What is Solar: Definition and 1000 Discussions

Solar power is the conversion of energy from sunlight into electricity, either directly using photovoltaics (PV), indirectly using concentrated solar power, or a combination. Concentrated solar power systems use lenses or mirrors and solar tracking systems to focus a large area of sunlight into a small beam. Photovoltaic cells convert light into an electric current using the photovoltaic effect.Photovoltaics were initially solely used as a source of electricity for small and medium-sized applications, from the calculator powered by a single solar cell to remote homes powered by an off-grid rooftop PV system. Commercial concentrated solar power plants were first developed in the 1980s. As the cost of solar electricity has fallen, the number of grid-connected solar PV systems has grown into the millions and gigawatt-scale photovoltaic power stations are being built. Solar PV is rapidly becoming an inexpensive, low-carbon technology to harness renewable energy from the Sun. The current largest photovoltaic power station in the world is the Pavagada Solar Park, Karnataka, India with a generation capacity of 2050 MW.The International Energy Agency projected in 2014 that under its "high renewables" scenario, by 2050, solar photovoltaics and concentrated solar power would contribute about 16 and 11 percent, respectively, of worldwide electricity consumption, and solar would be the world's largest source of electricity. Most solar installations would be in China and India. In 2019, solar power generated 2.7% of the world's electricity, growing over 24% from the previous year. As of October 2020, the unsubsidised levelised cost of electricity for utility-scale solar power is around $36/MWh.

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  1. C

    Capacitor charging above solar cell voltage?

    This has been confusing me a lot lately. I built a type of battery derived from a solar cell that outputs a constant voltage of 0.5 Volts. My original plan was to work out a method to boost this voltage to around 1V to power a joule thief and light an LED using a capacitor charged by the cell...
  2. I

    Python Is Leapfrog the best choice for N-body simulations?

    Hey guys! Working on a side project using machine learning and n-body simulations. I could just use the library Rebound (http://rebound.readthedocs.io/en/latest/) but I decided to first try building my own simulator before taking shortcuts. Simulation uses the masses of the bodies (from Sun...
  3. S

    What determines generated voltage and current in solar cell?

    I know illumination, bandgap of the material, temperature, quantum efficiency all have an effect on the current and voltage of a solar cell. But what about the doping, and the generation and concentration of charge carriers? A semiconductor can only generate a finite number of charge carriers...
  4. S

    Role of Quantum Mechanics and Thermodynamics in solar cell?

    What is the role of Quantum Mechanics and Thermodynamics in solar cell operation? Is quantum mechanics the photovolatic effect, and thermodynamics the cell efficiency?
  5. CaptainAtom1996

    Have you ever repaired a violin before?

    Hello all! So, my father works as a general contractor (I would work for him over the summers during high school). Being that we live in some what of a rural area, for some of our jobs we would be limited to bringing a gasoline powered generator to run all of our electrical needs until we were...
  6. S

    Calculating the output temperature of a Solar Thermal system

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  7. P

    How does the solar wind affect Earth's atmosphere?

    In the past many of us have read Mr Faraday calculated the “weight” of photon’s striking the surface of the Earth per acre at something like 4 and ½ ounces. Today, frequently we hear stories on the subject of the Sun's solar wind and how it is tearing away the Martian atmosphere and even...
  8. S

    What different types of on-grid solar systems are there?

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  9. S

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  10. S

    What equipment is needed for illuminated I-V measurements of a solar cell?

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  11. B

    A Is Solar Wind Formed by Planetary Resonance and Solar Cycles?

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  12. S

    Irradiance and Isc and Voc of a solar cell

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  13. S

    Current in a solar cell when temperature increases?

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  14. S

    Looking for help calculating daily solar PV insolation

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  15. Stefen

    B Da Vinci's flying machine meets solar sail?

    so the question has been previously answered as to what would happen if a fan was in the vacuum of space. but the responses I seen all ask what the fan would push on or up against. what if the fan where to push against light? solar sails are able to have a force push against them in space?
  16. J

    Integrating the solar wind equation

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  17. S

    I Spectral Sensitivity and Solar Energy

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  18. A

    I Pluto's interaction with solar wind

    Do you think that new discoveries about how Pluto interacts with the solar wind suggests that Pluto should be reclassified as a planet?
  19. S

    Efficiency of a PV module and solar thermal collector

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  20. jim hardy

    Is it practical to generate all US power by solar PV?

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  21. mishima

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  22. Borg

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  23. Jeffb47

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  24. G

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  25. S

    Does the Sun's Movement Create a Solar System Vortex Motion?

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  26. H

    B Roads as solar cell collectors

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  27. K

    I Calculated solar irradiation not matching up with measured

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  28. Steve619

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  29. lasisdabomb

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  30. S

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  31. Clancy John

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  32. Physicist50

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  33. F

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  34. A

    Calculating temperature rise due to solar insolation

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  35. N

    Centripetal forces in our solar system

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  36. N

    Quantum Photovoltaics and solar energy

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  37. E

    A Question about Radiance, Solar Flux and Reflectance

    I stumbled upon this equation for a Lambertian uniform target: ##\rho^{*} = \frac{\pi L}{\mu_s E_s}##, where ##\rho^{*}## is the reflectance, ##L## is the measured radiance, ##E_s## is the solar flux at the top of the atmosphere, and ##\mu_s## is the cosine of the sun zenith angle...
  38. A

    How Does Turbulence Restore the Poloidal Magnetic Field in Solar Reversals?

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  39. caters

    Is Kepler Bb's Unique Solar System the Most Complex in the Universe?

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  40. W

    What are the negligible forces in the solar system besides gravity?

    I read somewhere that on the scale of the solar system, all forces except gravity are negligible. I can't think of any forces except gravity that would be acting on the planets... what are these other negligible forces?
  41. G

    Solar Sail/ Mirror Redshift & Blueshift

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  42. C

    Another Travesty of Science - Rejecting Solar Panels For....

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  43. S

    Writing: Input Wanted Building a Sci-Fi Fantasy Solar System & Planet

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  44. |Glitch|

    A possible super-Earth or Brown Dwarf in our Solar System

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  45. Dr Wu

    How Effective Are Current Martian Shelter Designs Against X-Class Solar Flares?

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  46. C

    Image Processing Software for Solar Astrophysics Research

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  47. W

    Order of calculations solar system model

    I am really, really stuck! I am trying to write java code to model the solar system, or at least currently just earth, the sun and mercury. I've made a big mistake somewhere, the planets are very unstable and either move in a line or spiral inwards! I just wanted to check that I'm doing things...
  48. W

    Sun Orbits Center of Mass w/ Jupiter & Earth: How To Calculate?

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  49. A

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    Okay, so if I we're in space and I kept going down past the solar system, what would I find? would there be another universe? Or would there be a flat surface?
  50. S

    Current limit through solar cell (forward bias)

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