Solar Thermal

Engineers in the US and Mexico have developed a way to use soot from emissions to improve solar thermal devices. The coatings are not only cheaper to produce but more efficient than using materials like graphene, while reducing pollution.

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.

Desalination is an important technology that may help expand the world’s supply of drinking water. Now, engineers in China have demonstrated a new, relatively simple design for a solar still with a high efficiency and low cost.

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.

​"Solar steaming" is a form of water purification in which sunlight is used to heat tainted water, turning it to steam which condenses back into liquid. That clean liquid is then collected as drinking water. A new system offers improved performance, and it copies the structure of the rose flower.

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.

Solar-concentrating thermal technology is being used to power the air-conditioning system of an entire shopping center in Australia solely from the rays of the sun. It is expected that this technology will help drastically reduce commercial building energy use.

Using superconducting, nano-particle infused ink, researchers have increased the efficiency of solar water heaters by up to 70 percent.