Solar Thermal

When it comes to solar power, solar cells and panels tend to get all the attention. But there's a different kind of solar power generator known as a STEG, and researchers have just figured out a way to improve its efficiency by a factor of 15.

Researchers in Australia are working on a way to lower the cost of producing solar thermal energy by as much as 40% with the help of shatterproof plastic rear-view mirrors originally designed for cars.

Two 650-foot-tall towers have risen in China's Gansu Province. Combined with an array of 30,000 mirrors arranged in concentric circles, the new facility is expected to generate over 1.8 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity every year.

Researchers in Jordan and Qatar have come up with a remarkable design for a "twin technology solar system" capable of generating clean energy 24/7. This double-action design promises more than twice as much energy as a standard solar updraft tower.

Engineers have demonstrated a pilot system that produces fuels from sunlight and air. The device captures carbon dioxide and water from the air and uses solar energy to convert it into syngas, which is then converted into carbon-neutral liquid fuels.

Air conditioners and other cooling systems are among our biggest consumers of electricity. Now researchers have developed a hybrid device that can not only cool buildings drastically without using electricity, it captures solar energy to heat water.

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.

​We may hear a lot about photovoltaic panels, but solar collectors are also quite useful – the devices collect heat from sunlight, which is used in applications such as the heating of homes. Now, MIT has announced a new material that could make them cheaper and more efficient than ever.

Scientists at the German Aerospace Center have tested a solar reactor concept known as CONTISOL, which also contains a thermal energy storage system to allow it to run day or night.

Just a month after the state government of South Australia announced a deal with Tesla to create the largest lithium-ion battery storage facility in the world, it has now revealed plans to build the biggest, single-tower solar thermal power plant on the planet with a proposed output of 150 MW.

A team of researchers from Madrid is developing a thermal energy storage system that uses molten silicon to store up to 10 times more energy than existing thermal storage options and could form the basis for a new generation of low-cost solar thermal stations to store solar energy in urban centers.

Although solar panels are active while the sun is shining, they typically don't do much once the sun goes down. A newly-developed device, however, uses paraffin to store heat energy until it's needed.