solar
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Harnessing the sun’s energy for water and space heating
Rooftop solar systems provide a simple, low-cost way to heat water and space.Photo: London PermacultureCross-posted from Earth Policy Institute. The pace of solar energy development is accelerating as the installation of rooftop solar water heaters takes off. Unlike solar photovoltaic panels that convert solar radiation into electricity, these “solar thermal collectors” use the sun’s energy […]
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Fundamental breakthrough could double electricity from solar panels
It is a truth often repeated that fundamental physical limits mean solar panels can never capture and transform more than about 31 percent of the sun's energy. But Xiaoyang Zhu at the University of Texas apparently just did the impossible, and in a most spectacular fashion: He found a way to increase the efficiency of […]
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Critical List: Congress does everything it can to screw the environment; fabric cleaned by sunlight
Congress voted to put sanctions on Iran, which would make it harder for Iran to sell oil, but potentially make oil sales more profitable for the regime overall. After all the work that the anti-Keystone coalition did, Republicans are trying to tack a measure to approve the pipeline onto a bill that extends the payroll […]
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Alexi Arango: Teaching solar to take a quantum-dot leap
Grist is proud to present the Change Gang — profiles of people who are leading change on the ground toward a more sustainable society and a greener planet. Some we’ve written about before; some are new to our pages. Some you’ll have heard of; most you probably won’t. Know someone we should add to the […]
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Totally plausible water solution: Collect ice in the desert
Look, it's very simple. All you need to solve the water shortage is a giant metal leaf that you put in the desert and it uses solar power to grow ice. Then you drink the ice. How is this difficult? Okay, this is not completely for real. The leaf's creators don't think it will singlehandedly […]
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Solar-powered tanning salon. Really.
This is real. Comedian Kyle Kinane spotted it while driving through the wasteland of unconquerable vacuity known as Southern California. The place is called Sunlounge, and it has a website and a Yelp page full of catty reviews from people who love to tan. Sunlounge says it gets 15 to 30 percent of the power […]
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Will Bill O’Reilly live up to his word and go solar?
Time for O’Reilly to put his money where his mouth is.Photo: Justin HochCross-posted from Climate Progress. Fox News pundit Bill O’Reilly likes to say he operates in a “no spin zone.” So when O’Reilly proclaimed recently that he wanted to install solar panels on his Long Island home, dozens of solar companies in New York […]
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Surprise! Koch-funded anti-Solyndra ad is ‘mostly false’
Here's an anti-Solyndra ad put out by Americans For Prosperity. It is wrong. And it's been viewed 1 million times on YouTube alone, not to mention millions more on television. Which just goes to show you that if you give the people what they want, they will eat it up like delicious candied bacon, because […]
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NY Times needs a time out
I recently turned 401. But I didn’t start feeling old until this weekend — because that’s when I started yelling at newspapers2. On Saturday, the New York Times published a lurid, sneering, over-the-top piece on renewable energy that was riddled with errors and really missed the forest for the trees. We’ve prepared a document rebutting […]
