Liverpool University scientists may have found an ingredient to make cheaper and safer solar panels...
For more than two decades, cadmium-containing salt has been used by manufacturers of solar panels. However, at 30 cents per gram, it is hampering efforts to achieve grid parity.A solution to cut the costs of salt in the production of solar cells by more than 99% could be replacing cadmium-containing salt with magnesium chloride - a salt more traditionally found in tofu.
Magnesium chloride occurs naturally and costs just 0.1 cents per gram. Its one of the substances that makes the ocean salty and is non-toxic, unlike cadmium-containing salt which is proven toxic, pushing up costs in manufacturing solar cells as employees need more protective gear.
Magnesium chloride is already used widely as a food additive in the production of tofu, as well as to treat icy roads and to make bathing salts. The team at the University of Liverpool found that magnesium chloride could provide a lower cost and non-toxic alternative, without reducing the efficiency of the solar cells.Their published paper can be found on Nature .
We often hear that for renewable energy to compete with fossil fuels (and eventually overtake them) then the costs need to come down. The findings of these British researchers has the potential to make this happen. Who knew a tofu additive could be so useful to make solar panels just as clean as the energy they generate.
When we heard that the Australian Government was spending $4.5 million of taxpayers' money on renovating the Prime Minister's official residence, it got the 1 Million Women team thinking…What if solar panels could be included at The Lodge, PM Tony Abbott's place in Canberra, as part of the renovation?
