Scientists at Sweden's KTH Royal Institute of Technology have developed a new film they say can be layered over the top of solar cells to capture infrared light, boosting their efficiency by as much as 25 percent.

Some solar panel components are more easily recycled than others, and scientists in Australia may have just figured out how to repurpose one of the trickiest and most valuable: the silicon that serves as its semiconductor.

Holland’s Nuna solar car appeared all set to claim another crown at this year’s World Solar Challenge, until disaster struck within a couple of hundred miles of the finish line, clearing the way for Belgium’s Agoria Solar Team to take the title.

The first solar farm to provide power to a railway line in the UK was switched on today by Riding Sunbeams, 10:10, Community Energy South and Network Rail.

The search is very much on for new water desalination technologies that can get the job done more efficiently. Scientists in Melbourne have put forward one rather promising solution, developing a new kind of system that heats up and purifies water using only the power of the Sun.​

Abu Dhabi are claiming the title of the World's largest single-site solar project, having hit the go-button on the Noor Abu Dhabi project this week, with a reported capacity of 1.177 gigawatts, eclipsing Dubai's Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park – for now at least.

Electronic devices are made possible thanks to rare-Earth metals, but these are rare and relatively expensive. Now, scientists have found a way to combine common elements into electronically-useful compounds, which could find their way into tunable lighting and solar panels.

A Spanish start-up called Proton New Energy Future has unveiled Ebörd, a smart table that has a wireless charger built into the entire surface, allowing it to charge multiple devices at once. Better yet, it harvests energy from the Sun or even artificial light.

Snowy places aren’t ideal for harvesting solar energy – panels can’t do much if they’re buried under blankets of snow, of course. Now a team from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) has developed a new device that can produce electricity from snow itself.

London-based Studio Bark has done a superb job with this contemporary take on a traditional barn-style house. Named Black Barn, the recently-completed home runs fully off-the-grid and is designed to resemble the local agricultural buildings in rural Suffolk, England.