In my last piece I noted an important development in solar technology. The source of my information has re-emerged. It is “Science News, June 3, 2006”.The article, “Quantum-Dot Leap” is written by Peter Weiss.

The substance of the article is that if the semi-conductor materials used are produced in very small units – 8 nanometers is said to be a champ, ultraviolet light can produce seven electrons, instead of the one electron per per photon that has been experienced until now. To quote from the article, “’It’s not just a pipedream to think about this giving you a real benefit in a solar cell device,’ says Richard D. Schaller of the Los Alamos National Laboratory.”

Bear in mind that this is the stuff of science, and you’re not going to see anything by way of practical results for probably quite a while – engineering and building machinery to commercially crank out stuff like that must first be realized. And, say the good folks at Los Alamos (I met them thirty years ago. Sierra Club had an internal debate down there about nuclear energy. Verrrrry interesting. Grand people.) But it do sound good, do it not? And, perhaps it’s fair to point out, they see perhaps a doubling of solar cell efficiency when all the chips are counted. That could be decisive when deciding whether or not to install a solar generator.

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