ENVIRON 157 Lecture Notes - Lecture 31: Energy Conversion Efficiency, Electrical Network, Energy Demand Management
Document Summary
Potential emissions from remaining fossil resources could result in ghg concentration levels far above. Re costs are still higher than existing energy prices, but in various settings re is already competitive. Technical advancements: for instance growth in size of typical commercial wind turbines. Re costs have declined in the past and further declines can be expected in the future. Few, if any, fundamental technical limits exist to the integration of a majority share of re, but advancements in several areas are needed. Silicon solar panels, and therefore solar cells, have a very basic working principle. Sunlight hits the cell and causes electrons to depart from their otherwise stable position. These leave the silicon and move through an electrical circuit, powering our devices. Solar cell efficiency is the ratio of the electrical output of a solar cell to the incident energy in the form of sunlight.
